Bay Crits Day 3: Geelong Botanic Gardens (short course)

Today’s race was again held right outside our door step in the Botanic Gardens. It was held on a 2km course over the other side of the gardens with a couple of tight corners at both ends and a slight rise out of the back one just to mix things up a little bit. From the time the race started, the pressure was on. This crit is basically the survival of the fittest and within the first few laps the peloton was strung out and the elastic band showed signs of snapping. I was clinging to the pack for dear life as the hammer was being thrown down and one by one riders started dropping off. It was hard to see who was causing most of the damage, but whoever it was, was doing an awesome job at it! Unfortunately this race was scared by a crash involving our NSWIS team mate Meagan Dunn. Meagan’s front wheel slipped out as she was driving it around the first bend and she crashed, breaking her collar bone. It was a very unlucky thing to happen, and she was lucky that no other major damage was caused! Meagan has now had an operation to fix her shoulder and hopefully she will be on the bike fighting fit in no time, I wish her a speedy recovery! The crash meant that the race stopped for around 18min whilst the riders were being attended too. The clock continued to run due to TV commitments and so we started the race with around 15min remaining. The bunch had regrouped (which most of the girls weren’t too happy with) and so the pressure was on again to regain the advantage that they had but into the bunch. As soon as we rolled out, I felt my legs. The lactic acid that had been building up over the last half of the race had accumulated in my legs and so I was struggling big time and I think so were the other girls. I managed to stay in the race until just under 5min remaining when my bunch of 5 other riders got pulled out. I was a bit disappointed not to be able to make it to the end of the race, but looking back on last year I think I lasted less than 10min? So that in itself is something to be proud of! The stage got taken out by surprise winner Rowena Fry, a mountain biker from Tasmania. It was a tactfully well timed sprint and a well deserved win. She attacked right as the peloton swerved left and no one was expecting her to go! Peta Mullens rolled across the line to pick up 2nd and Kirsty Broun rounded out the podium for 3rd. Chloe Hosking rode another brilliant race to finish 5th and so has moved herself into 5th on GC whilst Rochelle Gilmore scored herself a few more sprint points to extend her lead in the Sprint Classification! Tomorrow’s stage is one I have been looking forward to all week, Portarlington. Can’t wait! Hopefully I’ll be able to report back with some good news from the team!


Warming up before the crit

Take care
xo