PHIL O’SHEA RETURNS.D

Star (Christchurch), Issue 16875, 27 October 1922, Page 6

PHIL O’SHEA RETURNS.D

“ WOULD LIKE TO TRY AGAIN.” | ROAD CHAMPION’S WISH. New Zealand's best-known cycle racer, Phil O'Shea, Australasian road champion for the second term, reached his home in Christchurch this morning. He looks as fit and well as ever he I “ You know,” he said smilingly this j morning, “ 1 would like to have another shot at that A\ arrnambool-Mel-bourne race. 1 believe l could get it.” To-day he stands as Now Zealand’s champion for all events with the exception of the half-mile. Twice he has secured fastest time in the Wurrnambool road race. O’Shea, was surrounded by a number of friends and youthful hero-wor- ! shippers when he was interviewed to- ! day. "When asked about the published i statement that Kirk ham had left New ! Zealand’s champion standing at one stage of the journe- Phil expressed Ins | frank surprise. “ I don’t know how that impression -ot into the papers, - he said. “ Kirk ham never got away. Six of us started on scratch, but Kirkham was the only one to finish with me. He got second fastest time. “ About tivelve miles from the finish 1 got into some loose stuff and came ! down, and the others went on. But I easily caught them up.” O’Shea said that he had riders with him all the way, and they were all good sports with the exception of one who refused to do any pacing. “ I’m jolly glad Hill won, said O’Shea. Referring to the race D. Wright put up, he said that he “ toed it in like a madman ’ all the way. ! “ He rode a great race,” said the wi+Ti tmthnsaiasm. “He

champion. with enthusiasm. Lxe was placed fifth, but in reality got fourth.” i O’Shea, Wright and Hill rode .00 ‘ miles in a week and a. half in training ' tor the race in Australia, and O Shea ! thinks that this great amount of ridj mg made him feel just a little less fit j than ho was after the Timaruj Christchurch race, quite recently, j “ Yet I think if I had a good run of luck I would pull the race off,” he said. , “ Will you try ? ” 1 c ' Don’t know,” lie said. “ I’ll keep riding as long as I am able to, because if I didn’t I think ray health would suffer!” It is worth stating that out of the 200 starters in the race Phil O’Shea was the only one to do the distance of 165 miles under nine hours. He did it in 8 hours 59min 88sec. Touching on the hurly-burly of a finish to the big race O’Shea said that ! the huge crowds burst loose after their two hours’ wait when the first men showed up. The riders came down the track with the wind behind them at a terrific rate. Reaching the course where the finish was the riders had to make an abrupt turn and here they stiuck the rough, heavy going that caused so much confusion. It was an old ploughed course, used for sweating down race-horses, and this was the baldest going of all. Hill judged his tiack better than his immediate attendants. “ We had heaps of jobs offered to us over there. They all wanted us to siay,” said O’Shea, who mentioned that in all probability the inducements to live in the land of the kaj garoo would prove too strong for Hill.