Windsor Youth Cup

The Windsor Youth Cup was held at the Ciociaro Club. 66 youth from all over the province, ages 9-16 travelled for cycling racing in the competition organized by the East Side Riders Cycling Club and the Ontario Cycling Association. 3 local racers competed in the races representing Windsor and Essex County.

All youth compete in two different events and receive a combined score for the general classification (GC) to determine the results for the event. The first part of the youth race is an individual time trial, a race against the clock. The Squirt and PeeWee racers race 1.3km, Minime race 2.6km, while the oldest Cadet category races 3.9km. In the second part of the day, the youth compete as a group in the road race component, with the Squirts racing 6.5km, PeeWees 10.4km, Minimes 20.8km, and the Cadets racing 26km.

The youngest local racer racing in the boys Squirt category, Joshua Gryn (Independent), finished sixth overall (GC), with a seventh place finish in the individual time trial and sixth in the road race. Garrett Belanger (Tower International Cycling Team) from Windsor, racing with the Cadet boys finished seventh in the individual time trial and twelfth in the road race, coming in ninth overall (GC). Local racer Katrina Pawley Mason (Courtesy Bicycles Race Team) racing in the PeeWee girls category, finished first in both the individual time trial and road race. Katrina also took top honours in the GC, placing first and winning the event.

The time trial event was simply a straightforward sprint against the clock. Katrina practiced the course, strategizing when to hammer and go hard and when to actually sprint.

She started the race in great form, jumping straight out of the start and getting up to speed quickly against the wind. Katrina hit the hill with a lot of speed and hammered hard at the top and all the way to the sprint. Her final sprint was picture perfect although she won the time-trail by less than 1 second. What a close race as her competition raced excellent races too.

Katrina completed the 1.3km course in 2:12, averaging 35.5kph for her time trial.

After a 2 hour period where the other youth race, Katrina lined up with the other PeeWees. Girls and boys raced together to help with field size. After a good warmup and another strategy session, Katrina was ready to go. The road race for Katrina was 8 laps of the circuit for a total of 10.4km.

The field was mostly boys and they really drove the speeds during the race. Katrina won with a final time of 19:00 over the 10.4km. The average speed for the race for Katrina was 32.8kph.

Katrina held on and finished the final sprint in great form.

Full results at: Ontario Cycling Association.