Georgia Baker completed a golden hat-trick when she teamed up with fellow Tasmanian Macey Stewart at the Oceania Track Championships.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
The Tassie twosome clocked 37:51.71 to win the 120-lap 130km elite women’s madison in Adelaide with 35 points.
Baker, of Perth, and Stewart, of Devonport, finished three points clear of their fellow team pursuit gold medallist Ashlee Ankudinoff, of NSW, and South Australian Annette Edmondson’s tally.
Queenslander Kristina Clonan was the other member of the team pursuit triumph in the fastest time ever set at an Oceania Championships of 4:22.052.
Baker won the four-event omnium with victory in the scratch, tempo and elimination races to finish on 131 points, 14 clear of Edmondson with Ankudinoff third on 115. She also won bronze in the points race as Ankudinoff claimed a fourth title.
Stewart said the double gold felt “really good”.
“I am not in the best shape at the moment just coming back on the track after a busy year travelling and losing a bit of my track legs.
“The last couple of days I have been feeling a lot more comfortable on my bike again which is really good for the future. I'm heading to the Paris World Cup tomorrow and racing the madison there with Kristina. So this is really exciting and a bit of a confidence boost.
“I still think I can improve a lot. I still think I haven't ridden the perfect madison yet but we just did enough tonight to take the win and go away now and try and improve on our mistakes and hopefully we can get better and better each madison we do.
“It’s a big confidence boost to go back to back in my favourite event. Very exciting it is an Olympic event now as it has always been my favourite event so really exciting to focus on it over the next couple of years and give it a crack to try and get selected for the Olympics.
“I think with the madison you can't really plan for anything you just have to be able to react on the spot and use decision making out there to make the right calls. We didn't want to let anything get away and we needed to be on everything as soon as it went and just really be in the sprints.”
Tasmanians Zack Gilmore and Josh Duffy came seventh in the men’s madison, Ryan Lawson finished fifth after making the junior men’s keirin final and Tristan Aylett was 15th in the junior scratch race final.
China plate
Nathan Earle has moved into the top 10 of China’s Tour of Taihu Lake.
The Hobart 30-year-old from was in a two-man breakaway on the 116-kilometre sixth stage into Wujiang, winning both intermediate sprints and the most aggressive rider award.
The 57th-place finish leaves Earle one of three Israel Cycling Academy riders in the top 10, 27 seconds behind Belgian leader Boris Vallee.
Earle, who rode WorldTour alongside fellow Tasmanian Richie Porte at Team Sky in 2014-15, is contracted for another year with the ProContinental outfit.
Hammer time
Elsewhere in Asia, Richie Porte will lead “a well-rounded group of BMC Racing Team riders” into their final commitments of 2018.
The Launceston 33-year-old’s final races with the team he has led for three years will be the one-day Hammer Hong Kong followed by the last UCI WorldTour stage race of the calendar year, the Tour of Guangxi in China, from Tuesday to Sunday.
BMC sports director Jackson Stewart was optimistic Porte could help the team finish its season on a high.
“It has been a long season for many of our guys, and while it is sometimes difficult to maintain form and motivation in late-October, we are looking to have success in our final two races as BMC Racing Team,” he said.
“At last year's Tour of Guangxi, we had a very motivated roster and saw good performances which we are looking to repeat this year. Although we will be one man down due to some last minute changes, we are still lining up with a strong, competitive and versatile roster.”
Porte will be accompanied by compatriot Miles Scotson in Hong Kong along with Swiss Stefan Küng and Belgians Jürgen Roelandts and Nathan Van Hooydonck, with another Swiss, Michael Schär, joining the fray in China.