Alice Barnes (Canyon-SRAM) secured a road race and time trial double at the British national championships after taking the win on the road from a group of four.
Edging out Abby Mae Parkinson (Drops), Lizzie Holden (Drops) and Anna Henderson (Brother UK - Tifosi p/b OnForm), Barnes attacked in the last kilometre, pulling well clear to cross the line first. Anna Henderson finished second with Lizzie Holden taking bronze.
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The breakaway group of four worked well together after jumping from the peloton with 40km to go, taking out their advantage all the way up to the 10km to go mark.
Barnes beat Hayley Simmonds (BTC City Ljubljana) in Thursday's time trial by 25 seconds, meaning she has matched the accolades held by her sister, Hannah Barnes (Canyon-SRAM) who won the national road race in 2016 and the time trial in 2018.
Anna Henderson's second place finish gives her the u23 national road race title, with Lizzie Holden second in the category, meaning Henderson now also holds both titles after winning the u23's time trial on Thursday.
How it happened
The women's route was a 136.6km loop starting and finishing in Norwich. After 55km of racing the race finally started to split apart, with three riders gaining an advantage of 15 seconds over the peloton, Anna Christian (Drops), April Tracey (Brother UK Fusion RT) and Laura Massey (Torelli-Assure-Madison).
After Emma Cockroft (Bianchi Dama) had made her way over to the leaders, the breakaway was reeled in, before a new set of attackers launched from the bunch with 40km left, with Lizzie Holden and Anna Henderson soon taking out a 20 second gap.
Alice Barnes and Abby Mae Parkinson soon bridged over to form a leading group of four, gaining 30 seconds over the peloton, and working well together.
With 25km to go their gap was 53 seconds, increasing to 1-17 with 20km left to race and after another five kilometres it was 1-35, despite the chasing bunch behind numbering 25 riders.
The gap continued to go out as it looked increasingly likely that the four leaders would contest the title between themselves, holding a 1-55 advantage with 10km left.
The group of four started to look at each other as the last kilometre closed in, with Alice Barnes putting in the definitive attack to claim the road race title.
Results
British women’s national road race championships 2019 – Norwich, 136.6km
1. Alice Barnes (Canyon-SRAM), in 3-24-59
2. Anna Henderson (Brother UK - Tifosi p/b OnForm), at three seconds
3. Lizzie Holden (Drops), at same time
4. Abby Mae Parkinson (Drops), at 12s
5. Lucy Garner (Hitec Products), at 1-47
6. Hannah Barnes (Canyon-SRAM), at same time
7. Elizabeth Banks (Bigla Pro Cycling), at 1-49
8. Anna Kay
9. Eleanor Dickinson (Drops)
10. Elinor Barker (Drops), all at same time
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