Like all good comebacks, the story of Russ and Dean Downing’s return to this Sunday’s Rapha Lincoln Grand Prix started with a heavy dose of convincing. “It was my daft idea… no, not daft – it was a great idea,” smiles Russ, the now 47-year-old former British road champion. His older brother Dean didn’t quite see it the same. “In a polite way, I told him to get lost,” he says. “I said, ‘No, I’m 50 years old. Bugger off. I’m not doing it. It’s too hard.’”
Since retiring in 2014, Dean, now 51 and owner of Downing Cycling, had seen how intense the British scene had become. His coached riders, who were much stronger than him, had struggled round the Lincoln course – which counts 13 ascents of the cobbled, steep Michaelgate – just to finish. Dean, on the other hand, had barely ridden a bike in three years. “Mainly because I didn’t have one. It was broken,” he says.
So, when Russ secured a pair of wildcards to mark the event’s 70th anniversary, Dean passed it off as folly. “I think it took about a month after that to persuade me to agree to going, ‘Yeah, why not? Let’s see.’”
Still, the road to this year’s edition has been the toughest yet.
The Downings join me on a video call days before the race. Dean arrives first. “Where’s brother Russ?” he says. Moments later, when Russ flashes onto the screen, Dean makes a playful gibe about his long hair. Russ runs his fingers through his locks. “I think I maybe need to book an appointment [before Sunday’s race],” he says. “But I’ll be alright. I’ll put my helmet on.”
Last summer, after the brothers agreed on their goal to return to Lincoln, they contacted British Cycling to find out what they’d need to be able to compete. The answer: a second-category racing licence, for which they’d need to collect 40 points. Neither had a single one to their name. “I always said two or three years after retiring I’d want a bit of a challenge,” thought Russ. And so, Project Lincoln was born.
The plan was to hop around grassroots events, place high, and pick up points. They started at the end of March, and gave themselves five weeks to do it. How confident were they in reaching the magic 40? “Not very, I’ll be honest,” says Dean. “I had so much doubt. I realised how unfit I was. I realised my bike was an old banger.”
It didn’t help, then, when days after British Cycling gave them the target, Dean hurt his back lifting bricks into a skip. “I couldn’t get out of bed for two days,” he says. “I was like, ‘I’m not sure I can do this in five weeks.’”
Russ Downing competing at his last Lincoln GP in 2019, the year he retired.
(Image credit: Alex Whitehead/SWpix.com)
The first event they signed up to was a circuit race south of Bradford. It was the first time they had raced together since the Sheffield Grand Prix in July 2014. “The memories were flooding back,” says Russ. “We did a little video of me pinning Dean’s number on, and everyone thought it was great. We’ve been doing that since we were however old, and he still can’t pin his own numbers on.”
Russ ended up placing 9th, earning one measly point. Dean was 8th and got two. “It was savage,” Dean laughs. “I did five times one minute 500-watt efforts in that first race. I was cooked, and I thought, ‘How are we going to do this?’”
Soon, though, the brothers began to build momentum. Their fitness may have dipped over the years, but their racing nous was still sharp. Dean won his second event, this time in Middlesbrough, giving him a healthy 10-point haul. The pair then competed more and more; in fact, on 4 April, they raced three times in one morning. That day was also Dean’s son’s 12th birthday.
“We did a Masters race: 45 minutes, 15 minutes off. Then a third- and fourth-Racing race: 45 minutes, 15 minutes off. Then an elite race: an hour, 15 minutes off,” Dean recalls. “We got quite a big points haul, drove home, walked through the door at my house, and everybody’s there. 2:30pm, and I’m straight into dad mode.”
Come dinnertime, he adds, he was “absolutely cooked – we had this massively long day, but it was a beneficial day. We committed to it in every single way, and we managed to fit everything in around it as well.”
Testament to that is the fact Russ secured his crucial 40th point while on a business trip to London in mid-April. His coffee machine company, Rocket Espresso, was exhibiting at a home show at the time. Russ used his evenings to hotfoot across the city to races. “I got some good, cheeky, sneaky points,” he says, “and it was job done.”
Dean sealed his tally three days later. The project was complete in three weeks.
What, then, are the two expecting from their big Lincoln return? “I’m going to go and win it,” Dean says, triggering a laugh from his little brother. His tone then turns more earnest. “The main goal for me was to try and get to the start line, and we slid through the hoops, smashed the points, and had a lot of fun,” he says.
Russ agrees. “It was never about the result,” he says. “We love cycling, we wanted to do this again, and it’s turned us both back into bike riders.
“Lincoln has got a strong place in both our hearts, as family, as fans, as supporters. I think if it had been just any other race, we wouldn’t have committed as much as this. Lincoln stands out.”
The Downings will wear skinsuits specially designed by SpatzWear at the race on Sunday; the kit is predominantly black, with a green pattern – the same colours as their first cycling club, Thurcroft CC.
“If I go up Michaelgate on lap one, and I hear people shouting ‘Deano and Russ!’, that’s going to be mind-blowing,” Dean says.
It’s that sense of togetherness, he explains, that has proven the real beauty of Project Lincoln. “We’ve been told we’ve inspired a lot of people to get back on their bikes, mainly the guys of our age group, but even some of my female friends,” Dean says. “To inspire people, when that wasn’t really the narrative in the beginning, is pretty cool. It makes us extremely happy.”
The 70th edition of the men’s Lincoln GP takes place this Sunday 10 March at 1pm. The women’s race starts at 9am. Both are part of British Cycling’s Lloyds National Road Series.
