Farvel to Denmark

It's time to say goodbye (farvel). This is our last night here before flying out for good old Australia tomorrow morning.

With bikes packed and a spare day up our sleeves we headed up the coast north of Copenhagen to have a look at Kronborg Castle, or Hamlet's Castle as it is also known after Shakespeare used it as the setting for Hamlet.  The castle is located at Helsingor and within sight of Sweden.  Anyone interested in castles can find more information at http://www.copenhagenet.dk/CPH-Kronborg.htm.

Helsingor is worth a visit itself, situated right on the coast and very popular with boat owners as the following photo shows.

A very small selection of Helsingor's boat population

Kronborg Castle is very impressive. While it dates back to the 1600s, it's obviously been very well maintained, making it possible to really get a sense of how it must have been when it was a fully operational castle housing king and court.


Kronborg Castle from afar. It gives some sense of how imposing it is



Canons are situated all around the outer walls of the castle, apparently still at the ready if the
canonballs are anything to go by!

One corner of the enormous inner courtyard.

While in the castle, we discovered how Google Maps covers the areas where cars and other motorised vehicles can't go. It really was a case of the old meets the new.


Google Maps tricycle complete with all the paraphernalia necessary to photograph the world. Literally!

 The afternoon was spent on a final foray into Copenhagen for one last lap of Stroget, the capital's famous shopping street.  Copenhagen is not that much richer for having us there, but we enjoyed the spectacle of ancient buildings standing shoulder to shoulder with all the modern fashion houses and a huge variety of shops from an outlet devoted entirely to Lego, to a t-shirt outlet selling a variety of t-shirts and sweatshirts of a brand name not repeatable in polite company, and more jewellery shops than you could imagine!  All good fun and a good way to soak up those last few hours before returning to reality.

Copenhagen Town Hall

So this will be the last post from Denmark.  Thanks for tuning in and I hope you've enjoyed this journey with me.

Farvel and tak.

A little bit of luck goes a long way

The Roskilde World Championships circuit hosted the men's and women's tandem races this afternoon.  As predicted, the narrow and technical circuit proved challenging for the longer two wheeled machines, with several bikes coming to grief.

On one such occasion the victims of the misfortune were one of the American pairs in the women's race.  They suffered a front wheel puncture on one of the sharper corners of the circuit on lap 4 of 5 and had no hope of staying upright.  Brandie and Kerry were right behind them on the road and narrowly avoided kissing the bitumen with the Americans.  Rumour has it that Kerry has a future in any sport requiring the ability to change direction rapidly - she managed to muscle the Australian tandem out of harm's way and keep her and Brandie in the race. 

Unfortunately the interference with forward motion just as they were about to climb a small rise saw them lose contact with the main bunch, which at the same time, launched a series of attacks which effectively put paid to our girls' chances of regaining contact and being in a position to contest the final sprint. Still, better to be upright and finish the race off the pace than to be spending the night and ensuing days nursing road rash!

Kerry and Brandie getting involved in the action on lap 1 of the tandem road race

Of the other Australians in action this afternoon, Carol Cooke again added a silver medal to the team's tally in her trike road race, beaten by the same Canadian who won the time trial.

By my reckoning, Australia finished the 2011 World Road Para Cycling Championships with three gold medals and four silver medals.  Chinese Taipei produced its best ever result at Para Championships, with a 6th and a 4th.  Yes, OK, this is the first time, but congratulations to Jing for acquitting herself with great dedication and persistence.

Tomorrow everyone will enjoy some free time before flying out for Australia on Tuesday morning, another Worlds done and dusted.

Look out world, here comes Jing!

In her first World Road Championship appearance, Jing has improved from 6th in the time trial to finish a strong 4th in today's road race. The race was run over three laps of the 15.2km race circuit at Roskilde (the time trial was one lap of the same course).

The field stayed together for most of the first lap but the American defending champion, a Spanish C2 and a German C3 rider rode away on one of the climbs towards the end of lap one. The Spanish rider found the going a bit tough and dropped off, leaving the American and the German to ride together for the rest of the race, crossing the finish line with a joint victory salute for the cameras.

Meanwhile, Jing was having her own personal battle with another C3 rider, who narrowly edged her out in the sprint finish, but since they're in different divisions, it was academic anyway.

Here's Jing, very relieved to be crossing the finish line

This afternoon the tandem divisions have their road races, so more results later...

Deja Vu All Over Again

Sue Powell, World Champion. Again. Just in a different event this time.  Today Sue dominated the C4 Women's Road Race with a clever combination of attacks and conserving energy when it mattered.  As would have been expected after the time trial, when the three C4 women were separated by less than 12 seconds over 15km, the race came down to a sprint finish.  After 60km of racing, Sue took the gold by about 20cm ahead of Marie-Claude Molnar (Canada), with the Megan Fisher (USA) rounding out the placings.

On the podium again. Only two medals are awarded when there are only three starters

And what of the rest of we mere mortals?

Last night Jenny, Jing and I had dinner at Noma, Copenhagen's famous restaurant voted best in the world for the last two years.

Outside Noma which is housed in an old warehouse on the waterfront in Copenhagen

At Noma there is no menu, you simply eat what is put in front of you. And what is put in front of you is a range of very small servings of a wide variety of locally produced exotic fare. We had about nine appetisers including Reindeer moss, deep fried and served with creme fraiche..

Reindeer moss imported from Finland, served deep fried

The appetisers were followed by seven main courses and bread served with pig fat crumble and unclarified butter.  If you are into exotic food I suggest you go to http://www.noma.dk/ and check out the full menu.  It's certainly an experience!

This morning those who raced yesterday had a light recovery day and took in some more stunningly green Danish scenery.  Of course, one must have the obligatory "I was here" photo -

Jing and Kerry on the outskirts of Ringsted

As I've mentioned, Jing is here representing Chinese Taipei and this morning, the Chinese Taipei Ambassador to Denmark, his wife and secretary paid a visit to the Chinese Taipei team at out hotel.  It was an honour for us to have this meeting and to be able to provide some background on Para Cycling. 


Jing explains the finer points of cycling to the Ambassador

And so ends another varied and busy day in the world of para cycling.  Tomorrow is the last day of racing and Jing and Brandie and Kerry have their road races to complete proceedings.


Time Trials Done and Dusted

The time trials for all categories are now finished.  Unfortunately the second day wasn't quite as successful as the first but Australia still finished on the podium twice, with silver medals to Michael Gallagher in the C5 Men and Carol Cooke in the WT2 (women's trike) category.

Brandie and Kerry couldn't quite find their rhythm in the Women's tandem category and finished in 16th place. We'll chalk that one up to experience and move on to the road race tomorrow to look for a better showing.

In the women's C2 division, Jing delivered Chinese Taipei's first top 10 World Para Championships result, finishing 6th in her category and overtaking the rider from Russia, who started three minutes in front of her, in the process.  Jing's average speed was close to a personal best and Taiwan can be very proud of her representation.  Jing is also looking forward to the road race to see what it's like racing elbow to elbow with others in her category.

Today Sue is in action in the combined women's C4/C5 road race.  Sara Storey (C5) from Great Britain is also in this race and is a formidable rider in able bodied elite company, so my prediction is that the pace will be on and only the brave will survive!  Tune in later for results/report from this race.

Sue Powell, World Para Cycling C4 Time Trial Champion

Yes, the first events of the Championships are completed and Australia leads the medal count with two Gold medals.  David Nicholas won the Men's C3 Time Trial and Sue Powell has reclaimed the Women's C4 crown.

Final times haven't been posted yet, but David blazed around the 15km course in around 20 minutes.

Sue powered her way around in a stunning display of power and technique to shut out the USA rider who beat her by a full minute last year.

And here's the proof!

Another Rainbow Jersey for the collection!

That's it for now.  Time for.... you guessed it, a well earnt cup of coffee.....

More Wild and Woolly Weather

Today was another day of rain and extreme wind, which kept the temperature down and anyone vaguely faint hearted indoors.  Not the intrepid Australian and Chinese Taipei teams though. In the interests of cross team harmony, Australian physio and classifier Anouska and Taipei's star athlete Jing came together for a trainer session early this morning, fully supported by various members of the Australian team waiting to leave for their training session on the course.

Jing and Anouska tough it out in the wind on the trainers while Kerry, Brandie, Sue, Peter and Jayme provide moral support or distraction, depending on your perspective!

Kerry and Brandie had an interesting time on the tandem, suffering a puncture only a few kilometres into their training ride, then as the wheel was changed, the sky opened up and it started to pour.  Some days are like that I guess.

But no matter what the weather...

A very rainy, windblown view from the hotel room

...there's always the reward of a hot cup of coffee waiting, if you just know where to look...

Latte at the local cafe

Today things started to get serious around race headquarters.  This morning we collected numbers, had racing kit inspected to ensure it complied with UCI regulations and were issued timing chips - after handing over a 100 euro deposit!

This afternoon at the Manager's Meeting we were briefed on all the various requirements for the next few days of racing, like where we have to park, how and when riders have to turn up for their time trials, when and where feeding is permitted during the road races and so on  all the administrative stuff that ensures the racing runs smoothly.  We were also given cool stickers to put on the front and rear of our cars to show that we are really allowed to follow our riders during the time trial.  What a shame they gave me stickers with "Turkey" on them instead of "Chinese Taipei"! Might have to do something about that tomorrow.

The day ended with yet another drive from Roskilde to Ringsted, but this time I was able to enjoy the scenery from a passenger seat. Soon we won't have to drive the vans because they'll know the way on their own! Here's an example of the scenery along the roadside.

The benefit of all the rain

Tomorrow marks the start of the business end of the trip.  Sue races in her C4 time trial starting at 2.14pm local time (10.14pm AEST). Australia also has three other competitors in action tomorrow. Jing and Brandie and Kerry will be on course racing for the first time on Friday.

Tune in tomorrow for results and race report.

Bikes, Bikes, Everywhere Bikes!

The thing that has astounded us most here in Denmark is the absolute respect motorists have for bikes.  There are on road bike lanes on all the major roads and at intersections the bikes have right of way.  At face value this doesn't sound much different to at home in Canberra.  Except that here, the cars actually give way, to the extent of reversing back from the bike lane if they drive out a little too far then see a bike coming!

The law here is that if there is a bike lane, bikes have to use it, and the law is pretty stringently applied, so that may have something to do with it.  As a result of the mutual respect however,ignificant numbers of people ride, and there are bikes of all shapes and sizes imagineable, everywhere you look. The bike parking areas at the railway stations are bigger than the car parks and are full of bikes from people commuting to Copenhagen from regional centres such as Ringsted and Roskilde, and its impossible to walk down pretty well any street without walking past rows of bikes. There's a lot of 'town bikes' - upright straight barred bikes with all the necessary guards that allow people to ride in suits and skirts, but there's a lot of hybrids and the occasional mountain bike. 

Bicycle parking in Copenhagen

People ride in every sort of clothing imagineable and mainly without helmets - don't want to spoil the hair on the way to work after all!

Here's an example of one of the more modern hybrids around the place.  Note the brand name stamped into the frame.

A Copenhagen "Avenue" bike

And what of the other bikes that we're actually here for?  Today we spent some more time on the course.  The wind was even stronger than the last time, but coming from a slightly different direction.  With the weather so far, there's no question that the wind will be a significant influence once racing begins, unless the forecast for rain is accurate.  The wind seems to drop a bit when the rain comes in.  If we're really lucky we might get both!

Here's Sue and Kerry getting ready to spend some more time etching the twists and turns of the race circuit into their memories.  As you can see from Kerry's attire, it was a bit cooler this morning.



Sue and Kerry mounting up.  Note the Avis van - graffiti artists are alive and well in Denmark too.

I took the following photo to give some idea of how tights parts of the course will be.

This is the narrowest stretch of road that the bunches have to pass through. It's about halfway through the race lap.  You can see a street sign at the back of the picture.  This signifies the T-junction immediately after this little squeeze.  The competitors have to make a tightening right hand turn at this T-junction, just to keep it interesting. And interesting it will be when the field of 40+ men's tandems, 20+ women's tandems or 50+ men's C1-3 bunch come through. Could be a good place to take photos!

I had to include the following photo just to prove we really are in Denmark at the World Para Road Cycling Championships.  The picture is a lot like the rest of the country - a curious mix of traditional and modern.



Not the oldest street sign I've seen, but almost ancient by comparison with the UCI sign beneath. This is the turn onto the finishing straight

  The mixture of traditional and modern is illustrated everywhere in Copenhagen.  We took a train ride into the capital this afternoon and treated ourselves to a canal tour.  Everywhere you look there are original buildings built as early as the 1600s (maybe earlier, but that's what I noticed) and right next door something extemely modern. In fact the "Black Diamond" is a renowned extension to the original city library and is a huge black, glass encased building constructed off the original, centuries old library building. Quite fascinating.

From the canal tour you get a good appreciation of how important boats are to the Danish people, although from the state of some that we saw moored in the canals, some people are a little more familiar with the bridges now joining Denmark to surrounding islands and countries than they may have once been with their boats!

Some of the more impressive craft along the canals

With more rain forecast for tomorrow it looks like being another wind trainer day, but we will wait and see.  Only two more days til racing starts, so we're nearly at the serious stuff.  Stay tuned...


And then there was rain... Oh, and colds.

We woke this morning to the not so soothing sound of constant rain. Not so good for practising on a technical course and not worth risking falls so close to competition. It wasn't such an issue for Sue, who was given the day off to try to see off the cold bug that's been plaguing her since a couple of days after arrival.  Kerry also had the day off to try to prevent the onset of the same bug. Brandie has also had the bug but is on the way up again, so good timing for the commencement of competition later in the week.

Jing has managed to stay healthy - must be because she's part of a different team! We still weren't prepared to chance it by going out in the rain, so she completed a productive session on the trainer, blowing the cobwebs out of the system.

This afternoon saw us doing another reccie of the course in the van. Its not quite as good as actually riding it, but it allowed us to identify a few more important things that will help get the best possible result come race day.

The weather also afforded an opportunity to check out the Factory Outlet Centre across the road from the hotel, and another couple of coffee shops.  At between $7-8 per cup of coffee, we're on rations though!

We picked up our accreditation from Championships HQ without any hassles, although there were some raised eyebrows when three English speaking people fronted up representing Chinese Taipei!  At least Jing and Jenny look the part.  I just maintained that I was adopted.  It elicited some laughs, but somehow I don't think anyone took me seriously.  We now look very official in our very smart team kit AND our accreditation cards on our very special "Sport Event Denmark" lanyards.

We're hopeful of good weather for tomorrow to allow some more riding on the course and then hopefully a half day trip to Copenhagen for some R&R pre race day.

Shotguns, Vintage Cars and Electric Fences

Yep, today we've seen it all!

We drove over to Roskilde this morning to familiarise with the course.  Our little Chinese Taipei team was lucky enough to go the 30-something kilometres in convoy with the Australian team, since we hadn't been there before and they knew where they were going.  Made it much easier than finding our own way!

We drove around the course first to make sure we knew where to go, but we needn't have worried as the Danish organisers had already been out on the course and there were helpful arrows clearly identifying every turn. Next step was onto the bikes for Jing to do a semi dress rehearsal on her time trial bike with me hanging desperately onto her back wheel offering advice on cornering lines etc, when breathing permitted it!

Jing taking in the scenery on the course

The course quickly leaves urban Roskilde, the road becomes quite narrow and winds its way through small country villages that are only a very few kilometres away from town, but in appearance could be 100 years away - thatched roofs, doors opening onto the road and so on.

The view towards Roskilde from the back of the course

So the reference in the post heading? Well first of all, we rounded a corner to the sounds of shotgun fire to discover a full blown duck hunt going on around the shores of a small lake between a few cottages.  One of the shotgun wielding crew looked to be no more than about 12, but, safety first, at least he was wearing protective earmuffs! We quickly carried on in case they mistook us for flightless birds and showed us a different kind of Danish welcome. 

Vintage cars.  I think there must have been a vintage car rally on somewhere because there was a constant stream of rather old cars passing by.  For the most part this wasn't an issue, but a couple of times it caused a bit of nervousness when confronted with an old 1950-60s Rolls Royce or similar, which took up the entire narrow country road, or an even older, "real" vintage car (1920s), which seemed to have difficulty with the steering, heading straight for us on a bend, but then veering back onto its own side of the road at the last moment!

In spite of various suggestions that Denmark is totally flat and there can't possibly be any hills on the course, it's actually quite undulating and to add to the interest, has several quite tight corners, which when combined with the narrow roads, will make for some interesting racing if anyone is feeling a bit daredevil.  One of the Australian hand cyclists, Michael, tried out one of the sharp downhill corners today and overcooked it a bit. After a spectacular barrel roll/flip with a degree of difficulty Matthew Mitcham would be proud of, he ended up in the long grass adjacent to the road.  This of itself wouldn't have been an issue, except that in true Tour de France style, he ended up tangled up in the fence.  Fortunately not barbed wire, but as it turned out, an electric stock fence.  Needless to say, a great deal of care was taken extracting him!!

Since there was a cast of thousands on hand to see Michael right, Jing and I continued on our way and made friends with a local Danish para cyclist, Bo and rode for a few kilometres with him before Jing rode off to complete the course on her own.

A matching pair...


On the drive back to Ringsted, we took the time to get in touch with our inner Monets.

On the road between Ringsted and Roskilde

And as any dedicated cyclist knows, a good ride has to finish with a good coffee, so let's do the same for this post - 

Cappuccino and Latte, Roskilde-style

Greetings from Denmark

Where the days are long and the weather is warm....

After a long 24 hours or so of travel we've arrived safe and sound in Denmark.  We landed at 7.30 this morning and now, 13 hours later, I think the jet lag is starting to set in!  A good night's sleep should see that off though.

It turned out that the New Zealand team and one member of the Australian team were on the same flight as us from Singapore to Copenhagen, so it was quite the invasion of the Paras.

On arrival at Copenhagen we cleared Customs and Immigration pretty quickly, then were fortunate enough to have all the bike gear come into the terminal from the plane in one piece and at the same time as the other luggage. We picked up the other Aussie, Mel's, gear for her so she didn't have to manipulate luggage, hand cycle and wheel bags from her wheelchair. This brought our total luggage to three bike boxes, a hand cycle, two wheel cases, two wheel bags, four wheelie suitcases cases, two soft bags and various backpacks!  Not surprising then, that we had a bit of fun getting our four trolleys and a hand cycle out of the baggage collection area with only three people pushing, but we managed with the help of a random stranger!  We handed Mel off to the Australian crew there to pick her up and set about finding out where to get taxis and where we could make a pickup after we picked up the hire van.

Jing and I set off in a taxi to downtown Copenhagen to get the van, leaving Jenny a forlorn figure on the side of the road "guarding" three bike boxes, two wheel cases and various assorted other pieces of luggage.

We returned in record time, with only one wrong turn on the way, and without ever straying onto the wrong side of the road (given they drive on the 'wrong' side over here).  Jenny and all the gear were safely waiting, so we set about loading up, only to be accosted by the Kiwis, whose van hadn't turned up to pick up their gea. A few minutes later we set off for Ringsted with a very full van loaded up with Kiwi equipment.  Had we not just stepped off a long haul flight and been a little more alert we could have enhanced the Aussie hopes of medals significantly by conveniently losing a truckload of bikes.  Oh well, lucky we're nice people!

Once registered at our hotel - the Scandic Ringsted, the bikes obligingly went together without any hiccups and we all set off for a ride to blow the cobwebs out, Jenny on a townie bike borrowed from the hotel. The law in Denmark is that if there's a bike path running along the road (separated by a narrow grass verge or a concrete gutter) bikes of all types have to use it - apparently that rule applies to motorised scooters as well, because we encountered quite a few of those on the paths as well as bicycles. Fortunately the lanes appear to be well maintained, wide and uninterrupted for the most part, and bikes have right of way at intersections with side streets and the local motorists seem to be very well behaved.

 Jing and I managed nearly an hour.  Jenny lasted really well on the ton-of-lead townie, but turned for home at the first sign of the road going slightly uphill.  Who could blame her with only one gear, tyres twice as wide as ours, and a bike that probably weighed more than all the bikes we transported from the airport put together!

A reccie of the course is planned for tomorrow morning, but now it's time to give in to the need for sleep.  More soon.....

The Final Countdown

I always feel relieved to actually get on the plane for a big overseas trip.  Not because it means you're on your way, but because by that stage, if you haven't done it, it isn't going to get done and there's nothing you can do about it!

Things are moving along nicely for this one though.  Most of the bikes are already packed and most of the clothes are in the bags, although certain members of the team may have to remove several items to make the weight limit....

If you have serious baggage limitations because of the prohibitive cost of excess baggage, you become very good at leaving out anything that isn't essential.  I read an article the other day about a man who travelled right around the world with no baggage at all - he carried his spare bits and pieces in the pockets of his vest.  I don't think I ever want to go that extreme but keeping the bag to less than 10kg is a pretty fair effort!

For those of you who haven't managed to get to the official websites yet, here's the race schedule for the Canberra paras.  If you want more detail, you will have to make the trek a bit further into the internet.

Race Schedule:

Thursday 8 September1000-1200 – Sue Time Trial (actual start time tba)

Friday 9 September 1400-1600 – Jing, Brandie and Kerry Time Trial (actual start time tba)

Saturday 10 September 1600-1800 – Sue Road Race

Sunday 11 September 0800-1015 – Jing Road Race

Sunday 11 September 1330-1615 – Brandie and Kerry Road Race

Bye for now.

The Wagga Effect

Anyone who lives in the ACT or NSW is generally familiar with the "Wagga Effect" - the phenomenon that sees certain regional centres produce inordinate numbers of quality sportsmen and women.  I think Canberra is challenging these regional centres for the lead in producing top athletes and making a disproportionate contribution to Australian teams and international results, in cycling at least.

Canberra has a long history of producing world class cyclists, but I've just looked at all the Canberrans selected for World Championships this year and its quite amazing how many of Australia's best cyclists started their careers in a city with a climate that could hardly be considered optimal for a tough outdoor sport!

This year, in the Road World Championships long teams, we have one out of 14 riders in the U23 men's team - Tom Palmer; 2 out of 17 in the Elite men - Michael Matthews and Rory Sutherland; and three out of 13 in the Elite women's - Chloe Hosking, Jessie Maclean and Vicki Whitelaw.  Then there's the Juniors - one out of nine in Allison Rice; and the Paras - three out of 18 with Sue Powell, Brandie O'Connor and Kerry Knowler (pilot), not to mention Jing Huang competing in the Paras for Chinese Taipei.

For a population of not too much more than 350,000, I think that's a pretty fair effort. Let's hope it converts to some medals finding their way back to Canberra towards the end of September.

Counting Down to Denmark

Having promised to fire the blog up again in preparation for the Para World Road Titles in Denmark, I thought it high time I actually did so.

The Canberra crew leaves next week to arrive in Denmark with enough time to scope the course and see if that 40m elevation on the course - yep, from lowest to highest point on the 15km lap the difference in altitude is just 40m - is going to hurt too much.  Should suit the sprinters - as long as there isn't too much wind to wear them out along the way!

In case anyone isn't across it, the "Canberra crew" comprises Kerry and Brandie on the tandem, Brandie being the visually impaired (VI) stoker (the person on the back, obviously!), and Sue, our current C4 track World Champion and Jing, a newcomer to World Championships and competing in the C2 category.

Brandie, Kerry and Sue are competing for Australia, while Jing will fly the flag for Chinese Taipei. This is the first time that Chinese Taipei has been represented in para cycling, so I'm sure Jing's performances will be closely watched by many in that area of the world.

Now in case anyone is wondering, I've done a bit of research and apart from long summer days and extremely short winter ones, Denmark is mainly famous for Georg Jensen jewellery and Carlsberb beer.  I'm not sure that any of us will able to afford any Georg Jensen and I doubt there'll be too much Carlsberg consumed before the Championships, bit it will something to keep an eye out for in the one day of R&R before everyone flies back to Australia.

If you want to know more about the Championships, go to http://www.paracycling2011.dk/FrontPage/?id=875.  There you'll find information on the course and the area that is hosting the Championships.

Entry lists and other more official information can be found at http://www.uci.ch/templates/UCI/UCI5/layout.asp?MenuId=MTU3NDI&LangId=1

I probably won't post too much before I get to Denmark, but stay posted and I'll do my best to keep everyone as up to date as possible.

Bye for now...

The fat lady has sung

Today saw the conclusion of the Sydney Para Cycling World Cup, with time trials for all divisions.  Australia had a successful day with many appearances on the podium.

The time trial course was based around the Homebush Bay precinct that was home to the 2000 Olympic Games, even down to a lap around the outside of one of the main stadiums on the bumpy 'pave' or paving as we would call it here in Oz. It was quite technical with many corners, changes of terrain and road surface.

Brandie and Kerry weren't quite able to maintain yesterday's form in the time trial, but still finished a creditable 5th, only 3 seconds off 4th place and a mere 30 seconds off the silver medal.  Considering that they were more than 4 minutes off the pace at last year's world championships in this event, their performance today is testament to how much difference six months of good solid training can make.

It was an interesting scheduling exercise that saw the tandems, who had the longest road races of any division yesterday afternoon, first up in the time trials today. This is unusual in two ways. Normally the TT is before the road race, and usually there is a day in between. Still, it was the same conditions for all the tandems, so not much point in complaining!

After the tandems ripped up the course, Sue and Jing headed out within two minutes of each other. Sue finished with another gold medal and a very good average speed in excess of 37k/h in spite of all the corners and hills on the course.  Jing keeps getting stronger and stronger and again finished second to the American world champion, so nothing to be ashamed of there.

There won't be a lot to report for the Canberra Connection for a few weeks, with Jing, Brandie and Kerry taking a well earned season's end break, and Sue heading off to Europe mid May to scare off her Worlds opposition!

More Bling

It's been a good couple of days racing for the Canberra Connection.

On Wednesday, Jing finished with a silver medal in the women's C2 road race - her first international bling, but hopefully not her last.

Richo gained some more valuable experience in how to race this very different creature that is a hand cycle. The big difference is that in a racing chair the weight is all over the wheels but on a hand cycle, the weight is more to the middle, so cornering is a very different experience.

Today, Sue and Alex started their C4 race with the C5 women and stayed with them for a couple of laps before settling into a comfortable rhythm that saw them eventually lap the South African competitor in their category and secure the Gold (Sue) and Silver (Alex) for Australia.  OK, so Alex isn't from Canberra, but she's definitely part of this story.

Brandie and Kerry rode a blinder in their women's tandem event, competing against several world champions.  They stayed well in the bunch for 7 of the 9 laps of the Eastern Creek circuit, which incorporated not only the main racing circuit but the drag race circuit as well.  In lap 7 they weathered two withering attacks from two world champion teams, only to be dislodged by the third attack in a very short space of time.  They continued strongly to finish in 4th place, only 2 minutes down on the winners.

And since we're talking Australian success, mention should be made of the spectacular 1-2 result in the men's tandem race.  Our tandem pairings of Bryce Lyndores/Sean Finning and Kieran Modra/Scott McPhee were involved in a successful breakaway with the American tandem in the latter stages of the race.  Unfortunately for the Americans, they punctured with three laps to go, leaving our boys to fight it out for the gold medal.  Not surprisingly, the more sprint oriented Lindores/Finning tandem took the honours, with Kieran and Scott delighted to collect their own special piece of silver bling.

The time trials are on tomorrow, so more opportunities for World Cup medals and Paralympic points. Stay tuned for more results...

And the winner is... Sydeney!

Para action descends on not only Sydney this weekend, but in the heart of 2000 Olympics territory at Homebush Bay.

The first UCI Para Road World Cup for 2011 is being held over the next three days at Eastern Creek Raceway in western Sydney (road races) and around the Homebush Bay precinct (time trials).

There's a complete listing of, well, everything, at http://www.uci.ch/templates/UCI/UCI2/layout.asp?MenuId=MTU4ODg&LangId=1, including start lists, course maps and profiles - just in case you want to make a last minute dash to Sydney for a bit of spectating.

There's also a very informative media release from Cycling Australia on who's competing and who is in the Australian team, or not, as the case may be!  See http://www.cycling.org.au/?Page=42271.

The Canberra crew will all be competing, Sue, Brandie and Kerry as part of the Australian team and Jing and Richo as 'privateers' as we'd call them in motor sport!

Brandie and Kerry will probably find the competition the toughest, with a strong field of tandems entered, including a few world champions.  Oh well, if you're going to be the best, you have to beat the best!  Having narrowly missed out on the automatic qualifying speed to get them to the World Road Championships last month at the National and Oceania Championships, the girls will be keen to impress the selectors one more time.

With her place for Road Worlds looking pretty secure on the basis of last year's Worlds results, Sue will be using the World Cup as a solid hitout before heading off to Europe for some more international racing later this month.

Richo will be hoping all the training he's been doing in the new position (hand cycle versus racing chair) will see his results much closer to the big boys.  If you think changing from a chair to a hand cycle would be easy - it's still using your arms for propulsion after all - think about how you'd feel if you had to change from walking forwards to walking sideways everywhere.  Yep, the sensation is apparently that different and Richo's triceps were not happy with him for a while in the early days!

I will try to be a diligent blogger and post results as they come to hand, so hopefully you can stay tuned over the next couple of days and be well informed.

So near and yet so far...

The Australian Para Cycling Road Championships on the Sunshine Coast are done and dusted.  Our crew came out of the weekend with some mixed results.

The time trial on Saturday was run in very poor conditions, with pouring rain and gusting wind while the Canberra riders were out on course.

The conditions didn't seem to bother Sue too much. She added yet another Australian Championship to her palmares, edging out the 'now-not-so-new' kid on the block, Alex Green from Sydney. More significantly though, Sue easily made the automatic qualifying speed to meet selection requirements to compete in the World Road Championships in Denmark later this year.  Sue's average speed of more than 37.5km/h was well above the required 35.6km/h for her division.

Not so fortunate were Brandie and Kerry on the tandem. While they won the championship convincingly, their average speed in the high 40s for the 24km distance fell agonisingly short of the automatic qualifying speed by around 4/100 sec.  The weather was a bit of a factor in this, making braking and cornering that bit more difficult given the length and bulk of the tandem versus a single bike.  Not to worry, they have another couple of chances in the Oceania Championships coming up this weekend and the Sydney World Cup in early May.

Jing showed enormous improvement from last year to record a win in her division with an average speed just shy of 30km/h.  Unfortunately Jing needed to record 33.18km/h for automatic qualification so still a bit of work to do, but she's definitely headed in the right direction and once she starts time trialling on a time trial specific bike the improvement should be significant. Yes, that's right, this result was posted on her normal road bike, so that puts a bit of perspective on the average speed in my humble opinion, otherwise, why would they have designed time trial specific bikes!

In his first national competition in hand cycling, Richo found out what it's like to play with the big kids. His third place in the time trial in such short time in this form of competition shows that there's a big future for him when he gets a handle on it! (Yeah, I know, poor joke!)

On Sunday the weather gods were a bit kinder, delivering warm sunny conditions for the road races.

All the girls again pulled out wins in their respective divisions, possibly as expected.  The highlight was Jing's win in her division, finishing in a time considerably quicker than a competitor (from a different division) who beat her last year when their divisions were combined.

Richo, who I'm told is not particularly suited to long distance racing, gave his triceps a real workout just to finish the road race with another third place to add to his collection.

Well done to all and good luck for the Oceania Championships this weekend. For anyone who wants a bit more information, here's the website -
 http://www.cycling.org.au/default.asp?ID=40881&MenuID=Events_and_Results%2F20011%2F0

A new chapter

Now that Track Worlds are over, this blog will revert to a Canberra based Para Cycling updating tool with an occasional inclusion from further afield no doubt!

So what do all aspiring Paralympic cyclists do after a long hot summer working towards World Championship medals? Sleep in every morning for a week?  Take a well earned break on a tropical island? Sit back and catch up on a month's worth of TV, DVDs or emails?

No, in fact none of these. Well not the Canberra contingent anyway.  Because of the timing of various championships, the focus turns immediately to road racing.  In addition to getting back into their full time day jobs, everyone is straight into training for the Australian Para Road Championships in Queensland on 9-10 April, then the following weekend, the Oceania Para Road Championships. These championships are very important because they're an essential stepping stone to a place at the Road World Championships a few short months away in Denmark (in September).

The timing is so tight, with only three weeks to find their "road legs", Brandie, Kerry and Sue all raced last weekend in local club competition. I can't say there was immediate success but the outing certainly helped remove the last vestiges of jet lag and provided a wake up call to the bodies that yes, in fact track season is over and now you no longer have to keep pedalling all the time you're moving like you do on a fixed wheel track bike!

At the Road Championships next month, the track trio will be joined by Jing, who is C2 above knee amputee and Richo, who is transferring from wheelchair racing to hand cycling, so the ACT will be well represented.

Stay tuned for more progress reports and results from various events. Can't guarantee as regular blogging as the last three weeks, but hopefully regular enough to sustain interest!

Post Script..

For those who haven't read the CA press release, Australia finished 3rd on the medal tally, beaten only by Great Britain and China.  For further detail go to http://www.cycling.org.au/

All over bar the shouting

The 2010 World Track Para Cycling Championships are over. Yes, that's right these championships were officially the 2010 edition after they were postponed from late last year.

Montichiari must be sad to see us go because the weather has turned very un-Spring-like, with howling winds and lashing rain! It made packing all the bikes and gear into the truck a lovely soggy job, but that's how it goes.

But enough talk of the weather, and on to what you've really tuned in for - the final wrap up of competition.

This afternoon we had the Women's C4 500m Time Trial. Sue was our great hope in this event and didn't fail to please, with a gutsy ride on a near empty fuel tank to finish with a silver medal, beaten for gold by the Chinese world record holder in this event. Neither rode anywhere near their personal best times, indicative of how the weather impacts on performance.

The new kid on the block, Alex, finished sixth, but managed to go very close to, or possibly better, her PB, showing a glimpse of what we have to look forward to in the future.

Jayme rode her 500m TT solo again, with no other entries in her category. In a fine performance as Australia's last appearance on the track, she was only 1.5 seconds off the world record. Hopefully she'll have some opposition in the future so that her achievements can be formally recognised.

Here are the results for each team member, in no particular order other than ladies first, of course:

Felicity and Stephanie (tandem) - Gold medal 1000m TT, 11th place 3km pursuit
Alex (C4) - Bronze medal 3km pursuit, 6th place 500m TT
Jayme (C1) - 1st 3km pursuit, 1st 500m TT
Brandie and Kerry (tandem) - 8th 1000m TT, 6th 3km pursuit
Sue (C4) - Gold medal 3km pursuit, Silver medal 500m TT, 8th team sprint

Bryce and Sean (tandem) - 10th 1000m TT, Bronze medal 4km pursuit
Kieran and Scott (tandem) - 9th 1000m TT, Gold medal and world record 4km pursuit
Michael (C5) - Gold medal and world record 4km pursuit, 12th 1000m TT, 8th team sprint
Andrew (C2) - Silver medal and (briefly) world record 1km TT, 8th team sprint

So that's it from me for this trip. We leave Montichiari at 7am tomorrow for the long haul home. Thanks for checking in and I hope everyone enjoyed the reports as much as I enjoyed putting them together.

I'll leave you with a few final photos from the last day of competition and a big thank you to Hotel Faro for the excellent internet access that's made this blog possible.

Ciao, ciao.

Guess where we've been...

Australia starting the C1-5 combined Team Sprint

Our final medal of the Championships - Sue Powell, silver, Women's C4 500m Time Trial

The beginning of the end

The end of the championships that is. This morning we had Kieran and Scott competing in the Men's Tandem Sprint, Sue, Andrew and Michael in the Team Sprint and both women's tandems competing in the Pursuit.

Unfortunately, this is the first post where I can't report on amazing successes, which is not say that everyone didn't ride very well.

Kieran and Scott looked good for a spot in the quarter finals of the sprint until the big hitters from the UK and a couple of other countries came out to play. For world record holders in the pursuit, they did well to qualify 9th in the sprint. Only the top eight qualifiers go through so they missed out, but by finishing top 10, they accrued more UCI points for Australia.

In the women's tandem pursuit our sprinters, Steph and Flick went out easy and built through to the end of the 3km journey - no mean feat when they normally only go 1km and this was their first attempt. They ended up qualifying 11th out of 15, so no embarrassment there.

Brandie and Kerry rode well to the schedule for the first 2km but the cold in the velodrome (it's been raining since yesterday evening) got the better of them in the last kilometre. They finished with a 3.44, which is not quite as good as their PB set in Sydney a month ago, but still makes them the 6th fastest women's tandem pairing in the world over the distance and again, more valuable UCI points in the bank. Not too shabby for their first World Championships.

Our team sprint team qualified 8th and as far as I can ascertain at the moment, was one of only two teams that included a woman on the roster. This didn't see them reach the ride offs but was a good warm up for Sue for the TT which comes up a bit later this afternoon.

While we didn't win any medals this morning, everyone rode well and we accrued more valuable points, so it was still a successful session.

Check in later for a final update on the competition. Our remaining events are the women's C4 500m time trial featuring our "get out of jail at the last minute" legend Alex, and our pursuit world champion Sue. Jayme will also be riding her C1 500m time trial this afternoon.

Winning never gets boring!

Sue Powell - World Champion. Kieran Modra and Scott McPhee - World Champions and world record holders. Jayme Paris - winner. Alex Green - bronze medallist. Bryce Lindores and Sean Finning - bronze medallists. Those are the latest results from the rest of today's racing.

And of course, here's the photographic evidence.

That's Sue and Alex after receiving their medals...

...and the two men's tandem teams after receiving theirs.

I think the highlight of today's racing was Alex's bronze medal in the women's C4 pursuit. Alex hasn't yet developed a blindingly fast first lap and the Chinese had obviously done their homework after the qualifying ride - Alex was racing a Chinese woman who had qualified 2 seconds slower than her for the bronze. It just so happens that this Chinese rider holds the world record for the 500m time trial. The Chinese strategy turned out to be to get their rider to essentially ride a 500m time trial and catch Alex within the first two laps, which would have been the end of the race, bronze to China, 4th to Alex. In the strangest pursuit I've ever seen, the Chinese rider made it to literally within about a metre and a half of Alex's back wheel as Alex gave her all to get up to race pace. At almost exactly two laps, the Chinese rider blew up, Alex kept going and then caught the Chinese rider at about lap 7, securing her first World Championships medal in the process.

Now I did promise to introduce Peter Day, the Head Coach of the team, but he's so busy orchestrating all of the successes I've been reporting on that I can't get him to stand still for long enough to take a clear photo, so I'll keep trying, but tomorrow's another busy day, so I'm not holding my breath!

It's funny the things you notice at this type of event. Like all the cars, trucks, vans etc in the parking lot with an amazing array of sponsors' logos all over them, but the following really took my fancy so I had to share -

I found it quite entertaining to have a VW van emblazoned with advertising for Skoda! And yes, for all you purists out there, they are part of the same motor group, but it's still pretty funny. Or maybe I got up too early this morning!

Now, for anyone who hasn't been keeping count, here's a summary of the results to date.
Gold - 4
World Records - 3 (even though Andrew's only lasted a moment!)
Silver - 1
Bronze - 2
First place - 1 (because Jayme doesn't have any to race against, she can't be awarded a medal, but she's still a winner to us)
PBs - 5

Tomorrow is the final day of competition and we have the women's tandem pursuit, the mixed team sprint, the men's tandem sprint and the 500m time trials for Sue, Alex and Jayme.

The results just keep coming

World records, personal bests, podium finishes - this Australian team has it all!

In the remainder of this morning's session, Kieran and Scott broke Kieran's longstanding tandem pursuit world record to qualify fastest for the final this evening.

Bryce and Sean produced a five second personal best time to qualify third and therefore go into the bronze medal ride off tonight.  Unfortunately for Bryce and Sean, they had to overtake the other team on the track during their qualifying ride and but for that, may well have gone the .2 second quicker that they needed to make the gold medal ride off. Such is the nature of competition.

Andrew produced yet another PB to clock a time .3 of a second under the Men's C2 1km TT world record, only to have a Chinese rider come out and beat the old mark by a full 2 secs and drop Andrew into the silver medal position. You know the competition's tough when beating the world record only gets you a silver medal!

That's it for now but stay tuned - at this rate we're going to have excess baggage on the way home just for the medals!

Qualifying comfortably

This morning saw Sue and Alex in action in the Women's C4 Pursuit qualifying round.

The conditions were a little cooler than last night and certainly not as conducive to riding quick times.

Sue had the benefit of riding in the last round, so we were able to select a schedule to deliver a time good enough to qualify but to also leave enough juice in the tank to bring it home tonight. In the end, Sue qualified fastest in 4.15.781.

Alex wasn't the quickest off the mark in her round but gradually regained the advantage and ended up with a creditable 4.24.784, which sees her in the bronze medal ride off this evening, missing the gold medal ride off against Sue by less than 2 seconds. For her first World Championships that's still a fantastic outcome.

There won't be many photos of the action for the next couple of days because the coaching (naturally) takes precedence, but in case you thought I'd let the human interest side of things slip, think again.

Here's Grandpa Kieran showing all the newbies how to relax before their events. Yes, that's tatting that he's gainfully employed with!

And true to form, notice the thongs (or flip flops) poking out the bottom of the towel!

The other bikes on this morning are the two men's tandems in their pursuit qualifying. Later today we also have Jayme riding her C1 pursuit and Michael (C5) and Andrew (C2) in their 1km time trials. I will update on their progress later.  

Stop Press - World Champion number 2

Word just in from the track - Michael Gallagher is the World C5 Men's Pursuit Champion!

After a steady start that saw his opponent gain some false hope that he might have a chance at the Gold, Michael powered home in the second half, riding right on schedule to win by a comfortable margin of around 3 seconds.

Gold medal number 2 in the bag. Go the Aussies!

A great day for PBs

What a way to start the championships! Five bikes on the track, one world championship (so far), one world record and five personal best times.

Brandie and Kerry opened the tandems competition as first bike off in the women's tandem 1km time trial. They rode a personal best time by just over a second and held first place until our other pairing of Flick and Steph took to the track. Another PB saw their names take over top spot. So for a while the scoreboard looked like this

Unfortunately Brandie and Kerry's PB wasn't enough to keep them in that position when the big hitters came out to play, but none of the later riders managed to better Fick and Steph's time so we have our first World Champions for this meet. And just to prove it, here they are with the bling.

Brandie and Kerry ended up 8th, which is significant because the top 10 placings earn UCI points. 

Earlier in the day Michael Gallagher scorched around the track in the qualifying round of the C5 Men's Pursuit and took around half a second off the world record. He is still at the track for the final as I write this post so I'll have to update you on his final result next time. In the meantime, this is how he looked right after his world record ride fresh as a daisy!

And no, he hasn't defected to Argentina, they're just in the pits next to us!

The men's tandems also both produced PBs and finished 9th (Kieran and Scott) and 10th (Bryce and Sean), delivering more UCI points for Australia. The UCI points are significant because they contribute to determining places at next year's Paralympic Games, so every top 10 finish helps.

Early start tomorrow so it's off to bed now, but I'll leave you with a photo of Scott and Kieran just after they finished their time trial, mainly because Scott told me the other day that he's never seen a photo of he and Kieran on the tandem. This one's for you Scott.

The team behind the team

Considering that my day job involves, in part, assisting sports in the development of coaches and officials, I thought it would be very remiss of me to leave the team officials out of the introductions. Here is the team that deals with all the behind the scenes stuff to keep things running smoothly so that the athletes can do what they do best.

Murray Lydeamore, or Muz as he's affectionately known by anyone who's ever spent more than five minutes with him, is our team manager. While he maintains a reasonably low profile, he's always busy sorting out one issue or another to make sure all is as it should be.

Paul Martens is one of the coaches and looks after the tandem boys. He also runs a pretty good local tour and can always be relied on to unload and load the truck for ergo training sessions. That may be why he sometimes ends up like this -



Most of the time, though, he's busy plotting the opposition's downfall!



This is Tom Skulander. He's another of the coaches and apart from helping out with everything from chauffeuring the troops around Italy, and to essential shops to stock up on essential equipment, he is responsible for Alex Green and Jayme Paris at these championships.

I mentioned Peter Steggall in an earlier post. He's our physiotherapist and the one who attends to keeping all the athletes in tip top shape physically. This is him on his way to breakfast. He's probably already run a couple of laps of town and carried out three or four massages just to get warmed up for the day, such is his dedication to the job!

Our mechanic is John Keegan, who insists that his image is copyrighted, so he can't appear on the blog. I think he's just more comfortable working behind the scenes, keeping the bikes running so smoothly that I think they could win the races all by themselves.

Most of you already know me and I did appear in an earlier cameo, but I'm Sian and I'm also one of the coaches. On this team I'm responsible for the Canberra connection, Sue, Kerry and Brandie. Here's me doing my best impression of being a tourist.

The final member of the support staff is the Head Coach, who I'll introduce in a later blog.

Tune in tomorrow morning, by which time I should have blogged some results from the first day's competition. Just a reminder, today we have Michael Gallagher in the C5 pursuit and all four tandems in the 1km time trial.

How do Australians warm up?

They say a picture is worth a thousand words. This one deserves a post all on its own and very little commentary is needed.

Kieran doesn't see much need for excess clothing and for almost the entire trip, he's been in shorts and T shirts, even when the temperatures have been in the low single digits and everyone else is in layers of polar fleeces, but thongs on the ergo? It doesn't get much more Australian than that!

Competition Eve and all in the house was quiet

Well, perhaps in your house, but certainly not here, where its been a hive of activity as everyone puts the finishing touches on their preparation.

This entry will round out the team introductions so without further ado...

This is final tandem pairing of Brandie O'Connor (R) and Kerry Knowler (L). Someone thought the author should make at least one appearance in the blog so that's yours truly putting in a cameo in between the two girls.

 Brandie and Kerry are the other two rowing converts in the team and just can't help but refer to their training efforts as 'pieces'. Kerry's no stranger to top level competition, having represented Australia at the 2000 Olympic Games - in rowing, of course. This is Brandie's second time at a World Championship, having represented Australia at last year's para road Championships. She's worked hard in training since then and is hopeful that the extra fitness and experience she now has will lead to some good results here in Montichiari.

And finally, here are our two single bike men, Andrew Panazzolo (L) and Michael Gallagher (R).

Andrew, or Fabio as he's known here in downtown Italy (can you guess why?), is our C2 men's representative.  With his Italian heritage he doubles as local food critic and team interpreter when the going gets tough for the non-Italian speakers.

Michael competes in the C5 division. He's an old hand at this International competition business and is known for his meticulous preparation, not to mention a swag of World Championship and Paralympic medals.

That's it for the introductions, so hopefully you'll be a little better acquainted with everyone as you follow their achievements in the next few days and, who knows, maybe even beyond that as their para cycling careers progress.

Tomorrow sees Michael open proceedings with the C5 pursuit qualification round. Later in the day, all four tandems will be in action in their 1000m time trials. For those unfamiliar with cycling, that's four laps of the track for the tandems and 16 laps for Michael. The finals of the men's pursuits are also on during the evening session, so hopefully my next post will bring you some good results to brag to the rest of the world about!

Until then...