Nightcliff GP strikes gold at 2023 Australian Cycling Masters

Australian cycling royalty came to the aid of an amateur cyclist in his hour of need after an unfortunate set of circumstances left him unable to compete. Read the unlikely story.

Phillip Brownscombe (centre) standing atop the podium after winning gold at the Masters. Picture: Contributed.

Dr Phillip Brownscombe was left questioning why he’d bothered travelling 3700km to Victoria following a catastrophic mechanical failure in the lead up to his race.

The Darwin GP and avid cyclist made the trek to Shepparton to compete in the 2023 Australian Masters Cycling competition, something he’d been preparing for months in advance.

With success in prior iterations of the competition, Brownscombe was looking to replicate said heroics after suffering a terrible run of injuries that’d kept him sidelined for the past couple of years.

After two separate cycling accidents left him hospitalised with four broken vertebrae and a nasty shoulder infection after a break, Brownscombe said he was back to his best and was eager to have another shot at elite competition.

However, the Darwin Cycling Club member was left wondering why he even signed up for the comp in the early hours of qualifying day.

“I was seriously asking myself ‘why am I here’ and ‘am I better off just packing it in and heading home’,” Brownscombe said.

“The night before I was on the bike and I noticed that my gears weren’t shifting.

“So I stopped and gave it a look and realised it had spontaneously broken.”

Phillip Brownscombe proudly wearing his gold medals after competing in the 2023 Cycling Masters, Shepparton, Vic. Picture: Contributed.

An integral piece of equipment on any bike, a derailleur is a type of bicycle gear responsible for moving the bike’s chain from one sprocket to another, shifting gears in the process.

“Shimano stopped making the derailleur on my bike so I spent the whole night trawling through sites like Facebook Marketplace, eBay, bike shops, basically anywhere I thought was a chance of having one for sale,” he said.

“I eventually found a store in Melbourne that said they had one in stock so after being up late, my mate and I woke up in the early hours of the morning to drive the two and a bit hours to the store.

“And when I got there and asked the employee if I could purchase one he told me that in fact didn’t have my derailleur and said it was an error that it was still advertised as being in stock.”

He got back to Shepparton with 30 minutes to spare before the qualifying time-trial.

Deflated and believing that he’d not be able to compete, it was Brownscombe’s mate that threw up an idea out of left field.

“He said, ‘why don’t we just go down to the local shop and see’,” Brownscombe said.

“So we walked in and then what happened was frankly unbelievable.

“Turns out the shop was owned by Australian Sports Hall of Fame inductee and Aussie BMX legend Leigh Egan.

“I told him what my issue was and he replied, ‘stay right there’.

“He came back with a bike and said, ‘This is one of Brett’s old bikes, I’m sure he won’t mind if you borrow his (derailleur)’.”

Tour de France – stage 12 – bourg-de-peage to mende. Riders make their way up the last 3 km of the Cote de la Croix-Neuve. Australian Brett Lancaster makes his way up the climb.

As fate would have it, another cycling legend and local Brett Lancaster OAM worked at the shop too and had the exact same derailleur as Brownscombe on one of his old racing bikes.

Riding in the Men’s 6 category, Brownscombe went on to win the double, first in the Road Race and the Criterium.

Brownscombe said he was absolutely over the moon with the result and while the races were tough he was quietly confident he was fully capable of bringing home the gold, and wouldn’t have been possible if not for the generosity of complete strangers.