Ed Laverack: The cycling champion who cannot defend his British title

Ed Laverack loves cycling uphill and is very good at it, the best in Britain in fact.

This year’s race will go ahead on Sunday, 25 October at Streatley Hill, Oxfordshire – a venue covered by Tier 1 Covid regulations in England – with a depleted field

“I am a little bit gutted,” the 26-year old from Llanelli told BBC Sport Wales.

“I’m in good shape and I’ve made pretty significant gains in the last few weeks and have been seeing personal best times that I haven’t seen for around two years.

“But as a mindset thing I shouldn’t focus on how negative it is, I should just focus on the fact that I was British champion and that’s something to be proud of.”

The British National Hill Climb Championship, which takes place on a different hill in the UK each year, has been held annually since 1944 attracted almost 500 entries this year.

But a large number of entrants will not be able to race as many face travel restrictions because of the coronavirus pandemic.

Laverack, who will take on one of his local climbs in south Wales on Sunday instead, is against postponing the event until next year, but suggests it may have been possible to stage the race virtually.

Riders would swap the road for a room at home and using modern indoor trainers, each competitor would use a take on the course via an app on their computer.

“You can take a GPS file and kind of paste it onto a programme and it will directly kind of mimic the gradient, and obviously the length and everything else so it would be a perfect replica really,” he added.

“So, they could have done that and it might might create a little bit of discussion.

“If something like this happens again, then maybe we should move it indoors, but then you’re obviously taking certain things away from it, but it is entirely possible.”

Laverack, who won the under-23 gold medal at the British National Road Championships in 2014, earlier this year left Continental-level SwiftCarbon Pro Cycling team to focus fully on hill climbing and based his year around a small number of events.

However, the impact of coronavirusruined his plans, meaning he has only raced in one major event in 2020, the Tour des Stations in Switzerland, which describes itself as the world’s toughest one-day bike race.

“I planned to do four or five major things on the road and ended up doing just one race,” said Laverack.

“I wanted to build on last year. Being British champion, certain things come along with it, you have the jersey and the accolades and possible sponsors that come on board because you’re British champion.

“But next year is another year and this is just one event and you can never predict who’s going to win the national championships.

“I just think it’s important to take a positive from everything so I’m still happy with what I’ve achieved this year, both on and off the bike.”