Newton wins Lincoln GP

Chris Newton (Rapha Condor Sharp) claimed his second Lincoln Grand Prix on Sunday, ten years after his first victory at the race in 2000. Newton was able to shake loose of breakaway companion Irishman Philip Lavery (Team Ireland) in the closing stages of the event to seal a seven second win. Simon Richardson (Sigma Sport - Specialized) took third place.

Newton and Lavery had both placed themselves in early breakaway, but their decisive escape came on the last of the 11-laps which made up the 137 kilometre course. Despite the success of his late race move, Newton had been active throughout the race.

"I am in a great team this year," said Newton after his win. "My form is OK and I am just relaxed and enjoying bike racing as much as ever. Last year we just rode round but this year we decided to keep attacking. I was in a small break early in the race and I had decided to attack and let Dean [Downing] sit on.

"Then I got into a three-man break and then I put a dig in on the climb and I was up at the front again. I have ridden this race enough now to know how to stay near the front. Sometimes it works really well like today. It is a hard race and my legs feel like they are cramping now.

"I was just feeling good and it wasn't like full on, I just went hard on the climb, which everyone's got to do and then I knew something would split, the bunch was coming and a better selection of riders was going to join the break. In the first move I wasn't really fully committed, in the headwind I just eased back, let the other two catch me and share the work," said the experienced Newton.

"We stayed strong in numbers which worked out well, the guys are going well, it helped that I just had two weekends where I wasn't racing and I just knuckled down, got some good hard training done and I was a bit tired after the East Mids Classic, but I knew to ride through it, just backed off it a little bit and its working well now, I don't really need to push it, the Ras will see me through to the crit series."

Newton had faced stiff competition throughout the race, including Team Sky riders Russell Downing and Geraint Thomas. The Rapha Condor rider had chosen to neutralise the threat of his ProTour opponents by going on the attack early.

"We had a game plan today, to attack all around the course, not just save it for the hill, for the climb through the city so, you know..." said Newton's teammate Dean Downing.

"Team Sky was clearly strong, but we had numbers and Russ [Downing] just congratulated John Herety and said well done, your team were fantastic, which proves that we stuck to the game plan. Chris was cruising today in that break that myself and him were in, he was really cruising and he said, ‘Right, I'm going to smash it up the climb' with five to go, so as a team we were brilliant today, from the gun everyone was attacking, everyone was near the front, I think everyone was in a move."

These sentiments were echoed by team manager John Herety, who was delighted with his charges. "It's exactly what he [Newton] needed to do, he wanted to make sure that they had to keep coming up to him as opposed to the other way around.

"It's far better for him to get that little gap first of all. That said, today I think Chris was going that well that it didn't matter; this year we made sure tactically everything went according to plan. It doesn't always work out as we well know, but we always have a plan, we try to execute it and today was one of those days when it worked out perfectly."

"I am getting towards the end of my career and this is a lovely race to win," continued Newton: "I think it is harder since they took two laps out of the race a few years ago. I knew the Sky Team riders were going to be strong because they have come in from the Continent, so I knew I had to be ahead of the race waiting for them to come up to me.

"It made my job easier that our team had strength in numbers. Philip Lavery did an awesome ride today. He told me his legs had gone with a lap to go so I knew to back off and use him to stay clear. He was really strong on the flat and it worked well."

Philip Lavery was very pleased with his ride, which saw him take not only second, but also the under-23 race title. His performance on Sunday comes in a season which has seen the 19 year-old Dublin native win the overall classification in the Tour the North and a stage of the Tour of Ulster in Northern Ireland earlier this year.

"It was pretty hard out there," said Lavery. "I didn't feel that great with stomach problems, but my legs are great so they carried me through. Hopefully I can come round a bit more in the next couple of weeks.

"For the past couple of weeks I was riding against the likes of Dean Downing and Malcolm Elliott in the Tour of the North and the Tour of Ulster and I knew that I was strong. I wanted to see if I could match my performance against greater numbers and that it would be an indicator of form. It's great that I can come here and put in a good performance. I have been riding in Belgium and I have had a couple of wins there too so I am pretty happy."

"The cobbles were not too bad today," continued Lavery. "They're what we call 'clinkers' in Belgium as they are a little bit smoother. It was more the 11 times up the climb that hurt the legs, but it was good that I had the experience of knowing how to ride them. I got into the early break, but I was looking after the legs as I wasn't feeling that great. The legs came round but I was suffering on the climb so I thought I would have a go and Chris came over to me.

"We just kept tipping through nicely and we had a big gap. Someone from Sky was trying to come across but they couldn't close the gap. It didn't seem that fast to me, but we must have been really shifting."

Lavery's next major event is the eight-day FBD Ras in Ireland before heading off to Canada for the under-23 Coupe Des Nations in June.