Women weren't allowed under the UK time trialling rules to compete against men, until sometime through Beryl's career. Certainly Marguerite Wilson would never have competed against men in a time trial. However, all the place to place records held by Marguerite had mens equivalent records, but the mens were considerably faster. IMHO Beryl was in a different league to any other woman cyclist (not just because she twice caught me in time trials!). Her times would still win nearly all womens events today in spite of all the new technology available. Beryl rode very few place to place record attempts. But her famed 12 hour time trial ride of 278 miles, which beat the mens record too, is still held in awe by us all today. It may well have been the greatest time trial ever ridden by either sex.
Mike Waite
Amersham Bucks UK
mrwaite@btinternet.com
>I think the thing that amazes about Burton is she regularly competed
>against top male trialists and often beat all but the best of them. Not
>sure if Wilson did that to the same extent. Of course time trialing is an
>essentially individual discipline, so female cyclists competing against men
>would be a lot more common than in road racing.