We had two Wattbikes parked up on the pavement in the centre of Redhill on Saturday and challenged the world (particularly those aged under 16) to try their hand…



....the aim being spin the wheel as fast as possible and cover a hypothetical 200m distance in the fastest time possible.
 

And wow… what a result!!
 

Jack Ralph, aged 14 , managed a time of 11.8secs.
 

It was the fasted time for an Under-16 boy on the day and so he wins the Redhill Raiders’ £60 prize.
 

The existing best record on the Wattbikes website for a 14-year-old is listed as 13.00sec achieved by Stan Thompson.
 

For the girls, it was 13-year-old Jess Ferry who stole the limelight by spinning herself over the 200-metre challenge in 16.1secs….. and that beat the existing record by an even larger margin!
 

The best previous time recorded by a girl of that age on the Wattbikes website (where you will find 382 individuals logging their times for the 200m challenge) is Caitlyn McNally’s figure of 20.00sec.
 

Jess was the fastest Under-16 girl and so she wins the second Redhill Raiders’ £60 prize.
 

Well done to you both.
 

Other scores:
 
 

age 5
32.0sec - Lucy Bellingham

age 6
none

age 7
17.4sec – Arthur Bellingham

age 8
22.0sec – Mathew Burnham

age 9
none

age 10
20.9sec – Seb Webb

age 11
13.2sec – Kyle (no surname given)
16.8sec - Zach Wilshire
17.3sec – George Bellingham

age 12
14.7sec - Chris Luxton
16.1sec - Matt Turton
17.0sec – Lucas Webb
19.6sec - Jordan Wyatt

age 13
12.3sec – Sagar (no surname given)
13.2sec – Ziggy (no surname given)
16.1sec – Jess Ferry
18.0sec – Dom (no surname given)

age 14
11.8sec – Jack Ralph
14.4sec - Olly Groombridge
 

Tim Sales, British Cycling’s Go-Ride coach for our area, was in charge of the Wattbikes….. a man from BC headquarters told me that I wasn’t qualified to manage the gym-style machines which (wonderfully) meant that I could spend my day instead out on the grass in Memorial Park getting all-comers to try their hand at the short skills circuit.
 

Tim’s comments: “The influx of Royal Alexandria & Albert school boys provided some some exciting matched sprints.
 

“One boy led for ages with what I thought was going to be an unbeatable time, that was until his friend equalled the time to the milli-second!”
 

The possible dilemma of ending the day with joint leaders (so two prizes or half-a-prize each??) was later solved by Jack. His figure put it the prize out of reach to anybody else.