Southland riders win novice and junior time trials

Press, 23 February 1989, Page 44

Southland riders win novice and junior time trials

By

MALCOLM CONDIE

A postponement of the senior kilometre time trial because of rain and the time-consuming pursuit qualifying rounds added stress to the full programme in the national track cycling championships in Invercargill yesterday. The host centre, though, provided near-ideal conditions later in the day for a catch-up session, and after two wins, it was riding on a high. Southland riders won both the novice and junior time trials — the first events decided on the programme. The novice title went to Stuart Mac Lean, who pedalled 500 m from a standing start in 35.3005, nearly half a second

quicker than Waikato’s Brendon Cameron, who was second. Andrew Barlow rubbed salt into the wounds of the other cycling centres by giving Southland its second medal, in the junior 1000 m time trial. He stopped the clock in Imin 09.9945, faster than a majority of the seniors could ride.

Late on Tuesday evening the senior time trial got under way, and with only four of the 35 riders remaining, rain drenched the track. The entire session was rerun yesterday morning.

Because the track was colder in the morning, times were generally slower but the favourite, Tony Graham, was a clear winner in Imin 7.8835. Canterbury’s fastest

time trialist was the national sprint champion, Jon Andrews. Andrews was third behind Waikato’s Gary Anderson, stopping the clock at Imin 8.6565.

Graham’s time equated to an average speed over the 1000 m of 53.032km/h.

Five Cantabrians made it through the senior 4000 m individual pursuit qualifying round yesterday. Olympians Nigel Donnelly and Brian Fowler join Jason Smith, Mark Lucas and Carlos Marryatt. They were seeded to ride against the other qualifiers, Stuart Williams and Tony Graham, of Auckland; and the titleholder, Gary Anderson, of West Coast, North Island. Chris Barnsley, Todd

Skilling and Tony Creelman qualified in the junior 3000 m pursuit but are against tough competition in Southland’s Barlow and Nelson/Marlborough’s Craig Saunders.

z Women took to Kew Bowl for the first time yesterday in the first two rounds of the sprint. Although Canterbury had four sprinters of the total of ten, all had been eliminated by the second round.

Today the programme concentrates mainly on the elimination rounds for all the sprints and individual pursuits. The junior 8000 m will be the highlight of the day’s session and the quarter-final-ists of the sprints, and semi-finalists of the individual pursuits will be known. ' >