The final leg of the Cheddi B. Jagan Memorial three-stage Cycle-racing competition has unfortunately been cancelled.
The CBJ Memorial, now in its 20th year, was originally billed for March 19, but was postponed to March 26. Now, due to unforeseen circumstances, the event has had to be cancelled.
Organised by National Cycling Coach Hassan Mohammed, the three-stage racing event was expected to take to the Essequibo Coast after the first two legs had been held in Berbice and on the West Bank of Demerara respectively. Mohammed made this sad disclosed of the event being cancelled on Saturday at the conclusion of the 4th annual Star Party Rental’s 11-stage meet in the National Park at Thomas Lands.
He told riders and those in attendance: “It is unfair, and I would not allow the riders to be subjected to a journey where they get up early in the morning and travel — ride and travel all the way back to Georgetown – and (I) can’t be providing a breakfast and a lunch for them.”
The veteran cycling coach added that, to compensate for this loss, he would soon be organizing a 50-mile road race.
Organiser Hassan Mohammed
Shaquel Agard, in a time of two hours, six minutes and fifty-four seconds (2:06:54), won the first stage of the CBJ Memorial cycle road race, and in the process erased Marlon “Fishie” Williams’s 2016 record of 2 hours, 15 minutes and 10 seconds registered on March 5 in Berbice.
Agard approached the finish line in a tussle with Alanzo Ambrose, and both men got off their seats for a 200-metre sprint to the finish line. However, Agard proved he was by far the better sprinter when they were both were 50 metres from the finish line. Ambrose was forced to settle for second place.
Third place went to Hamza Eastman, ahead of Paul De Nobrega, Orville Hinds and Michael Anthony in that order.
The second of three cycle races of the CBJ Memorial rode off on the West Side on Sunday, March 12, with Team Coco’s Jamaul John outsprinting Michael Anthony in a close finish to take the top prize in the seniors’ division of the event.
John bettered the 2015 timing in the event to stop the clock at one hour 54 minutes and 30 seconds (01:54:30), shaving 10 seconds off club mate Hamza Eastman’s time recorded in the 2015 edition. This is a pretty impressive feat to be accomplished by the young man, as the 55-mile journey commenced in the early morning sun at Wales, West Bank Demerara and proceeded to Bushy Park, Parika, from where they headed back to finish at the Demerara Harbour Bridge.
