Well, 2020 as we all know has been a weird and wonderful year.

We have been extremely lucky on the Isle of Man in the fact our restrictions have allowed us to lead fairly normal lives and continue in the sports we love.

Our team plans this year were aiming to progress into national series events to put our Ladies up against the nations best. After learning the ropes with some team series events over the last couple years, this was the next step up.

We were also aiming high with the Island games due in July 2021, this year would then have been a big build into developing another strong medal potential team which we had in Gibraltar 2019.

Those are things that didn't happen and really out of our control. With strong resilience and huge determination from all, spirits were extremely high all year. This was also helped in the fact we were still able to compete on the island with possibly more events than we would normally have anyway.
The team were a brilliant unit right from day one, all joining together as a team and showing strength in every event they took part in.

This was also reflected in constant comments from competitors and fans alike.

Some outstanding highlites were certainly the consistency and strength Jessie Carridge showed every time she pinned a number on. Winning not only the overall Ladies Jurby series, but also beating all the men in one of the rounds for good measure.
Jessie was also riding extremely well in the time trials, going faster this year than last, as well as retaining her National road race title.

Kirree Quayle took the win in each of the mountain bike races, securing what for sure would have been her place on the Island games team. The improvement in Kirree's road racing skills was also noticeable and great to see.

We also have Becky Storrie, who is in Sterling University, so her race program has been much trickier than ours due to tighter restrictions. Saying that, Becky just won the UK national under 23 hill climb championships and took 3rd overall, a brilliant result.
As well as that, she also finished 3rd in a 25 mile time trial, also setting what I think is a new Manx record. (TBC)

We have also had two of our riders hit Commonwealth games long list standard, which is amazing considering we started with a pool of only 5 riders 3 years ago.

With 2021 just around the corner and also the 2022 Commonwealth games on the horizon, things are looking good for the team, and long may it continue.

All of the ladies combined showed huge improvements throughout, with some being brand new to racing and really getting to grips with all the aspects involved.

The growing numbers, and ever increasing fan support is really showing through with the team, and the enjoyment and team bond they have together is refreshing to see.

All of this has been supported by our sponsors Conister Bank and Mac Group IOM, thank you for helping our program develop.

Tags: Ladies, Racing