The new kids on track block: The Coffee Ride #193, with Reece Homfray
MACEY Stewart and Kristina Clonan on joining the national women’s track endurance program, is Esteban Chaves heading Down Under? And Miles Scotson scores two-year deal with French team.
Cycling
Don't miss out on the headlines from Cycling. Followed categories will be added to My News.
MACEY Stewart and Kristina Clonan on joining the national women’s track endurance program, is Esteban Chaves heading Down Under? And Miles Scotson scores two-year deal with French team.
AUSSIE CYCLING FRESHLY BREWED, EXCLUSIVE TO ADVERTISER.COM.AU
NEW KIDS ON THE BLOCK
THE two newest members of Australia’s women’s track endurance team have arrived in Adelaide dreaming of Tokyo in 2020 but for now are simply focused on getting through training one day at a time.
Macey Stewart joined her track teammates after five months racing on the road in Europe a fortnight ago while Kristina Clonan flew in from Queensland as the baby of the squad at 20 but not short on ambition.
Both will race the Oceania Track Championships in Adelaide from October 10-13 but aren’t expecting to set the boards alight.
“It’s been an awesome five months but time to switch on and get in a bit of a routine now for the next couple of years,” Stewart said.
“I think it will take a while to find my track legs, there’s a fair bit of work to be done, but I’ll keep looking at the bigger picture which is Tokyo and take it day by day and do as much as I can.
“This year has been great, I’ve had some amazing experience racing around the world but it’s going to be nice to unpack my bags and just stop living out of a suitcase, get day to day and weekly routine.
“I think I need to be in one place for a while to get the best out of myself.”
Stewart, 22, was disappointed to miss this year’s Commonwealth Games but after a serious crash at the women’s Tour Down Under in January knew she was up against it.
“It just wasn’t meant to be, with my crash at Tour Down Under which I’m fine with that now, but I’ve missed out the last few big events for Australia and I’m keen to not let that happen again,” she said.
Her switch back to the track full-time coincides with the news that her pro team Wiggle-High 5 would cease to exist beyond this season but Stewart said she was likely done with the road for now anyway.
“Even if Wiggle kept going I’m not sure I would have gone to the road next year anyway, so it’s worked out well for me that I wanted to focus fully on the track for the next two years,” she said.
“I’ll still do a little stint in winter just to get out of the cold but I’ll be based here and that’s where we’ll put in all the hard work.”
Stewart will train through the Oceania Track Championships and isn’t sure whether she’ll defend the madison title with Clonan.
“We’re racing the Paris world cup straight after so it’s all sort of training for a bigger picture,” she said.
“My biggest aim at the moment is to try to make the worlds team in January, so for me it’s building up and training until then.
“We’re not 100 per cent sure whether we’ll race the madison together yet (with Clonan), we’ve got a really good group of girls here and are keen to mix it up and see who’s best with who so possibly we’ll end up racing together but we’ll see.
“The environment in Adelaide has changed a lot the last couple of years, we’re all genuinely friends and it’s such a strong group and I think we’ll go ahead in leaps and bounds. The culture we have here will help our performance on the bike.”
Racing for the Japan Track Cup starts tomorrow. Hopefully our legs are as fast as the track tomorrow 👊ðŸ»ðŸ‘ŠðŸ»ðŸ”¥ðŸ”¥ pic.twitter.com/o7bwb5MlGV
— Kristina Clonan (@kjclonan) July 5, 2018
Clonan said she was keen to learn as much as she can from her more experienced teammates but still has high hopes of making an impact herself.
“All the girls have so much experience so it’s kind of good to be the young one and take in as much as you can,” she said.
“But you don’t come to Adelaide and relocate your whole life just to roll around so I’m definitely looking for big things to come hopefully.
“Me and Macey both worked really hard trying to push into that group of girls, so I wasn’t surprised because I’d been working towards it for a long time but I’m very humbled to be
amongst those girls.
With Annette Edmondson due to fly in from Europe this week the whole squad will be training together in the lead-up to Oceanias.
“It will be good to ride with those girls who have so much experience and get a feel for it,” Clonan said.
QUICK SPIN ...
ESTEBAN COMEBACK DOWN UNDER?
INJURY-HIT Colombian climber Esteban Chaves is a chance to return to racing in Australia over summer.
Chaves, who started this season by winning the Herald Sun Tour, has not raced since the Giro d’Italia in May while recovering from a knee injury.
His 2017 season was also cut short by injury when he stopped racing in September.
If Chaves makes it back to Australia it’s not known whether he will defend his Sun Tour title or race the Tour Down Under in Adelaide - or both.
But Aussie fans are unlikely to see either of the Yates brothers including Simon who made history last month when he won Mitchelton-Scott’s first ever Grand Tour at the Vuelta a Espana.
SCOTSON SET TO JOIN FRENCH TEAM
GOOD news for former national champion Miles Scotson who is set to join French pro team Groupama-FDJ for next year.
Scotson is one of three Aussies currently on the BMC roster who are all set to move teams next year when BMC becomes ‘CCC’ in 2019.
Scotson, 24, last raced at the Tour of Britain last month, and is expected to join FDJ on a two-year deal.
OPPY FOR SPRATTY
ROHAN Dennis and Amanda Spratt put the exclamation mark on a very solid world championships in Innsbruck, Austria, for the Australian team last week.
Dennis’ time trial win was a lifetime in the making but particularly sweet given he’s endured a shocking run of luck with crashes and equipment failure in major TT’s to get there.
But Spratt’s silver medal in the women’s road race was a huge result and should make her a major contender for this year’s Oppy Medal as Australian cyclist of the Year.
Consider her results in 2018:
4th - National Championships
1st - Tour Down Under
7th - Strade Bianche
4th - Trofeo Alfredo Binda - Commune di Cittiglio
3rd - Amstel Gold
5th - La Fleche Wallonne
2nd - Liege Bastogne Liege
1st - WWT Emakumeen XXXI Bira
1st - SwissEver GP Cham - Hagendorn
3rd - Giro d’Italia
8th - La Course be Le Tour de France
5th - GP de Plouay - Lorient Agglomeration
6th - Boels Ladies Tour
2nd - World championship road race
If that’s not the definition of consistency then I don’t know what is.
Originally published as The new kids on track block: The Coffee Ride #193, with Reece Homfray
Ranked: Who should really be named SA’s top sporting hero?
We’ve named the top 100 athletes, teams and sporting icons from South Australia. But did we get it right? Rate our full list here.
Great Ocean Road Race: Aussie team produces stunner in scorcher
The mercury went above 40 in the men’s Cadel Evans Great Ocean Road Race, and it was an unlikely Swiss sensation who delivered glory for an Australian team in the sweltering heat.