Australian Vets Titles
Canberra, 12th to 14th October 2010
Grampians Ladies Shine

Once again the Grampians Veterans Cycling Club ladies came up with Gold at the Australian Veteran Cycling Championships held last weekend in Canberra.

Crystal Wemyss took Gold in both the time trial and road race in the 30-35 year age group. Meg Parnaby did the same in the 55-59 age bracket and Mildura based Stephanie Frawley made a clean sweep of the time trial, criterium and road race in her 50-54 age group, also taking 3rd place in the prestigous Russell Mockeridge Trophy for the fastest overall age based rider in the time trial event. Errol Schmidt, who is also based in Mildura, was third in his time trial event.

The time trial was held over a testing 25 kilometres at Mt Stromlo, with the course rapidly sorting out the hill climbers from the rest. Riders competed in their age divisions, and also overall against a standard time for their age, with the rider posting the best time against their age standard winning the Mockeridge Trophy.

Crystal got into her rhythm quickly and was looking to post a very fast time when she over shot the roundabout at the half way point and lost valuable seconds, but still averaged an impressive 34.9kph, giving her a time 30 seconds faster than the age standard.

Meg Parnaby had a slight mechanical incident at the starting line but quickly made up for this, passing her first rider on the early hills within the first 3 kilometres. She average 31.8 kph, giving her a sizeable 3 and a half minutes faster than the age standard time.

Stephanie Frawley, who is a time trial specialist, dominated the women’s race with an average speed of 37.6kph, and posted a whopping 9 minutes under her age standard.

In the road races, many age groups were combined to give bigger working bunches over the two laps of the hilly 60 or 42 km out and back circuits.

Based on the time trial, Crystal Wemyss always looked like being the dominant rider in the 30-39 age group. This proved to be the case with only 3 riders remaining at the front of the bunch to contest a sprint finish. Crystal made a charge a long way from the line and rode very strongly to win by 30 metres.

Meg Parnaby and Stephanie Frawley were both in the combined 50-64 age group and both lightly built riders looked good prospects for gold. They attacked and got clear on the last long climb before the first turning point but were caught again on the return journey after an overly cautious but safe decent and turn around.

This move, however, did break up the bunch and leave just 4 riders vying for the 2 gold medals up for grabs. and also turned the race into a tactical competition between the Grampians and ACT clubs.

With Frawley lacking a sprint finish, she again made a break on a hill, and with Parnaby on her wheel dropping back to block the following riders, this time got clear ensuring the gold in the 50-54 division.

Parnaby tried a few more attacks in the last 10 kilometres but could not get away and was forced to go for a long sprint which she also won by about 30 metres, taking out the 55-59 age division.