Junior cycling champion Geron Williams won the third annual Ride for Life five-stage race in record time and pocketed $200,000 when the last stage ended yesterday on Homestretch Avenue.
Williams, by virtue of his age, also won the junior category and broke last year’s record set by Junior Niles (10:38.13) by recording a new mark of 10:30.51. In yesterday’s stage from Kara Kara, Linden to Homestretch Avenue Williams rode to his first stage win, upstaging leader going into yesterday final stage Godfrey Pollydore, by registering a time of 2:49.34s; Mario Forde was second and Tony Simone placed third.
Meanwhile, yesterday’s proceedings at the presentation ceremony were not devoid of controversy and drama at the Cliff Anderson Sports Hall (CASH).
It started when the veterans’ category winners were announced and Raymond Newton, who was given third, felt that he was cheated.
It was his contention that he beat Turhan Harris in all the stages of the race and therefore Harris should not have won the category.
Subsequently, Sport Minister Dr. Frank Anthony instructed Chairperson of the proceedings Nazim Hussain and Community Mobilisation Coordinator AIDS Programme Secretariat to announce that the raucous rider and some of his supporters be disbarred from riding at future Ride for Life events. Police were also called in on standby. Speaking at the ceremony national cycling coach Hassan Mohammed thanked the overseas riders for participating in the race, which is also conducted to raise awareness of the deadly HIV/AIDS disease. He told the gathering that despite there were some shortfalls he hopes that they may come back to participate in the event.
He remembered when the race first started in 2007 there were only local participants which changed the next year with the overseas participants pushing the number of competitors to 52.
He promised that in the next edition of the race the organizers will invite as much overseas riders as possible since this year there was a marked improvement in amount of participants (66).
Minister Anthony said he was pleased that the third event was successfully completed despite some challenges and he congratulated the riders and organizers for their efforts.
He said that the event was facilitated by his Ministry and the “resources” came from the Ministry of Health (MOH), which plugged some six million dollars into the event and has undertaken to continue with this generousity until 2015.
Anthony said that his ministry hopes to collaborate with MOH to ensure that the calendar event grow from strength to strength. He said that one of the ways this can be achieved is to have more international participation which will show that others care about fighting the effects of the deadly disease.
Minister within the MOH Dr. Bheri Ramsarran implored the riders to “continue to be a potent force against the spread of HIV/AIDS”. He also implored the riders to be ambassadors when the national week of testing from November 16-20.
Other prize winners:
Junior category: 1st- Geron William; 2nd- Christopher Holder; 3rd- Daniel Ramchurgee (whose father presented him a 1000 for each of the 226 miles of the race).
Veteran category: 1st- Turhan Harris; 2nd- Kennard Lovell; 3rd- Raymond Lovell
Senior category: Geron Williams; 2nd- Mario Forde; 3rd- Tony Simone; 4th- Enzo Matthews; 5th- Robin Persaud; 6th- Godfrey Pollydore; 7th- Alonzo Greaves; 8th- Simon Clarke; 9th- Eric Sankar.
