With Dawn at his side, until the 2000 championships, Neil had won every national title except the Combined Senior British.  The past two years saw the title slip through his fingers. 

The 1998 Championships saw Neil winning the Senior Free Skating championship but failing to clinch the Figure title and therefore the Combined title eluded him.  Again in 1999 a similar scenario, but this time Neil was unable to compete in the Free skating due to an injury, but managed win the Figure skating championship. 

The preparations for the 2000 championships were a different story.  It was the weekend of the 15th and 16th of July.  He was fit, ready and having previously won both the Figure and the Free titles, albeit in different years, he and Dawn knew what was needed.  

The Saturday, went according to plan Neil and comfortably won the Figures and the Short Programme.  Sunday was the day of the Long program.  With everything hinging on the Long it was important to get it right.

In the practice and the official warm up every thing was on target.  The planned technical elements were the jumps, double Axel; triple Salchow; triple Salchow in combination; triple Toe Loop; triple Flip (Toe Salchow) and the butterfly, and previously Neil's weak area, some great spins including the difficult heal camel, attempted by only the most daring.

The program was performed well, unfortunately, unlike the practice, the triple Flip at the start was faulted but the rest of the programme was without serious error and the marks confirmed that Neil had indeed won the Free skating championship, and with it the Combined championships.

Dawn, Neil and the Richardson cup awarded to the winner of the Senior Men's combined championship.

Neil and Dawn will be travelling to the world championships in Boston USA in September 2000 and the European championships in October.