Ben Forsyth C-R-Y Race Day 2025

The 2025 edition will be held on Sunday 23^rd March, at the Fife Cycle Park. Entries are open until 5 minutes before midnight on Sun 16^th March here - https://www.britishcycling.org.uk/events/details/314271/2025-ERC-Ben-Forsyth-CRY-Youth-Race-Day-Youth-Circuit-Series-R1

Read on if you want to learn more about the event's history.

Origin
The event originated in the 00s when the club ran the ‘Ingliston Crits’ where youth races were held on a small side-circuit. Eventually these morphed into the ‘Season-starters’, early season races to enable Scottish riders to get valuable points towards the British national series entry. These were mostly held at Ingliston but occasionally ventured to East Fortune, famed for rain-swept and snowy days in March.

Following the construction of the Fife Cycle Park, the event moved to Lochgelly and once again incorporated adult races.

Ben’s parents, Keith and Margaret, donated a cup in his memory. Many of our up-and-coming open champions have their names on the trophy. A full list of winners is given below.

This year
The event changed to its current format in 2024 to make it a youth-only event built on the experience of running the Youth Cycle Games and of a multi-group training event devised by Evan Oliphant. This has enabled everyone to have more track time and a mixture of races. We wanted to attract riders from further afield by having something more than a 10-minute crit race. Last year’s format proved very successful so we have decided to repeat it with a few adjustments informed by that experience.

All under 12 categories will have a mini stage race. Stage 1 is one lap time trial, i.e. a solo timed ride, with each rider starting at 30 second intervals. The TT time is used to seed riders in stage 2, the street-sprint, i.e. a 400 meter 4-up knock-out race. Each rider progresses to another round to provide an overall ranking. Stage 3 will be a traditional mass start race of between 10 and 30 minutes depending on the age category. The final positions will be determined by the highest positions in each stage with ties broken by the most wins. There will be podiums for every year of birth which will give first year riders an extra 15 minutes of fame.

Under 16s and 14s ride in the afternoon. Their races form the first round of the Scottish Youth Circuit Race Championship. There are two races, one for girls and one for boys, with the winner of the boys’ race holding the Ben Forsyth trophy for a year. Following the races, Scottish Cycling coaches will be a holding training session in preparation for the 2025 Youth Tour of Scotland to be held in Perthshire. Note that the entries for the A&B events have now closed but Youth C (U12) riders may still enter the Perth Grand Prix on Sun 13 April 2025 to be held on the final day of YToS, https://www.britishcycling.org.uk/events/details/314058/2025-Perth-Grand-Prix.

Charity
Cardiac Risk in the Young (C-R-Y) is a charity that aims to prevent young sudden cardiac deaths through awareness, screening and research, and supporting affected families. The charity is close to Ben’s parents and ERC since Ben suffered from a heart condition which stopped him from riding and proved to be fatal. We hope to raise funds at the event, which will go towards youth screening sessions in Scotland and save a family from losing their child at an early age.

Past winners
Ben Forsyth Cup (YA open) YA girls
2024 Elliot Speedie Edinburgh RC Melanie Rowe Deeside Thistle CC
2023 James Sweeney Edinburgh RC Kayla Dinnin Dumfries CC
2022 James Sweeney Edinburgh RC Molly Evans Deeside Thistle CC
2021 Elliot Rowe Deeside Thistle CC Evie White Deeside Thistle CC
2019 Fraser Gault Aberdeen Wheelers CC Eva Young Pedal Power RT