As the relentless march of the campaign moved deeper into its twilight weeks, a suffocating, paralyzing plague gripped the peloton: indecision. A collective, hesitating dread seemingly infected the very air surrounding our battleground. Do we race, or do we surrender? This pre-war paralysis bled far beyond the trembling riders; even the staunch, unyielding organizers and vital marshals found themselves wrestling with off-tarmac chaos! A vicious onslaught of real-life dramas and worldly obligations kicked off in the shadows, fighting desperately to keep the vital crew from ever reaching the start block. Yet, willpower triumphed over the logistics, keeping the 2026 pain machine rolling.

But this profound psychological hesitancy among the riders was absolutely no accident. Our grand theater this week, a twisted, Frankensteined hybrid of Hollin Lane and Withenshaw Lane, was deliberately forged to shatter the human mind before a single pedal was ever turned.

Unfolding across a sprawling, chaotic map, the geography itself actively weaponizes confusion. Climbers are first thrust southward along a deceptively smooth but agonizing "false-flat" highway, periodically interrupted by punchy, lactate-spiking lumps that demand immediate, furious sprints. Surviving this, the asphalt mercilessly degrades. Hooking fiercely south-east, riders are dumped onto a grinding, soul-sapping stretch of rough gravel. Just as the rhythm settles, the road rears up into a terrifying, steep hairpin littered with wheel-eating potholes. And the final, most sadistic twist? Just when the summit line appears theoretically within grasp, the course demands one last sharp left turn, catapulting warriors northward onto a seemingly infinite, mind-bending false-flat finish line that eternally refuses to arrive. Here, atmospheric winds offer no mercy. Pacing on instinct alone equals absolute death. Total, razor-sharp cognitive focus is purely required from a brain that is already bleeding oxygen! For when one sets their hubris against the ancient inclines, the very earth rises to exact her cruel tithe of breath and bone.

Thanks to an incredibly early raid by the organizer, the start and finish lines were painted proudly upon the tarmac a full month in advance (successfully bypassing last week's wildly traumatic wet-paint panic). Unsurprisingly, many riders utilized the lingering summer evenings to quietly stare down this twisting serpent. Yet, the vast majority deliberately refused to lay down true race-pace markers, paralyzed by that overwhelming, creeping indecision.

Some, however, embraced the void. Heading up entirely independently during the week, both junior prodigy Ed Stubbs and veteran powerhouse Johnny Winbolt-Lewis conducted fierce reconnaissance missions. Unbelievably, despite riding separately in totally different conditions, they crossed the ghost-line with identical times of 9:22! But to nobody's surprise, the award for throwing cautious reconnaissance to the wind belonged to Maxwell Smith. Launching his scout-run on the very eve of the battle, he bludgeoned the gradient to strike an epic 8:19, obliterating his historic 2023 PB of 8:57.923 set three seasons prior. A buzzing Maxwell openly admitted the mathematical flaw in his pacing logic, cheerfully proclaiming his ride to be: "Recon for tomorrow's race at 95% (more like 110% 😹)".

Nobody painted a more vivid, harrowing prophecy of this tactical nightmare than our resident oracle and super-fan, Phillip Coates. Broadcasting his Thursday evening sermon from "Pressure Central," Phil ruthlessly warned the uninitiated about the lethal mirage of the climb's statistics:

"Friday night is pain night, and tomorrow's no exception, Withenshaw Lane!!!!!!!
2.6km 6% Average Gradient. Let those figures sink in. Not too far, not that steep really is it? Nah mate, you'll be fine, just enjoy it, except you more than likely won't be fine and you really won't enjoy it, because try as you might you will probably arrive at the farm, at the start of the proper climb, totally cooked having over-gassed the opening stretch, not keeping your watts in check and being generally over-excited.

It's then that your problems really start.

I'm off at 7:22, Paul Whittaker is providing motivational focus right behind me, Thijs is keeping Paul honest starting right behind him. I've got it all to do tomorrow, mistakes must be seen and rectified instantly or Paul will catch me on the course. And I really don't want that."

With just days remaining until launch, the official start sheets looked bizarrely bleak. Trapped by indecision and the horrors of Phil's forecasts, the local cavalry seemed hesitant to formally ride to war. Seeking to stir the echoes of eras past, the organizer launched a massive, sprawling digital flare into the heavens. Reaching out to an almighty list of 500-600 battle-scarred souls, comprising anyone who had even glanced at a Macclesfield Wheelers start line since 2019, a grand proclamation was issued.

The purpose was not to plead for entries to Round 13. Rather, it was a holy decree. It served to formally warn the region of our impending, monumental road closure atop Tegg's Nose for Round 14... and to finally break our monumental, heavily-guarded secret to the public:

The Macclesfield Wheelers have been bestowed the ultimate honor. Upon our very slopes, we shall formally host the prestigious National Hillclimb Championships in October 2027!

The reaction across the realm was an instant, beautiful, and profoundly hilarious hypocrisy. Struck by the glorious intoxication of National prestige, the dreaded plague of "indecision" was instantly and miraculously cured! Within mere hours of the text message, a gigantic, unstoppable tidal wave of late entries came smashing through the digital gates for both this event and the next. A spectacularly comedic volume of panicked gladiators messaged the organizer to join the fray, defensively citing that they had "simply forgotten" to enter earlier in the week. Yes, indeed. 'Forgotten!'

Behold the sudden, fickle alchemy of the racing spirit: what mortal dread so easily forbids, the hunger for immortal glory swiftly commands. To peer at the mountain's terrors is human; but the promise of National Championship lore clearly cures all amnesia. Methinks the peloton protests too much!

With the starting trenches unexpectedly flooded, morale skyrocketing to feverish new heights, and the sheer prestige of 2027 hanging in the turbulent crosswinds, the battles for Withenshaw Lane ultimately commenced!

When they did, it became glaringly apparent that the psychological warfare of the valley was affecting everyone's logic. Take, for instance, our reigning Veteran titan, Thijs Geurts. Plotted on the startsheet to keep Paul Whittaker and Phillip Coates heavily in check, Thijs decided to interpret a pre-race "warm-up" with psychotic freedom. Exactly one hour prior to his actual launch, a deeply concerned spectator frantically rushed to the organizer, whispering: "I've just seen that Thijs guy warming up with some serious speed." That was the understatement of the year. Unbelievably, Thijs blasted off the line and fully raced the entire mountain for "practice", burning an absurd 388 Watts of raw Dutch power to hit a blistering 07:45. His summary of this suicidal expenditure before an actual race? "So nice, had to do it twice." In defiance of all known physiological laws, he arrived at his official launch an hour later, inexplicably squeezed the exact same 388W from his exhausted legs, and scorched the tarmac in 07:34.473 to shatter his PB by 10.8 seconds and seize 4th overall!

Directly in Thijs's roaring wake was the ultimate prophet himself, Phil Coates. Entering the fray carrying intense start-line anxieties that relegated his warmup to a desperate, fleeting morning effort on his daily commute, Phil clung heavily to his pre-race manifesto: Hold the power down until the farm. However, this winding, jagged course actively corrupts the soul.

"Well, I had a plan," Phil later confessed. "But this course doesn't half lead you astray at the start, and by the time you realize you've over-cooked it, well, it's way too late then!" Blasting past the pub on the deceitful lower slopes, his rigid discipline spectacularly detonated. Sensing a sharp kick in the gradient, instinct overrode logic. He aggressively chased momentum, spiking his wattage deep into the red! Alas, even the most stoic philosophies unravel, for no intellectual resolve can truly endure the primordial scream of a body in torment.

Whipping wildly around the ensuing left hook with his legs flooding with lactate, he spotted his minute-man looming ahead, setting off a surge of adrenaline. "I'm going for it... rein it in again... bollo#@s, refocus and just behave!" he furiously commanded his screaming body. Miraculously snapping out of the frenzy as he breached the upper farm gates, instructing himself to finally "stop being a prat and grow a brain again", Phil ground out a seated, brutal 90 RPM siege in first gear to successfully reel in his target! Shunning a violent out-of-the-saddle finish to hunker down in an aerodynamic tuck, Phil stopped the merciless clocks in a sensational 08:24.124. For a man convinced he was falling apart, the timekeeper's bell revealed utter glory: a monumental 32.552-second lifetime PB!

It seems keeping Phil 'honest' paid off beautifully. Looming directly over his wheel, as ever, was the legendary Paul Whittaker, crossing four crucial seconds faster in a ferocious 08:20.183. However, both of these highly publicized titans were completely blind-sided by a stealthy phantom! While Phil's pre-race prophecy was intensely fixated on tracking the looming threats of Thijs and Paul, his highly monitored radar failed to detect Glossop Kinder Velo's Matt Bond. Infiltrating the valley like a silent assassin, Matt entirely bypassed their hyped social media rivalry, aggressively stomping his way into the elite sub-8-minute club with a staggering 07:52.405. Snatching 5th overall and silently tearing away the 2nd M VET spot directly behind Thijs, Matt emphatically proved that the deadliest climbers in the peloton are often the ones you never see coming.

Yet elsewhere on the grid, that lingering virus of "pre-race indecision" exacted its revenge upon those attempting a grand return to the scene. Veteran Phil Wood hadn't tangled with a hill climb in quite some time, and the false-flats welcomed him back with maximum brutality. Crawling over the strip with a lung-busting 11:16.732, his Garmin recorded a violently throbbing max heart rate of 189! Recovering over the bars, Phil stared down the press-officer listening in on the summit. "That's the first time doing an effort on a hill for a long time," he panted, immediately realizing his quote would inevitably be weaponized in the weekly race report: "Don't quote me on that!" Naturally, we quoted him directly. Accepting his glorious, inevitable media fate, he admitted: "That was a tough reintroduction to efforts... but I always enjoy it after the event!"

For others, the raw panic erupted before they even unclipped! Arriving at the venue slightly late, contender Daniel Ramsden somehow found himself atop the finish line with merely five minutes left until his launch. Desperately turning to the finish timekeeper, he nervously asked, "I'm starting in 5... will I make it?!" Plunging frantically down the twisting, narrow gorge, a terrifying, mad-dash descent ensued. Skidding into the start-trench with exactly two seconds remaining on the starter's countdown clock, Daniel miraculously launched straight into his race with zero chance to catch his breath. Capturing a mighty 08:35.794, an adrenaline-spiked Daniel confessed: "Happy with that considering I arrived at the start with 2 seconds to spare. I had to go far too deep on the way out to even get there, so definitely not the best time I could have got."

Across the upper echelons of the peloton, the recon numbers logged earlier in the week were completely and utterly obliterated when the whistle blew. Having casually ambled up the route in 09:22 on Monday, Veteran Johnny Winbolt-Lewis suddenly flipped the kill switch on race night, slashing nearly half a minute off his recon time for a majestic 08:55.477. An equally magnificent escalation was achieved by Maxwell Smith! Proving that his highly sarcastic "110%" eve-of-battle test ride actually masked a vastly deeper well of explosive potential, Maxwell somehow discovered another savage gear, capturing an amazing 08:03.022. Earning a highly distinguished 6th place overall, Maxwell's onslaught of 2026 PBs remains absolutely unstoppable. Musing on his successful, lung-scorching preparation tactic, Maxwell philosophized: 'Pleased with that effort. Maybe a near full-gas recon the day before is the ideal opener!' Yet, remaining firmly grounded in humility despite securing one of his all-time best finishes in the series, he laughingly credited his leap up the leaderboards to one crucial, off-bike geographical factor: '(It helps a number of the hitters are on holiday!)'

However, neither of these titans could have prepared for what the younger vanguard had engineered. Remember Ed Stubbs? The terrifying Junior who nonchalantly reconned at the exact same 09:22 pace as Johnny? Transforming that casual pedal into pure violence under race conditions, young Edward mercilessly demonstrated the cruel, rapidly-regenerating biological difference between youth and a seasoned Veteran. While Johnny impressively extracted a heroic thirty seconds from his recon, he did so whilst battling live-action traffic. Unfortunately encountering farm-workers closing up for the evening on the open roads, an unavoidable hazard of authentic grassroots racing, Johnny had to desperately navigate agricultural momentum. He summarized his uphill siege: 'Pleased with the power put down on easier gradients. Not so pleased with the Range Rover that wouldn't wait five seconds and drove me right into the hedge on the finishing straight!' To drop half a minute from a PB whilst dodging 4x4s makes his 08:55.477 staggering.

Yet, returning to the battle, Ed brutally vaporized practically two whole minutes from his recon! Such is the eternal tragedy of the wheel: decades of suffering may temper a veteran's mind with cunning, but no vast wealth of experience can ever truly buy back the reckless, regenerating nectar of youth. Whether fueled by the fountain of youth or an epic masterclass in mid-week psychological sandbagging, Ed demolished the twisting road in a jaw-dropping 07:28.338. Carving away a spectacular 20.8-second lifetime PB, he decisively stormed into the overall Top 3 to take the Junior victory. Directly ahead of him, Chorlton Velo's Daniel Herterick effectively weaponized the steep inclines to claim the silver overall in 07:16.278, locking in the ultimate M SEN silver.

But total sovereignty unequivocally remained securely seated upon its throne. In what is fast becoming a ruthless, weekly ritual of destruction, reigning Monarch Jack Morris swept out onto the road and simply commanded the very physics of the terrain to bend to his will. Slashing through the horrific crosswinds and bouncing through the upper potholes, Jack didn't just break the elusive seven-minute threshold; he threatened to annihilate it completely. Surging across the phantom finish line with a magnificent 07:01.201, King Jack extracted another 3 seconds of precious PB magic to stand proudly atop the battlefield. However, even climbing gods occasionally suffer technological doubt! Arriving at the summit, Jack stared down at his cycling computer with a furrowed, bewildered brow, complaining to onlookers that his power readings 'kept fluctuating' throughout the ride. Naturally, the crowds could only assume his profound confusion stemmed purely from the fact that his digital screen occasionally dared to display a number dropping below a steady, constant 800 Watts! On this jagged, gear-grinding terrain, clearly even mythical leg-power is forced to occasionally shift.

Behind the untouchable Kings, physical destruction was proudly embraced by the mortal ranks. M SEN warrior Nathanael Booker boldly launched an utterly blind assault on the asphalt, declaring it was "exciting to race up a road I'd never cycled up before." Clocking a formidable 08:15.691 for 7th overall, the lactic toll of the "unknown" thoroughly wrecked him. At his last race on Blaze Hill, Booker notably acted as a 'sacrificial teammate', completing a colossal effort just to brutally spin around, bomb down the hill, and physically hand his smoking bike to his female teammate! Looking entirely hollowed-out at the Withenshaw summit tonight, onlookers humorously noted it was a blessing he didn't have to execute a U-turn descent this time, as his post-race wobble suggested gravity would have aggressively claimed him! Meanwhile, esteemed club member and regular National Hill Climb photographer John Bunyan ground his way through the false-flats to log 12:57.921. Framing his own brutal photographic reality, John delightfully evaluated his pacing success via the most fundamental biological metric available: "Didn't have a heart attack, so a result. Looks like I was about 30s slower than when I last did it 5 years ago."

Amongst our reigning queens, the ferocious war for female sovereignty showcased breathtaking form. Snatching the supreme women's overall crown was Alice Larkin, conquering the agonizing drag with a regal 09:31.269. Yet, while she seized the ultimate victory, Alice found herself trapped in an unbelievable Groundhog Day with the timekeeper's clock! Reviewing her five consecutive annual campaigns upon this exact asphalt yields a terrifying, cyborg-like biological consistency: 09:31 (2022), 09:30 (2023), 09:30 (2024), 09:33 (2025), and 09:31 today!

Heartbreakingly missing a lifetime best by less than a singular second, she laughed off her uncanny physiological metronome: "My goal to get a PB on this climb still eludes me - fifth time unlucky despite the nice tailwind! At least I'm consistent - which I guess I should be happy about." Grappling with the route's cruel, erratic geography, that early tailwind morphed into a vicious wall of air on the final northern straight. "I did enjoy the new smoothish tarmac though, that I was staring hard at as I gasped for every last molecule of oxygen I could extract," she vividly recalled. Reaching her ultimate limit in the heavy air, a fellow titan materialized to save her momentum: "Great to get a cheer from Egg near the top - I needed that to push on into the headwind as those precious seconds ticked by!"

Hunting fiercely behind Alice's impenetrable false-flat sovereignty, across the generational divides, was phenomenal Juvenile speedster Seraphina Green. Surging gracefully up the broken gravel lines to cross in 10:04.762 and claim 2nd place overall, Seraphina heavily agreed with the reigning Champion on the harshest element of the route, sharing: 'Great event! Vivid memory: the headwind at the top.' Indeed, that invisible, punishing wall at the summit was the cruel toll the mountain demanded for the sweeping tailwinds granted earlier in the valley.

The shifting, biting winds also heralded a brutal, seasonal milestone: the ferocious heatwaves that boiled the tarmac in previous weeks are definitively over! For the heroic finish-line timekeepers and marshals anchored stationary at the top, this location predictably lived up to its vicious historical reputation. Like clockwork every year, Withenshaw Lane claims the title of the first summit where uncontrollable, unavoidable shivering sets in, regardless of how many thick winter layers you wear.

Defying the plummeting temperatures and the grueling layout entirely, Station South CC's powerhouse Rebecca Bowler bludgeoned the final incline to seal her class-victory in 11:06.058. Taking the F SEN glory and cementing herself onto the outright podium, Rebecca completely baffled her fellow gasping ascenders. Arriving at a summit littered with broken riders complaining of the headwind, she enthusiastically delivered a totally contrary verdict: 'The hill is nice!' Exposing her ultimate motivational advantage hidden upon the twisting lower slopes, she cheerfully explained: 'It's also a bonus when the climb goes past a pub!'

Finally, true grit belonged exactly where it usually thrives: with our eternal fan-favorite Kathleen O'Donnell! Waiting in the tense start-line queue, she happily passed the time chatting with young Seraphina, learning the talent traveled from a club near Sheffield. Jokingly wondering if the Juvenile speedster had braved the fearsome Snake Pass to reach the venue, Kathleen recognized a fierce, rising star, noting: 'She was pretty cool and I see a great cycling talent... maybe one day I will join her on the Nationals if I can drive to them!' Thus, out on the slopes, Kathleen was simply thrilled to see Seraphina fly past her at the exact minute-marker she had humbly predicted.

While Withenshaw is a mystery to many, it holds no geographical secrets for Kathleen. 'I do know all the nooks and crannies, each carefully honed pothole slightly changing its demeanour over the years,' she stated, famously having sprinted up this exact road during the 'Langley 7' running races. Desperately commanding her own brain to 'stop checking your watch to see if you can make the PB!', the temptation ultimately overpowered her. Approaching the brutal finale, she loudly bellowed out to the cheering fans, using the very last molecules of air in her lungs, that she only had exactly 30 seconds remaining to smash her 14-minute goal!

Turning that final corner into the stunning, wind-blasted finish, the ticking clock unfortunately showed no mercy as she logged 14:43.025. Analyzing the physical cost of her vocal cord expenditure, she cheerfully admitted: 'Had I not called it out, that air might have been the oxygen the muscles needed to get over the line... but regardless, I surpassed it. Out of time, but performance as ever, very fine ;)))).'

The cold, mechanical judgment of the stopwatch measures solely the fleetness of limb; it takes the roars of the summit to measure the true magnitude of a rider's heart.

Most crucially, however, this magical summit crossing marked Kathleen's final racing effort of the 2026 campaign! But do not expect to escape her piercing gaze next week. Stepping off the pedals and onto the administration desk for our legendary closed-road Round 14, Kathleen has fiercely promised to intensely interrogate every single competitor as she pins on their number, heavily demanding verbal confirmation that they will absolutely 'be going for it'!

With our warriors returning to civilization to thaw out from the sudden evening chills, a massive milestone looms on the horizon. The great tarmac of Tegg's Nose has been cleared. The roads will be completely barricaded to cars. Our once-in-a-season, ultimate, traffic-free coliseum awaits the brave... with the brand-new, shimmering prestige of the 2027 National Championships hanging high above the peaks. Get your entries in. Face Kathleen at sign-on if you dare. We will see you on the start line!

Full Results: https://hillclimbproject.co.uk/race/?c=Jt0xlr6p21#R
Shots from various people's phones: https://hillclimbproject.co.uk/shots/2026-07-24/
Photos from Paul Jones (£1.25 each): https://www.photodesport.co.uk/time-trials-1