Wright eyes World Champs after six golds at Qld Titles

A training shift helped this Mackay cyclist blitz the field and hog the podium at the Queensland Track Masters this week

Mackay Cycling Club member Hamish Wright went a perfect six-from-six at the Queensland Track Masters in Brisbane this week.

Another year, another golden medal haul for Mackay’s premiere track cyclist Hamish Wright.

The 43 year old went a perfect six-from-six at the Queensland Track Masters in Brisbane this week – a feat even the uber-fit athlete admitted he never thought would be on the cards.

“I’ve always done relatively well in my specialty events – the sprint events – but this year being the funny year that it is, I changed my training just a little bit,” Wright explained.

When Wright last spoke to the Daily Mercury in March this year, he had just claimed gold in the M3 Keirin at the Masters Track Nationals and had his eyes set on the World Titles in Manchester.

That October date with destiny was cancelled due to coronavirus and Wright was forced to refocus his efforts on the Queensland Track Masters, which were pushed forward three months.

“Normally the state titles are in February, so I would (plan to) have a mini-peak there and then time my proper peak for nationals which are usually in March. But this year they’re five months apart, so I just trained on through and didn’t back off,” Wright said.

That meant arriving at the Anna Meares Velodrome this week a touch off his top-end pace for the sprints, but with more staying power in the seat.

“I was around 0.2 of a second off my PBs for the flying 200m and 750m time trials, so a little bit off,” Wright said.

“That’s explained by not having that top-end speed. In the 200 I was touching about 68km/h – you really need to hit that 70km/h mark to break that 11-second barrier, which I did at last year’s nationals.

“In saying that, my sprint events were good; in line or even ahead of where I thought I would be. The endurance events I was way ahead of where they normally would be, so I definitely benefited from the continual training.”

Mackay Cycling Club member Hamish Wright won all six of his events at the Queensland Track Masters at the Anna Meares Velodrome.

His altered approached paid dividends, with Wright also claiming the 15km Scratch Race, Omnium and Points Race to go with his usual stellar sprint results in the Match Sprint, 750m Time Trial and his favourite, the Keirin.

It meant pushing the luggage weight limit when he flew home to Mackay on Wednesday.

“It weighed the bag down a bit,” Wright joked of his six gold medals.

After shrugging off the disappointment of no World Championships this year, Wright knuckled down in training with renewed vigour.

With “95 per cent” of his training done solo, Wright said the main disruption brought about by coronavirus this year was the lack of competitive meets.

“You’ll normally plan your season around reaching certain goals throughout the year and training for big events is part of that,” he said.

“As soon as I finish Nationals one year I’ll start on the next year.

“This year’s training was all targeted at going back to Manchester for the World Championships – when that got canned it was a matter of refocusing.

“I had to say, ‘OK that’s not ideal, but but this gives me another year to prepare’.”

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All going well, Wright’s return to the world stage will come in early October 2021 when the showpiece event moves to Los Angeles.

“I’ve been to Worlds twice and medalled the last time I was there,” he said.

“The target now is a step higher on that podium.”

That will mean a return to his pet sprint events, using the Masters Track Nationals at the end of March next year as a much-needed competitive building block.

Toowoomba’s Nathan Graves set the M3 200m World Record at this year’s Masters Track Nationals and will once again be one of Wright’s fiercest competitors next year.

Joining the Queensland pair in Brisbane next March will be New South Welshman Shane Dirks, who is the reigning M3 750m Time Trial World Champion.

“Two of the best guys in our Masters age group are in Australia, so it’s great for me to get that yardstick against those guys,” Wright said.

In his quest for World Championships glory, the Mackay cyclist is leaving no stone unturned. After four days of gruelling cycling in Brisbane, he was back on the back just hours after touching down in Mackay.

“We’re heading north for Christmas and the New Year but I’ll take the trainer and road bike and train right through,” he said.

“I think it encourages you when you get some reasonable results. I have to hold on to (the conditioning) that I have now – I can’t be backing off.”

Wright and his fellow Mackay Cycling Club members will next be in competitive action at the Rockhampton Cup early next month.

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