AFTER taking his first win in the Dulwich Primavera road race 11 years ago, Winchester's Rob Hurd showed when winning the race for the third time that time has done nothing but mature his talent.

Hurd is now back in England after spending most of his racing career in Belgium.

Races on the tough cobbled roads are not for the faint-hearted and the riders survive on the good prize money on offer.

The 101km race was held in windy freezing conditions and the quality field included Commonwealth silver medallist Tony Gibb of the new DFL pro team.

Hurd allowed Gibb to make much of the early running in the race.

The DFL rider did take an early group of riders away but Hurd bided his time to see if the strength that Gibb possessed would in fact be his undoing.

In a break away it is important for riders to work together as a cohesive group - one strong rider can destroy the rhythm which ultimately leads to its demise.

That proved to be the case here and Hurd capitalised to win, 30 seconds ahead of another former winner, Gary Baker.

Hampshire's Rob Hayles, pictured above, won the Eddie Soens Memorial handicap race on the roads around the Aintre racecourse.

Soens was the first coach of Olympic champion Chris Boardman. He passed away in the early 1990s.

The Re-cycling.co.uk team made up the vast majority of the scratch group that had three minutes to make up on the lower category groups over the 81km.

Olympic medalist Hayles powered to a deserved solo win with three of his team-mates following him home 15 seconds behind.

Hayles will be competing in the individual and team pursuit at the Los Angeles World Championships in three weeks and will be hoping for gold after a recent run of silvers in major events.

RESULTS:

Dulwich Primavera/Wally Gimber RR

Homewood School, Tenterden

SUNDAY 6 MARCH; E/1/2/3/4; 101Km

1. Rob HURD Bio Agrico-Fabelec Selexion 2. Gary BAKER Anglia Sport / Condor Cycles 3. Andy LYONS Parrot Print - Tal RT 4. Edward WHITEHORN

Glendene CC / Bike Trax 5. Chris McNAMARA Tunbridge Wells RC 6.

Thomas GARDNER Glendene CC / Bike Trax 7. Joel STEWART

www.agiskoviner.com 8. Roger MORGAN Stilton RT / Terry Wright 9. Chris

BIRCH Evans Cycles RT 10. Simon COPE Pacific Racing Team

Eddie Soens Memorial 81km Aintree

1 Rob Hayles (recycling.co.uk/MG X Power/Litespeed) 81km in

1hr46m53secs 2 Dean Downing (recycling.co.uk/MG X Power/Litespeed)

3 Russell Downing (recycling.co.uk/MG X Power/Litespeed) 4 Chris Newton

(recycling.co.uk/MG X Power/Litespeed.