Brandon Wilkie surely looks like he belongs in cycling’s top flight.
The junior rider made his transition to senior ranks seem near effortless while capturing the gruelling open points race to culminate Wednesday’s track league action at the National Stadium’s Randolph Field Velodrome.
Wilkie finished the race with an event-best 45 points, getting double points for leading at the end of both the 16th and final laps of the trying 15 000-metre event.
This after he and Colombian G4S Swift teammate Jaime Ramirez broke away from the main group after just five laps to dominate the greater part of the 30-lap race.
Darren Matthews, Greg Downie, Ross Callender and Edwin Sutherland eventually hauled them in with five laps remaining, but Wilkie held on to cross the line ahead of Ramirez and Matthews.
Ramirez finished second with 30 points, while Matthews tallied 16 in G4S Swift’s clean sweep of the top three places.
It was the highlight of the club’s dominant showing, which was also bolstered by Liam Lovell’s double in the juvenile division.
A Class Battery Golden Wheelers rival Edwin Sutherland actually won the category’s first race of the night after relegating Lovell to second in the open 1 500 metres.
But the gifted 14-year-old rebounded to capture the shorter 1 000 and 500 races, beating Sutherland’s teammate Romario Thomas in both events.
Earlier, Ramirez and Matthews gave their opponents a sign of things to come when they finished 1-2, respectively, in the night’s very first race – the point-to-point, ten-lap 5 000 metres.
Teenaged Matthews then returned to take the Devil Take The Hindmost, before Velo Caribe’s Kevon Bishop finally broke up G4S Swift’s string of senior victories by winning the 750.
Velo Caribe had further success in the masters division through the exploits of Ricky Tempro (3 000, Devil Take The Hindmost) and Ricardo Hinkson (1 000), who accounted for all three races between them.
Seasoned female veteran Esther Rosemond-Miller continued her dominance of the women’s category after sweeping all three races she competed in under the AMOND Fugen banner, while tiny mite Tunnico Weekes did likewise for Golden Wheelers.
The track league series continues on Wednesday with the keirin and shorter sprints at the same venue.
