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Friday night winter track racing
Week 1, Dunc Grey Velodrome, Sydney, June 16, 2006
FNWTR is go!
By Paul Craft
The opportunity to race on the world’s best track during the off season has enticed over 80 riders to the Dunc Gray Velodrome for the first week of FNWTR for 2006. It was great to see familiar faces and FNTWR veterans, as well as many fresh faces on the first night of the 14 week series.
Last year’s series winner Patrick Bolan was in fine form with the biggest smile on his face all night, clearly due to the opportunity to be back on the track he loves so much. The 2005 series runner up Justin Tomlinson had the benefit of another year’s growth and has shown that in the endurance events he will be hard to beat for 2006. Three times FNWTR series winner Shaun Hopkins was a welcomed return to the series. Although he wasn’t at full fitness, he will certainly improve as it gets closer to the World Paralympics titles where he will be piloting Benny on the tandem. Another rider of interest to make a return to track racing was Brent Dawson. Having not raced for over 2 years, the expression (what the hell am I doing) on his face after the first race was priceless. However, after the first round he settled in nicely and was clearly one of the stronger riders. He may be a rider to watch as the season continues.
The feature race was “The Velocraft 1km wheel-race” for Div1.The prize pool was increased with many thanks to Rebel Sports Bankstown. A large field and very tight handicapping, particularly between 30 and 50m’s, had everyone predicting a scratch race. However, Ross Harding had different ideas. Starting off limit on a measly 90m, Ross exploded off the start and never looked back as he increased his lead to around 50m on the predicted scratch bunch. Ross looked fantastic until 1 ½ laps to go where he hit the super slow-mo button, losing his lead much faster than it took to build.
Off scratch young super star Bolan had an impressive start that left his companions behind. He moved quickly to the business end of the pace-line however, much like the Japanese Soccer, team fell to pieces in the final yards.
It was left up to another young gun, Geoff Hopkins (nicknamed “Softy”) who took advantage of his 45m handicap to be the first to pass the legless Harding and launch his prolific sprint early. Softy hit the bell lap with a 20m lead and then held onto it over the fast finishing scratchie, Daniel Ellis.
Daniel has shown vast improvement on his Junior World Bronze medal form and we wish him all the best in his bid for Gold this year.
Many thanks to the title sponsor Velocraft. Check out what is for sale on http://stores.ebay.com.au/Velocraft and of course thanks to Rebel Sports http://rebelsport.com.au/
Most impressive were the Div 5 group of first time track riders who provided very exciting racing. Phil Hutt was clearly the strongest however he had a hard time beating the so called beginners especially Manny Cachia who challenged him all the way. The three girls Marika, Brie and Kayla showed great style in all races.
Round 3 this week featured Miss’N’Outs which are always exciting and Round 4 had the tactical Point-score race. The Law family from Illawarra was very impressive all night. Clearly Dad (Grant Law) has taught the kids well as the two youngsters dominated Division 4 and 2. Unfortunately, Dad was unable to reciprocate the domination in Div 1. The interesting question is on what date will Scott Law surpass his mentor? It will be an interesting drive home to the Gong on that night.
The “CNSW Maersk Logistics Time Blaster” started with a full field of 24 riders and looked good over the first few laps however, when the bunch went through the first 10 laps 4 seconds down, a few individuals panicked and only 5 laps later we were down to 7 surviving riders. One of these riders was Div 2’s Ben Elliot who this time last year started his cycling life at FNWTR in Div 5. It is always encouraging to witness the progression of riders like Ben who take the plunge into FNWTR.
At ten laps to go and with only 5 riders left, an unfortunate split destroyed the chances of Root-man and in a blink of an eye we were left with two riders, Justin Tomlinson and Mathew Meisel-Diesel.
With 7 laps to go Matty cracked leaving Justin by himself. With much encouragement from the vocal crowd and against all odds, Justin’s determination prevailed, to beat the 9 minutes 15 seconds and win the $100 cash.
Next week will feature the Octogen Fitness 1km wheel-race for Div 2. In addition
to this we will have our first sprint night and judging by the speed of some
of our world class Div 1 riders it will be a blast. This will be a great night
for spectators as well especially now that we again have use of the magnificent
grandstand.
Results
Junior Development Demonstration 1 Brendan 2 Princess Round 1 Warm up scratch race Div 5 1 P Hutt 2 Manny Cachia 3 Marka Kohle 4 Kayla Salopek Div 4 Part I 1 Andrew Herlhen 2 Jackson Law 3 Tirian McManus 4 Howard Galloway Div 4 Part II 1 Grant Fahey 2 Darryl Moylan 3 Scott Carver 4 Andrea Beer Div 3 1 Damien McGarry 2 Liam Melville 3 Neil Land 4 Jack Bennett Div 2 1 Scott Law 2 Meissel Dennis 3 Andrew Burne 4 Keith Oliver Div 1 1 Justin Thomlinson 2 Patrick Bolan 3 Peter Spencer 4 David Browne Round 2 The Velocraft 1km wheelrace for div 1 1 Geoff Hopkins (45m) 2 Daniel Ellis (0m) 3 Michael Mellish (40m) 4 Jason Roberts (40m) Round 3 handicap Div 5 1 Manny Cachia 2 Marika Kohle 3 Kayla Salopek 4 Brie Maloney Miss'N'Out Div 4 Part I 1 Howard Galloway 2 Tirian McManus 3 Grahame Heap 4 Andrew Herlhen Miss'N'Out Div 4 Part II 1 Jackson Law 2 Tom Harvey 3 Grant Fahey 4 Scott Harding Miss'N'Out Div 3 1 Damien McGarry 2 Jack Bennett 3 Liam Melville 4 Martin Millwood Miss'N'Out Div 2 1 Scott Law 2 Keith Oliver 3 Mathew M Dennis 4 Alex Tomlinson Miss'N'Out Div 1 1 Justin Tomlinson 2 Daniel Ellis 3 James Schneider 4 Peter Spencer Round 4 Scratch Div 5 1 Phil Hutt 2 Manny Cachia 3 Marika Kohle 4 Brie Maloney Point Score Div 4 Part I 15laps 1 Howard Galloway 2 Andrew Herlhen 3 Tirian McManus 4 Grahame Heap Point Score Div 4 Part II 15laps 1 Jackson Law 2 Mike Pugh 3 Scott Harding 4 Grant Fahey Point Score Div 3 15laps 1 Liam Melville 2 Jack Bennett 3 Peter Holly 4 Neil Land Point Score Div 2 15laps 1 Mathew Meissel Dennis 2 Brendon Fehon 3 Scott Law 4 Keith Oliver Point Score Div 1 20laps 1 Justin Tomlinson 2 Daniel Ellis 3 James Schneider 4 Patrick Bolan Round 5 Fast group Combine all div 4 1 Jackson Law 2 Scott Carver 3 Scott Harding 4 Howard Galloway Div 2 & 3 combined 1 Ben Harvey 2 Kieth Oliver 3 Neil Leiffels 4 Mark Scribins The CNSW Maersk Logistics Time Blaster Challenge Target time 9min 15sec for Prize $100 Div 1 +Div 2 Sratch 30lapper 1 Justin Tomlinson 8.59 2 Mathew M-Dennis 3 Peter Spencer 4 Gary Ryan
