Karl Baillie (Haribo-Beacon) has had a busy couple of weeks after returning from injury’s sustained in a couple of nasty crashes at the Tom Simpson national Junior series road event in mid June, which kept him off the bike for well over a month.

He returned to racing a couple of weeks ago at the latest round of the Junior national road series in Milton Keynes finishing 40^th after just training for over a week.

The week later Karl travelled with the Haribo-Beacon team to race in the junior version of the Tour of Flanders around Oudenaarde which was 125km over famous cobbled climbs and sections such as the Eikenberg and Taaienberg. He punctured early on after having to jump over a high kerb but got back in the peloton. Getting near to the front of a field of nearly 200 riders proved to be a struggle but riding strongly he finished a respectable 93^rd.

The day after the team travelled to Roosendale in Holland to ride in a criterium race that was a post Tour de France crit race attracting big names like Marcel Kittel for the adults race. Karl was active and aggressive at the front of the Junior race going alone off the front for a number of laps towards the end but was pulled back and finished in the bunch.

Karl then travelled to Manchester where he raced in the National Track Championships Junior Points race. There was a 50 lap qualifier in the morning that led to the 120 lap final of the Velodrome. In the final Karl was off the front early on almost gaining a lap on the field before finishing 9^th with only 16 of the 24 qualifiers managing to finish in what was a frantic and brutal race. Karl was really pleased with the result as it was a sign of his race fitness and some good form returning.

Sunday Aug 10th – Pontefract GP

Karl Baillie (Haribo-Beacon) raced in the Pontefract GP in the E12 event. The course was tight and technical with rain beforehand making it very treacherous. A crash early on split the field with Karl caught behind it. Karl chased for the rest of the race breaking away from riders and eventually sprinted to 10^th place. It gained Karl valuable points to get closer towards his 1^st cat license.