Round 3 Qld Teams Series

This round of the Teams Series included a criterium in Miles and a road race from Chinchilla to Bunya Mountains. The criterium was uneventful, however the road race was a true classic.

The road race was 150km, with a 10km climb to the finish. This climb was always going to be decisive, especially with the 20% ramps that featured on the climb. As a result, the race was fairly subdued for the first 50km as the bunch anticipated the tough finale.

Once the first hour was raced, the bunch became very active with many attacks taking place on the flat and fast course. It was difficult for a break to get away, but finally after 50kms of racing a break of about 15 riders finally got away and would stay away until the foot of the final climb
The team was thankful that Taylor was able to make it into this break, which allowed the rest of the team to sit in while other teams chased. Along the way, Taylor was strong enough to get points in both the King of the Mountains competition and the Sprint competition.

As expected, the break was caught at the foot of the climb, which is where the real race started. The climb started with a hard 20% ramp, which splintered the remaining group. Those who were left simply had to do would they could to get to the finish as the climb slowly broke rider after rider.

Peter Herzig was the strongest rider of the day and won in strong fashion. Meanwhile, the team all managed to finish the tough race, with all the boys getting themselves into good positions (results still pending).

Next round – Kingaroy

Next race – Metro Championships

Battle on the Border

Stage 1
The first stage was a short 5.5km TT. This stage had little influence on the overall race, with both Matt and Sam putting in decent times to be within 50 seconds of the lead. After this short test, it was important to save the legs for stage 2 in the afternoon

Stage 2
This stage was a hard 150km hilly stage around Mooball in northern NSW. With several large climbs and the distance, it was always going to be a hard race. Interestingly, there were no significant breakaways, and with 10km and two large climbs to go, there was still a large group together and a bunch sprint was to ensue. Sam managed to stay in the front group and finished up the front and was 18th overall. Nick Schultz too a great win considering he’s only 17. He also took the overall lead.

Stage 3
Stage 3 was 120km with several good climbs. Matt decided he would lay it on the line and try and get into some kind of breakaway to try and take the pressure of the rest of the team. Matt got into a couple of small breaks, but with 20km to go, the race was still mostly together. Over the last climb and with 10km to go, two rider slipped off the front and gained a good lead. Sam got into a small chase group who tried to bridge up to the front pair. Although they didn’t catch the front group, they maintained an advantage on the main group and Sam managed to get himself into 8th overall. Michael Hoskings took the lead.

Stage 4
The last stage was a tight 45min crit around Salt. Sam hoped to maintain his 8th spot and did a great job to hold onto the front group and managed to move up one spot in the overall to get 7th, which is a great effort for his first multi stage race.

Michael Hoskings took the overall win.