YORK'S top duathlete, Colin Hawxby, has been selected to represent Great Britain in this month's World Championships in Holland.

Hawxby returned from last year's competition in Calais, France, as Britain's top-dog in his age category, 30 to 34 years.

Venray is this year's venue for the competition, which sees athletes start with a nine mile run, followed by a 40 mile bike ride before finishing with a five mile run.

Hawxby was originally selected to represent Britain in the European Championships in Portugal and the World Short Course Championships in Italy as well as the long course tournament in Holland.

However, having achieved a silver medal in the British Long Course championships last year, Hawxby has decide to focus his attention solely on Holland.

Hawxby, 34, cycles for the Banana Team and runs for York Acorn.

York cyclists Paul Musgrave (Clifton CC) and Craig Gath (VC York) took third and seventh places respectively in the Zeus CRT 72-mile Road Race over six laps of the Stamfordham/Wallridge circuit near Newcastle.

Both riders were instrumental in early unsuccessful breaks, but then Gath got in a seven-man group that went clear on lap three. With this group 30 seconds clear, Musgrave and Craig Gilmour (Ayr Roads CC) jumped away from the bunch and bridged the gap to the leaders within four miles.

The now nine-man break piled on the pace and opened up a large lead on the fast disintegrating main bunch. A previous winner on the this circuit, Mus-grave felt confident of a top final-spring result but was baulked on the climb to the finish-line and had to settle for third, edging out Colin Ash (Kna-resborough RT) into fourth place. Arthur Clune (Clifton CC) finished in the trailing bunch.

Staffordshire Elite category roadman Mark Lovatt (Pro-Vision Kairfree) stormed to victory in the York Cycleworks Road Race.

The race was run on the extremely testing Sheriff Hutton/Bul-mer/Ganthorpe/Terrington circuit over six and a half laps, an overall race distance of 70 miles.

Semi-professional Lovatt, who so far this season has been below his top-notch results of recent years, demonstrated that he is now close to his best when he obliterated a high-quality field.

The race was immediately on the boil with a first lap attack by six riders gaining 45 seconds on the bunch. Andrew Windsor (Deeside Olympic) and York men Paul Watson and Ian Holmes (VC York) drove the ambitious early move, only to be reeled in on the following lap as the favourites tested each other.

On lap four Tim Buckle (McEll) and John Rutherford (Fausto Coppi) went clear to be soon joined by eight others, with Lovatt and Kevin Dawson (Pete Read) being the prime movers.

This group stayed clear until the climb through Terrington with 17 miles to go when it split: with Dawson, Southport's Gary Adamson, and Dave Cook (Middridge CRT) going clear.

Having apparently missed the move, Lovatt took a flyer from the back of the trailing group and attacked across the gap with ease, caught the leaders and proceeded to drive the front four well clear to some two and a half minutes advantage.

On the last lap Lovatt again attacked through Terrington and saw off Cook and Adamson, who were to lose a telling three minutes to the flying Lovatt in the final eight miles.

Dawson at this stage was matching Lovatt's pace even when Lovatt tested him on the last climb up to Sheriff Hutton.

The final showdown unfolded on the last ascent of the 1 in 6 Bulmer Bank, where Lovatt demolished top-class Dawson with an awesome display of superior climbing prowess.

Lovatt powered on to take 25 seconds out of Dawson in the last one and half miles.

Updated: 11:08 Saturday, September 01, 2001