Photo: © Anthony Tan

Moving on up: The Trent Wilson Journal 2003

Welcome to the Trent Wilson Journal for 2003. The young iTeamNova rider was one of the six who made the cut when the Australian Div III team merged with RDM-Flanders to form Flanders-iTeamNova, and move into Division II.

• Index to all entries

Not over yet - the Warny and the Sun Tour

Australia, October 11-18

G'day,

I arrived in Melbourne last Friday. After dodging the bad weather and getting a few chores out the way, we got a short easy ride in to roll the legs over before Saturday's Melbourne to Warrnambool. I got to check out John Trevorrow's "Cogs" café restaurant. The memorabilia was great and the coffee was even better. 'Iffy' had really done a good job.

Saturday was a very early start to the day with a 5am wake up. My old team mate and good mate Tomas Buchacek couldn't believe that we were getting up at this hour for a bike race. A very chilly 7.30am start and a 10km neural zone presented the bunch before the flag was dropped. We had the full Aussie contingent lining up, McKenzie, Drew, Iacuone and myself, along with kiwi Scott Guyton. It wasn't long before we hit some cross wind and the boys got gee'd to spice it up. We threw it in the gutter and split it to bits but it came back together once we hit the gale force head wind.

The next 80kms was winding through the flat lands towards Geelong, constantly being split in the gutter before hitting another block head wind. Finally a break went and we had Scotty and Macca there. They got a nice gap as the bunch kept racing flat out in the gutter and sitting up again when we hit the head winds.

We turned onto the Hume highway and it split big time and I thought that was the one to stay, but once again it came back together but it took 40km to do so. Attacks were going non-stop and breaks were going. Three groups of eight or so riders came together to make one big group. We hit a few hills coming into Camperdown after about 220km and it split even more down to 15 riders. Drewy and I were both there. Drewy felt great and wanted to get his third Warnie win. I drove the break to get the gap before the attacks started again and I got shelled and rode in the finish 12th with Phil Thuaux.

Drewy went on to make the winning break along with Gerrans and Matt Wilson. Gerrans went on to win solo, with Drewy getting second in front of Matt. Scotty Guyton went crazy for the sprints and picked up the Sprint Classification for the second year in a row.

The next few days were spent recovering in front of the TV and doing nice easy rides. I was staying in Melbourne with my mate Brendan that used to race with me in Sydney. It was good to relax for a few days instead of running around with thongs to do in Sydney. I also went to Trevorrow's annual golf day. It was a great day and Melbs put on its best weather, but I realise why I'm a pro cyclist and not a pro golfer.

VicRoads Herald Sun Tour

The Sun Tour was put back to an 11 day race and I was lining up for my fourth Sunnie. The team had an awesome Sun Tour last year so expectations are high. I would also like to repeat my performance of last year with the King of the Mountains jersey and top 5 on GC. Form isn't too bad but I don't really know what to expect from myself after a long year.

Day 1 of the Sun Tour was moved to Carlton's Lygon street this year and the crowd was huge. We did 30 laps around the 1.1km circuit and I felt every lap. The pace was on from the gun and never let up. I am glad we were called up to the front row of the grid, it would've been hard down the back. All of us rode aggressively all day going with every break. In the end Drewy found himself in the winning break with Gerrans, Mike Sayers, Hector Morales and Sean Sullivan. Drewy was nudged slightly towards the barriers and had to brake with 100m to go and Sayers went on the win the stage while Gerrans picked up enough bonuses during the tour to take the jersey.

Day 2 was 117km, 10 laps around the Portarlington road circuit where the old Nationals were held. This is normally a very hard circuit with two really sharp hills and if it's windy, it's usually in the gutter along the water. Today the winds were calm and the action was all on the hills. The first two laps I was going for the points in the KOM but after two laps I realised the hill was way too steep for me to get points on against the bigger, more powerful boys.

I, along with the whole team covered all the moves except one. We paid the penalty and had to chase for 7km. The next break that went, we made sure we had two in it with Drewy and Alby both there. A few teams got organised and started chasing with 40km to go, while the riders in the break started attacking each other. The break split with six staying away but only hanging by a handful of seconds. Drewy was in the front six and finished fifth but took the yellow jersey. So it turned out to be a good day for us.

Keep you informed on the next stages.

Cheers,
Willo