MULTI-terrain cyclist Victoria Wilkinson has just returned from Italy competing alongside the world's best at the World Cyclo-Cross Championships.

Victoria, who works in Ambleside, finished 20th out of the 40-strong elite women's field.

She was pleased with her performance in the fast, five laps of a 2k circuit in muddy parkland in the coastal town on Monopoli on the Adriatic coast.

She said: "I had a good start and put in a really good couple of laps and I finished only 40 seconds behind my GB team-mate, the national champion Isla Rowantree, and three minutes down on the winner."

February 5, 2003 11:31