Jonno Oxley is an U23 year old senior academy rider, racing for Beeston Cycling Club. Having played football from an early age and to a good level, Team GB’s success at London 2012, as well as Bradley Wiggins’ Tour de France victory introduced Jonno to the sport of cycling. 

An opportunity to ride in the Manchester velodrome in 2013 gave him the bug. He then started riding the track on Saturday mornings with Newport Velo, which was soon joined by Tuesday night training sessions, he adapted quickly and was given the chance to try racing for the very first time at the local track league.

It all started in 2013

Having raced the track through the 2013/14 winter, he started his first road race at the Castle Combe Easter classic in April 2014, racing for the Ride24/7 youth development team as an U16. Years of mediocre racing results followed as he tried to balance racing, school, A levels and a social life. These years did however bring good riding and racing experiences including riding the first stage of the 2014 Tour de France (Leeds to Harrogate) with Cyclists Fighting Cancer, as well as the Hot Chillee Alpine challenge in 2016, riding with now NTT pro cycling world tour rider Nicolas Dlamini.

Turning potential into strong performances 

It wasn’t until he started working with Bryan Steel and the BS Academy from September 2018 that he started to see real improvements. A really strong and committed winter of training saw him fly up Mount Teide on a week-long training camp in Tenerife and kick the 2019 season off with a bang, taking points and a podium in his first two races of the season, quickly followed by his  first road race win. He quickly made Cat 2 by April and was in the form of his life, heading for a possible top 10 result in his second ever Nat B before a final lap crash ended his race and had him off the bike for the 2 weeks leading up to the Rutland Classic. 

Unfortunately, he spent the rest of the season training and racing too hard, desperate to re-find the form he had before his crash and eventually burned himself out. Jonno used this time effectively to recharge and rebuild.

Bringing fire-power to the BCC senior
race team

Jonno grabbed the opportunity to come across with the Bryan Steel Academy to join Beeston Cycling Club and enjoyed a winter of training rides with some new and existing Beeston CC senior race team riders. He is confident that his U23 team mates can deliver success for BCC on the regional and national stage. Bryan Steel Academy hosted the four U23 riders for a training camp in Salobrena, where they spent the time building on the winter work already done with some base and tempo work, as well as some hard climbing sessions to get them sharp in preperation for the 2020 spring season. 

Jonno was confident that the four U23 riders would have a blistering season, however the pandemic put an end to that almost before it had even begun, only managing two races, albeit with good sensations in the legs.

Turning Covid setback into a focus
for success

So for now, Jonno has written off serious competition in 2020 and is focusing on chanelling all his efforts to make season 2021 a real success.
Jonno has used this time to competed in time trials for the first time, as it TTs have begun sooner than road racing. With the truncated season Jonno will be returning to the velodrome for the first time in a few years this winter, all in the hope of some success in his new Beeston CC colours. Jonno can’t wait to race along side the established senior BCC racers. 

Jonno and his senior academy riders remain very positive and their training programmes will enable them to seize successes when racing starts again.