Caleb Ewan racks up his 6th victory in 2016 on Stage 1 of the Tour Down Under in Adelaide, South Australia

Legendary sprinter Robbie McEwan summed up the first stage of the Tour Down Under in South Australia with poetic simplicity. 

“Too much fitness, too much form, too much speed,” McEwan said of Caleb Ewan’s win, his sixth of the year.

 

Stage 1 of the Tour Down Under set off just 3km from the Adelaide CBD in the inner-northern suburb of Prospect. It was steamy, windy, dusty and 130km to the finish line after three laps around the famous Barossa Valley wine region in to the town of Lyndoch.

Sean Lake (UniSA), Martijn Keizer (Team Lotto NL Jumbo) and Alexis Gougeard (AG2R La Mondiale) jumped ahead of the field as soon as the flag had waved.

Lake took the only categorised climb of the day at the 12.8km mark, edging Keizer in a photo finish. The UniSA rider donned the polka dot jersey at the end of the day, continuing a strong start to 2016 for Lake after a bronze medal at the Australian national time trial.

The three-rider break was kept on a short leash. Their advantage rapidly declined from 80km out as Orica GreenEdge set the tempo behind to keep Caleb Ewan “the guy with the freshest legs that wins the sprint in the end”.

The break jostled for the first Cockatoo Valley sprint point. Frenchman Gougeard opened hostilities from third wheel and crossed the line ahead of Keizer and an indifferent Lake. The second sprint points on the following lap were then taken in a bizarre fashion by Gougeard ahead of Lake and Keizer. The police motos were caught unaware of the acceleration behind them and accidentally blocked the riders from a proper sprint. Oops. Keizer would drop back to the peloton soon after.

With 47km to go, the field started to spread across the road and the Orica GreenEdge presence reduced to just Michael Hepburn. Hepburn wouldn’t leave the front until 15km to go.

Sean Lake gapped Gougeard with 22km to go, the Frenchman showing no interest in fighting for the diminishing 25-second gap in the scorching 40°C heat.

Lake’s move impressed Robbie McEwan as he commentated on the race.

“This sport is about having a big engine, and knowing how to suffer,” McEwan said about strongman Sean Lake.

Lake bravely stretched his gap to 55 seconds with 16km to go, but was swallowed by the group at the 6km mark.

Sprint trains began forming with 10km remaining. Lampre, Lotto-Soudal, Sky, and Dimension Data appeared to have the best organisation in the punishing wind.

Peter Kennaugh (Sky) took control at the 1km mark, leading a well-organised Sky train. Daryl Impey (Orica GreenEdge) dragged Ewan up the side of the Sky line, dropping him into the perfect position behind fellow Aussie Mark Renshaw (Dimension Data). Adam Blythe (Tinkoff) opened the hostilities from a long way out, but faded as the other sprinters wound it up.

Renshaw was sprinting for himself, but inadvertently gave Ewan the perfect lead-out. The 21-year old Australian jumped out from behind Renshaw and powered for the line, winning by two bike lengths. Renshaw would cross second, with Wouter Wippert (Cannondale Pro Cycling) third.

The impeccable timing, mind-blowing power-to-weight, and impossibly low position begs the question whether Ewan is beatable for the Tour Down Under.

“I need to thank Gerro (Simon Gerrans) for sharing the team with me” said Ewan, still panting from his sprint effort. “For a guy like that who can win overall to say I can have the team to chase a sprint, it means a lot.”

Ewan will lead the GC, sprint, and young rider classification for 132km Stage 2 on Wednesday (20 Jan) from the suburb of Unley to Stirling in the hills east of Adelaide.  

What were they thinking?

It’s surprising that a 20-team race allowed a three-man break to fight for the first polka dot jersey, decided only 12.8km in. In the end it was only two men contesting the KOM. This is a short race, every point matters. Also, polka dots look awesome, it has been scientifically proven. Good luck pulling the jersey off Sean Lake, the ex-rower is burly. 

Author James Raison

Thank You James and "The Lead South Australia"

SD TEAM.

The World Famous Stage 4 of the Granfondo China.

Last week everyone in the world was admiring and talking about the crash that happened at the finish line in Dali right next to the Olympic Stadium.

Road.CC was the one advertising in the western world, unfortunately they have reported what they picked up from local medias in China & Riders that were not there,and even worst then ever made no contacts to the Organising Team.Quite unprofessional I would say. 

I was there,and this happened few hundreds yards before my crossing on the line.Therefore, it would be unfair for me to explain this and also because I feel a quite passionate about the accident.

Therefore an anonymous rider that was in the pack writes to us to understand.

There appears to be gross misinformation and interpretation going rampant on global social media about what happened at the Yunnan Gran Fondo Day four spectacular crash. This is a comment in the attempt to shed light on what actually happened in China and for the record, it could happen to any organiser in the world.  Something similar had happened in Texas racing in the past where the lead group and chase group go separate ways on the race course, although not on the same scale in Dali. First, lets correct some facts. There were allegations that the lead car went the wrong way and that the organiser, Nordic Ways, deny fault. Both are un-true and come from people interviewed that were not even at the race. It seems that most of the Western media, including road.cc just copies the story released by China Press Agency Xinhua without verifying any of the facts including misquoting the name of the event. The statement that 17 cyclists were hospitalised as a result of that crash is also incorrect. There were many crashes, as is normal in bike racing, during the high speed stage and those riders went to the hospital. It is quite common for riders in China to be taken to the hospital as a precaution.  

Where is the investigative journalism in the sport of cycling?  Are journalists in the sport just seeking sensationalism without checking facts?  It was unfortunate that the local Chinese media based their reports on testimonies provided by people who had not even witnessed the crash accident and never bothered to verify claims with the race director or relevant people in the organisation.  This has led to Western media picking this up and re-publishing; thus creating the social media storm we are witnessing now. 

There was no doubt that the local organisation made a mistake with the final corner that led the lead group riders to take the wrong side of the road.  It was also announced immediately after the crash that damages of any kind would be compensated. This shows that Nordic Ways was taking responsibility for the incident, so the claim that the organisers refused to take the blame is ludicrous. It should also be remembered that a number of riders from the lead group said afterwards “as a rider you also need to keep using your head”.

As it happens, I was part of the lead group contesting the stage and now will offer my view on what happened in those last few moments of the 125km stage around the ErHai Lake of Dali. 

Firstly, this type of crash with riders from opposing directions hitting each other like Spartacus on bikes is perhaps a one-of-a-kind. As far as I know this type of crash had never happened before in the history of cycling and, statistically speaking, it is highly unlikely it will never happen again. It also could happen to any organiser and not just because it is in China. There seems to be an undercurrent of borderline racist comments happening on social media channels without any basis. These are people who have never before raced in China, perhaps never even been to China on a visit.  China does actually put on fantastic events and they are run with a high safety record. If you have raced in other countries like Philippines or other South East Asian places, you will understand how chaotic it can be. 

Think about it for a second, a peloton sprinting in full flight in the wrong direction to the finish-line and colliding with a second group of racers sprinting in the correct direction, makes for potentially a nasty fatal crash. Fortunately, all riders made it through relatively unscathed despite nearly 20 riders hitting the deck crashing into riders head on.  The final corner in question should have been marked and marshalled by local police officials. It transpired that the two assigned workers for the left-hand corner that led to the finishing straight, approx 800m before the finish-line, bungled the corner. They did not follow instructions given to them and they closed off the corner on the outside with tape instead of the inside. The workers had also placed bright orange cones but spaced too far apart, thus in the heat of the action the lead group followed the first rider and thats how the large group went down the wrong side of the road. Further confusing riders was the red banner on the right side of the road next to the correct banner.

I truly don’t know what was going on in their minds when the decision was made to do the U-turn and sprint again when it was crystal clear that the riders went down the wrong finishing chute?

Perhaps it was desperation for a result and thus prize money that is on offer?  What happened was truly the worst possible way to crash. There was a small group of five riders contesting the sprint amongst themselves (they had been gapped off the front group due to the crash with 4km to go). The rider in red buried himself and did not look up during his final 150m sprint. When he did look up, it was too late; he had smashed into the first rider also sprinting to the finish-line. It was miraculous that all riders came out of the crash with minor injuries; the damage was restricted to one broken collar-bone and one broken finger plus plenty of bruises. 

If there was no prize money on offer, would the riders still be so desperate to sprint in the wrong direction to win a bike race?

Back to the final corner blunder. In hind-sight, which is always 20-20, if riders themselves took on responsibility by scouting out the last 1km of the course, it may have prevented the events that happened as all would know to take the left side of the road after the corner. But then again, the organisers need to make it water-tight so that it is impossible for riders to take the wrong turn.  

This whole incident shines light on how important it is for protecting rider safety by ensuring water-tight courses. This was an unfortunate incident that transpired but lets not get caught up on the idea that it could only happen in China; it could happen anywhere. 

Racing in China is a unique experience for foreigners and lets not let an event like this prevent you from exploring the racing scene yourself, should you ever have the opportunity.   Nordic Ways has been putting on events in China for more than 10 years and have a solid reputation for putting on iconic events. They are also responsible for popularising the Gran Fondo movement in China. Visit their website for more details - www.granfondochina.com

Thank you

Mountain Cronoscalata,Granfondo China

Ciao Everyone,

After a day of rest travelling,  we arrived on Tuesday afternoon in the old town of Chuxiong, welcomed by traditional dances and music.

The hotel is located in the town square,walking distance from all the local attractions,food stalls & restaurants. 

The temperature was pleasant and everyone was happy to go out for a meal.So we all gathered and walk down the road until we found a local restaurant.

We then discovered the beauty of Chuxiong , a traditional minority people’s village which enabled us to step into the past of China.

We walked along the canals , hosted into people houses to try their local plum wine and snap few shots with them.

Dinner time arrived like a flash,  with all little BBQ food street stalls we adventured into one which we picked our raw skewers and vegetables ready for the following day Cronoscalata.

We remounted our bikes the following morning for a 23.5km mass start time trial to a summit of 2450 m.s.l with a total ascent of nearly 800 metres.It was sharp gently painful in the legs and lungs. I loved it so much after reaching nearly 2200 m.s.l. the cloud level was with us making the road nice and slippery with temperature dropped down to 6 Degrees Celsius.

A bit chilly a the the top but still amazing. Everyone was dismounting their bikes to be loaded in the truck to go to the Dali Stage.

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Tomorrow will be stage from the Dali lake race,115km on the lake.

Ride Safe.Share the road with everyone.

SD Team


Alex Jones & National Track Championship

After yesterday blog, today Alex tells us about his National Championship. 

National Mens, Womens and Para Track Championships

Three weeks later I was back at the National Cycling Centre this time to compete in my first Para National Track Champs– a daunting but exciting prospect as I would be sharing the track with the Paralympic and World Champion multi gold medallists Jody Cundy, Rik Waddon and Jon Allan Butterworth, who were all really encouraging and friendly. I knew that I would need to treat this as an experience to learn from and do my best in front of the GB coaches who were videoing my races for later analysis .

My events were the Kilo,the flying 200 and the 4k Pursuit, a race I had never done before as youths do not do those distances. I was very lucky to have my coach there to pace me and although it was an agonizing effort I got my time splits right and put in controlled first attempt. It was amazing watching the pros smash their times in the flying 200 and I was inspired by them to put down another PB. As youth rider I have been on strict gear restrictions but now I will be able to gradually increase my strength and gearing so that I will be able to compete on a more equal footing in the future. Again the results were factored but in the mens category I came away with 3rd,3rd,4th but more importantly with an improvement in all my times and another great experience to learn from. 

Thank you Alex and great effort.

Very well done from the SD Team.