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6th Jacob's Creek Tour Down Under - 2.3
Australia, January 20-25, 2004
News for January 25, 2004
Composites of the winning team: Helping out "Big Daddy"
By Karen Forman in Adelaide
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Patrick Jonker's swansong in the 2004 Jacob's Creek Tour Down Under is being dubbed a "fairytale ending" to his professional cycling career, but the 2004 TDU story doesn't end with the Adelaide father of two hanging up his bike tonight. While an elated Jonker will move onto other things, like spending some time with his kids and working with Bikestyle Tours in Europe as a guide, the members of the team that he credits for getting him to the finish in the coveted yellow jersey have their own stories to tell and their own books still to write.
Jonker may have worn the yellow jersey and appeared on the podium as the overall winner of the six stage event, but Matthew Rex, Luke Roberts, Gene Bates, Steve Cunningham, Russell Van Hout, Adrian Laidler and James Hannam, along with team manager Michele Primaro and mechanic Steve Nash, were all winners this week. They won the yellow jersey. They won the overall teams classification. They became the first composite team to win the Tour Down Under. They won the hearts of their Adelaide hometown crowd. They won by the biggest winning margin in the general classification. And they won a heck of a lot of respect and admiration from the international cycling community.
The question is, what happens next? Well, apart from some fairly heavy celebrations tonight at an undisclosed location (Michele wouldn't tell us) everybody is heading off to continue the 2004 road season - starting as soon as tomorrow. Patrick, well, he reckons he's going surfing with the kids.
Cyclingnews had a quick word to the guys before they hit the showers (and the pub) about the race, the win, Patrick and the future.
Adrian Laidler, riding a bike for six years, a member of the national team for four years and a professional for a year with Lemond Fitness (USA), will stay in Australia this year to race with the support of his sponsors Main North Nissan, Rio Coffee and Daccordi Bikes.
Apparently the team's money ran out this year, so he has decided to stay home, race domestically and then have another go on the pro scene next year. "It's been excellent, the Tour Down Under this year," he said. "Working with Pat, he's so professional."
Adrian, 22, has ridden the JCTDU with UniSA for four years, so he knows the yellow jersey winner well, both on and off the bike. "I have learned a lot from Pat," he said. "Things like how to control the bunch." He said the defining moment of the week for him was when Patrick took the yellow jersey. "We have all been working on the front for the last few days to control and bunch and make sure no-one gets away."
Personally, he said he would have liked to have a won a stage of the event, but Patrick's yellow jersey win changed the plan. "It then became important for us all to work for Patrick. We still feel a part of the yellow. It was a real team effort."
Apart from a gauze bandage on his elbow, he said he had recovered from the crash that affected him earlier in the week.
James Hannam, 20, who started riding on a mountain bike but then changed to the road five years ago after he got inspired by the Tour Down Under, said his first JCTDU experience had been fantastic. "It has been really good. My role has been to try to control the race. I am probably better in the hills. It was my first time riding with Pat. He's a legend. I have learned a lot, probably things you don't even realise you have learned."
He said he had a few regrets, like missing a few breaks, but was generally fairly happy with his performance.
The Adelaide rider, who raced with the Australian Institute of Sport in Europe last year, heads to Italy next week to join Aliplast, an amateur team.
Matthew Rex, 18, was unfortunately disqualified from the tour on Saturday after being found guilty of holding on to a team vehicle. Today, he was on the start line to help his team out, carrying caps and posters from members of the crowd to his teammates for autographing and being on hand to cheer them on.
Rex said he was having back pain on the day of his disqualification, which had been found to be a sciatic nerve problem. Despite that, he said he had loved everything about his first TDU. "It got better as the week went on," he said. "I was nervous at the start, stuffing up a lot".
His role this week was a domestique, riding for Pat. "He has so much knowledge," he said. "I learned heaps, like how to ride properly in the bunch and professionally at all times."
Matthew hasn't got a team for this year, although he is a member of the South Australian Sports Institute. "I guess I will do the national series, the Tatts Cups, the Sun Tour and the Sunraysia Tour," he said.
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Russell van Hout, 27, riding his fourth Tour Down Under, returns to Italy to ride with Selle Italia again this year. He has been riding as a pro for four years, with Selle Italia for the first two years then last year with four teams, including Axa in Holland. This year he's hoping to ride the Giro d'Italia.
"I got mucked around badly last year but this year Selle Italia has offered me a better deal than everyone with a possible start in the Tour of Italy," he said. "I am excited about the year."
He said he had enjoyed the JCTDU. "I love this race. Pat is such an inspiration to me. I never thought I would be able to ride alongside him in the winning team. We have been friends for a while. We both have Dutch passports, so we have that in common and we have trained together in Adelaide. He has always been such an inspiration and I have learned so much from him, from his experiences, like tactics and how to control the team. He is a real leader. I hope that one day I can have that role."
Russell said he was sad Pat was finishing up, but that it was inevitable.
Luke Roberts, who celebrated his 27th birthday today on tour, described riding with Pat this week as "awesome". "He gambled with his breakaway, trying to get some time up over the sprinters and it was our goal to help him. We had to work hard, then do out jobs to keep Pat up there. Being his last race it was a big thrill to be able to work for him for the yellow jersey."
Living in Adelaide for three months of each year, he often trains with Pat and enjoys racing with him. "He's always pretty calm and collected and chilled out. He never seems to panic and lose his cool."
Like he has for the past few years, he heads off to Cologne next week for ninth months of living and racing in Europe with Division III team German team ComNet.
"This will be my third year. Last year I had four UCI wins in stages of races, and I hope this year to get to the Olympics and the world track championships. I am targeting the individual pursuit in Melbourne and will be doing some German 2.3 tours as well."
Roberts said he was starting to sway away from track racing towards the road. "If I can get a gold in Athens that will complete the set," he said. "I really have nothing left to do on the track front. I am keen to concentrate on the road."
He said he would like to do the Giro d'Italia.
Gene Bates, 22, has been riding since he was a 12 year old boy. He has been a member of the national under 23 team for the past four years and last year raced with it in Italy. This year he will ride with Italfine, an amateur team based in Piacentra, Italy.
"It has been fantastic riding with Patrick for the last three Tours Down Under," he said. "The advice he has given me has been invaluable. Being around him and seeing how professional he is has been fantastic for me."
He said he was happy with his TDU this year, particularly with his second in the stage into Victor Harbor. "It was disappointing not to win," he said. "But it has been great to be riding for Patrick and helping him get the yellow jersey."
Steve Cunningham, 32, has put in a stellar effort considering he rides part time and has a full time job as a development manager with an insurance company.
"I have been working hard for the past three days, and I am feeling pretty tired," he said. "I had a nerve problem which has been around for around six months but has come out with the intensity of the tour. I have had some physio on it so it should be okay soon, I hope."
Steve put in one year as a professional in Germany a couple of years ago. He is married with no kids - "you couldn't do this with kids".
This has been a fantastic week, according to Steve. "It is just the best feeling," he said. "We just put everything on the line for Pat, knowing it was his last race. We have put a lot of individual work into UniSA in the past few years and I have learned so much from Patrick. He's so relaxed and can predict when something is going to happen. The night before the stage he tells us what is going to happen...and it always does. He is so relaxed. He is like the father of the family, the Big Daddy.
"We will miss him next year, although I think Luke Roberts showed yesterday how strong he is on Willunga Hill."
This year, Steve will continue to race nationally but hopes to get overseas for two to three months, probably to France, to ride with a category three team as either a pro or an amateur.
The other jersey winners
by Karen Forman in Adelaide
Robbie takes the sprint jersey
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Sprint jersey winner Robbie McEwen was smiling broadly on the podium after the stage, "I really would a preferred a longer stage but I am really happy with my overall performance this week," he told Cyclingnews. "I have ridden well and hard every day. I made every break and finished in the first three in five out of the six stages."
"I would have liked to have won a stage, obviously, but I am happy. Today the FdJeux.com boys controlled the sprint and I just got caught in the back. I had to follow Baden through, but that's what happens sometimes."
McEwen said it was good to have the sprinters jersey. "It wasn't that easy to win because I wasn't going for the intermediate sprints, but just getting points from the stage results," he said. "I had to keep an eye on the GC guys and I was only 15 seconds ahead of them."
He said he felt his form was good and he was looking forward to heading to Europe via Qatar on January 31. He heads home to Brisbane tomorrow to share some time with his parents and two brothers.
Tiralongo winds up for Giro with KOM win
Australian hills mightn't be as big as Italian hills, but KOM jersey winner Paolo Tiralongo says he had a hard time winning the climber's accolade this year.
"I am really happy with this," he said. "For me it is very important thing to win a KOM. I have only just been back on the bike after seven months away from riding. I broke two vertebrae in the 12th stage of the Giro d'Italia, so I am happy to be going well here."
Tiralongo said while the mountains may not have been as steep as what he is used to, he had found the head and cross winds quite a challenge.
Wilson is most aggressive
Newly crowned Australian road champion Matt Wilson wasn't expecting to get onto the podium after stage six of the Tour Down Under today. Like the rest of his FdJeux.com team, he was hoping to get Baden Cooke up there, for the stage win. And so he was quite pleasantly surprised to be presented with the most aggressive rider jersey for the day.
"I had some legs today. The plan was to get in the break with Baden or Mark Renshaw, but then it looked like we were going to have a bunch sprint," he said. "I had attacked a couple of times during the race but I couldn't get a group together. We were just trying to keep it happening to get Baden up there. The course was the perfect sprint for him, into a headwind and uphill.
"In the last kilometre, Philippe did a big turn and I was on him, then I swung off after 300 metres and Mark had his turn. Baden then went from 150 metres."
Wilson said it was nice to get the most aggressive jersey. "It's fantastic to win it," he said. "It may only be a token prize, but it's still nice."
Wilson wasn't hanging around for tonight's celebrations, flying to Melbourne to prepare to fly to Europe on Monday to start his European season.
Twenty years - and 29 seconds - separate two champion pursuit squads
By Gerard Knapp
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Prior to the "Legends Dinner" at the sixth Jacob's Creek Tour Down Under, two of Australia's champion pursuit squads came together in the 20th anniversary year of the gold-medal winning ride in the team pursuit at the 1984 Los Angeles Olympic Games. The Australian quartet of Dean Woods, Kevin Nichols, Michael Grenda and Michael Turtur took out the event in a time of 4.26 against the USA at the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics.
Some 20 years later, Mike Turtur has become the driving force behind the JCTDU and is set to watch another Australian pursuit team go for gold in Athens. Racing in the JCTDU are four of Australia's top track riders - Graeme Brown, Luke Roberts, Brett Lancaster and Peter Dawson - who blasted around the Stuttgart velodrome at the 2003 world track championships in a world record time of 3'57"28 for the grueling four kilometre event.
It was a photo opportunity considered too good to miss, and will help give the contemporary riders a taste of what 'Olympics hype' will be like later this year. At the photo call, Mike Grenda said there were no secrets or tips he could pass on to the current crop of riders: "The guys are already world champions and they know what needs to be done," he said. Twenty years ago in Los Angeles, he said "we just walked in blind, really, and were happy to be the best team there." (Australia's team in Stuttgart last year also included Ashley Hutchinson and Stephen Wooldridge, who helped qualify Australia for the final.)
Caption: The 1984 Los Angeles Olympic Games gold medal team pursuit squad of (l-r) Dean Woods, Kevin Nichols, Michael Grenda and Michael Turtur, stand with Graeme Brown, Luke Roberts, Brett Lancaster and Peter Dawson of the current world record-holding Australian team.
