Ralston Memorial

This weekends race looks to be hotly contested with riders coming from Timaru, Christchurch, Invercargil and Dunedin. This may be due to the $1000 prize money and a prestigious trophy up for grabs. The Ralston Memorial also heralds the return of the Batwing Fairweather to racing after being overtaken by Shane Melrose in the points table. However, the big names don't stop there! Shane Archibald, Dan Barry, Jerard Stock, Geoff Keogh, Ashley Whitehead, Alex Daniels and Jeff Notman. Its shaping up to be an exciting race over a rolling parcours with a 2km climb to a hill top finish.

Will Melrose and Batwing use their turn of speed to hurt the bunch on the flat or will the climbers such as Whitehead, Daniels and Notman come to the fore? Other danger men in the form of break and second break include Chris Henderson and Steve Havard. With scratch performing strongly last weekend there has been speculation that they may be handicapped out of the race.

The legend that is Ashley Whitehead is yet confirm his appearance. However, he has been spotted by our informants doing multiple laps of Three Mile Hill in anticipation of this weekends hit out. As for his excuse of "I haven't been training lately" we say: what a crook of shit!

David Ayre and Hurricane Stockwell will surely hurt their chances of victory by riding the approximate 100km distance to the race start tomorrow. Stockwell has been telling anyone who will listen "I need more miles". But this close to the race will it help the Hurricane destroy the field, I think not. Ayre is just trying to stoke his ego and prove that he can do it all.

As yet there has been no word as to whether the infamous Anonymous will be riding. Many riders are anticipating a heated battle with this particularly tough opponent! Will he let his legs do the talking or will the win escape his grasp? Only time will tell if he is up to the task.

Now for the greatly anticipated TAB Odds:

Shane Melrose: $0.90 - after last weeks effort the TAB need to recuperate their loss
Shane Archibald: $1.05 - can anyone beat this man?
Ashley Whitehead: $1.40 - your secret training is going to pay off
Geoff Keogh: $1.80 - Oyago's most consistent rider year in year out
Hurricane Stockwell: $2.05 - look out boys here comes the Hurricane
Batwing Fairweather: $3.50 - no sitting on for the sprint today Jimmy
David Ayre: $ 4.70 - will your ego hold out... probably not
Bank Guy: $12.00 - will be in the hunt after being rolled last weekend be Melrose
Joel Davies: $56.90 - your looking at some good pack filler, but not much else