Kelly Cycle Coaching had two athletes from Park Trent racing compete in Tasmania over the weekend.  The event in the north of Tassie was called the Mersey Valley tour, which featured as an U19 selection race for possible spots in the Australian U19 road and time trial team.  Both Drew Morey and Angus Lyons competed in the 3 days of racing, as first year U19 cyclists.

Here is how the racing unfolded:

Stage 1 – 17km Individual time trial.  Report by Drew Morey.

Stage 1 was a TT of 17km that started at Ulverstone, and ran along the coast line to Penguin over mostly flat terrain with a few small rolling hills. The day prior to race day, I went out to the TT course to do some recce and “open the system”.  It didn’t take me long to notice the ridiculous head wind on the way out, but it took a while for me to experience the tail wind on the way back. Mid way through the second lap of the course, to my joy it started raining as I was wearing my new waterproof clothing.  I got a good feel for the course and felt strong.

Race day had very similar conditions, minus the rain. Coach Helen told me that I would have to warm up very well to ensure that I would be ready to smash it into the massive head wind, where the time difference will be made. I warmed up by doing several 2-3 minute efforts starting below threshold and building up to absolute maximum.

I felt strong into the headwind, despite the speeds of 38 km/h on flat into the head wind. 10 seconds after the turn around I was in the biggest gear I had, sitting at around 52 km/h the whole way home. I got stung by a bee 500m from the finish, which hurt and made me ride faster. I crossed the line with a time of 22:55, which gave me 18^th place.

Gus Lyons finished a further 16sec behind Drew.  He found out after feeling flat all week that he had grown 1cm during the week.  [Hope his new TT bike still fits him].

Gus starting the TT

Drew Man - in the hurt box

Stage 3 – 120km road race.  Report written by Angus Lyons.

Stage 3 was Tassie’s  usual hilly terrain with 1400m of climbing along the 120km course, the major climb maxing out at 19%. Rolling hills rose for the first 75 km before a long rolling descent back to the beach.

During the initial stages of the race a number of minor breaks were attempted but never allowed out of sight. Drew and I both missed the vital break of 6 at about the 30km mark which included two Victorians in Alistair Donohoe and Oscar Stevenson. The break got out to 8mins with representation and Victorians covering in the main bunch.

Drew mid race. Raining hard.

Gus - mid race

The second split occurred on the last step of the major climb at the 75km mark this time all Victorians missed it. This second group of 5 came within 1:07 of catching the leaders with the main group just 1:10 off the back of them.

The last 10km was flat along the coast, following the Time Trial course, a few attacks were attempted but nothing stuck and it came down to a bunch kick. Drew and I went up the inside and I began lead-out with about 750m to go and launched Drew with about 200m and he held the others off until the last second when he got rolled and ending up third in the bunch and 14^th overall.

Gus ponders the upcoming hills

Bunch sprint on stage 3

For a selection of photos by Jim Morey, please click here.