The 2016 BAR competition has been slowly creeping along. The BAR, or Best All-Rounder, is a leaderboard made up of the average speed of riders across the 5 TT’s that we run during the club league season – our 11km season opener, Harry Dawson League TT, Club Champs TT, Dermot McGrath League TT, and our Hill Climb TT. It’s a riders cumulative average speed across all 5 events.
Ahead of the final race of the season, the Hill Climb, we have put together the leaderboard which you can find here: BAR Leaderboard
We have had 74 riders post times across the four TT’s to date. Noel Conway looks to have the final position in hand barring a mechanical or a no-show for the HC, but it is extremely tight for 2nd place overall between Jason Howick, David Hennessy and Rob Magee with 0.74kph covering all three riders. If all three sign-on for the last race David would be bookies favourite to cement his 2nd overall but the last step on the podium will be keenly contested between Jason and Rob.
A little further down, consistency has been the name of the game for Donal Devine who has posted a time in every TT so far. Not only does he occupy 5th place on the leaderboard but is also 1st Junior and certainly has that wrapped up.
Given the talk of the Hill Climb we can reveal that we will be returning to a hill that we last used in 2014 – “Dunran”. 2.8km long at 5% average doesn’t tell the tale of true test. With a gradual start for 500m the defining feature of this hill is two savagely steep ramps that pitch up 15% which punish anyone that goes too hard too early. Can you put the power down in the saddle or do you need to stand? If you need to stand can you stop your rear wheel from spinning? Once over the top you are faced with a final sprint to the line on a false flat which is a lot harder than it looks!
Strava segment https://www.strava.com/segments/3910642
It’s shaping up to be a great season finale!