Aaron Donnelly wins Stage 1 of Jayco Herald Sun Tour

YOUTH overcame experience in a scorching start to the Jayco Herald Sun Tour yesterday.

Matt Windley

2 min read

January 4, 2013 - 3:36PM

HeraldSun

Aaron Donnelly wins Stage 1 of Jayce Herald Sun Tour

YOUTH overcame experience in a scorching start to the Jayco Herald Sun Tour yesterday.

With some of the race's big guns floundering in near 40C heat, youngsters prospered as Aaron Donnelly, 21, beat Calvin Watson, 19, and Josh Atkins, 20, to the line in a gut-wrenching sprint finish after four hours and five minutes of racing.

Donnelly (Huon Salmon-Genesys Wealth Advisers) will wear the leader's yellow jersey in today's second stage and is every chance of maintaining his advantage - at least until tomorrow's final stage at Arthurs Seat.

He has a 14-second gap on Watson (Jayco VIS Apollo), 17 seconds on Atkins (Grays Online New Zealand national team) and 2min 20sec on fourth-placed Brad Linfield (Degani Bakery Cafe).

"I hope so. I'll definitely be trying to," an exhausted Donnelly said when asked if he could win overall.

"We've got a very strong team, so we'll see what happens."

The last thing Donnelly would have wanted after 147km of torture would have been a 500m sprint.

Watson loomed large on Donnelly's shoulder coming in to the short home straight at the Bendigo velodrome, but the NSW rider held on.

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"I started cramping big time with about 10km to go and I didn't think I'd be able to have a sprint at the finish," Donnelly said.

"Coming into the velodrome I knew it would be best to lead out and I was just glad it came off."

Spare a thought for Watson and Atkins, who were pipped by the narrowest of margins.

"It was just such a tough day out there," Watson said.

"Personally, I was away (from the peloton) from kilometre zero, so when we came in to the last 20km I was using all of my reserves just to stay with the guys.

"Aaron won and he deserved to because he was by far the strongest guy out there today."

Atkins said a lapse in concentration cost him.

"If you watch on the TV, I think you'll see it was a pretty poor effort at the finish by me," Atkins said.

"I thought it was two laps at the finish, but it was only 1 1/2, and I thought we would get a bell as well.

"I was sitting on the wheel waiting for the sprint, they started going and I thought 'I think I've cooked this'.

"You can have excuses, but still to ride away and have a good race was good."

Defending champion Nathan Haas (Jayco Australian national team) made an early attack, winning the first King of the Mountain points after involving himself in a breakaway of 11, but his momentum was halted soon after losing his chain on the descent into Newham.

The main move came after 60km when a group of seven split, at one stage taking a six-minute lead.

The peloton closed to two minutes with 2km to go, but could not catch the leaders.

Simon Gerrans was best placed of the Australian team, finishing 13th.

Stage two leaves the Mitchelton Winery at 11.30am and riders are expected at the Healesville finish line about 3.30pm.