2012 Year in Review - Part 2

After reviewing the first part of the year last week, what better way to send out 2012 than with part two of our Cycling Year in Review.

JUNE
Steph McKenzie is named Southland's Junior Sportsperson of the Year while Eddie Dawkins and Ross Machejefski both earn finalist spots at the ILT Southland Sports Awards.

JULY
Southland District Council's Cherie Champion, Adrian Buddle, Jamie Cunningham and Mark Day take out the 2012 Harrex Group Corporate Pursuit title, Bradley Wiggins wins the Tour de France and we honour Lyn Randall with Life Membership at our AGM.

AUGUST
Eddie Dawkins earns a top five Olympic result in the Men's Team Sprint while Natasha Hansen features prominently in her Olympic debut and the UCI Juniors Track World Championships are staged in Invercargill. New Zealand win seven silver and three bronze medals and an unprecedented five world record rides are recorded. Brilliantly supported by spectators and the wider Southland community, Cycling Southland delivers the best ever Junior World Champs and stamped the city and our velodrome on the world stage.

SEPTEMBER
Phillipa Gray and Laura Fairweather combine for a full set of Paralympic medals at the London Paralympics. The pair smash the world record in winning gold in the Individual Pursuit after taking bronze in the Time Trial and then completed their set with silver in the road Time Trial. Sophie Williamson rides strongly to just miss a medal in her final race as a junior at the World Road Championships in Holland while Andy McIntyre takes out the Murray McLeay Trophy on Cycling Southland's Memorial Weekend.

OCTOBER
A record field of 189 takes to the roads in our annual Yunca Junior Tour of Southland. The weather gods don't play ball on the Saturday in Te Tipua but the sunshine returned for some exciting climaxes on the final day. At the Velodrome the first track event of the new season shows the unquestionable talent coming through the Junior ranks and stamp Australian Jack Edwards as a freakish talent and a name to watch as a future superstar of the sport.

NOVEMBER
The final PowerNet-sponsored Tour of Southland ends in appropriate fashion with the race lead changing on the final stage of the week long race. Node 4-Subaru's Mike Northey claims a hugely popular victory on the ride to Gala Street. A record 17 Southlanders line up at the Oceania Track Championships in Adelaide. They return with 15 medals including an incredible Southland trifecta with Eddie Dawkins, Cam Karwowski and Matt Dodds finishing 1,2,3 in the Men's kilo.

DECEMBER
James Hargest retain the Secondary School track cycling title by a solitary point, two national records fall at the Southland Track Championships and Jeremy Presbury and Liam Aitcheson are named to ride at the Sydney Youth Olympic Festival in January. Sophie Williamson is named BikeNZ's Emerging Talent while she, Eddie Dawkins and Phillipa Gray all feature in the Halberg Award nominees.

Let's do it all again in 2013. Happy New Year.

Nick Jeffrey is Cycling Southland's Chief Executive

2012 Year in Review - Part 1

As usual, my final columns for the year look back on some of the highlights from the Cycling Southland year.

Each of these deserve more words than this column's word limit can provide, but collectively they add up to one helluva year for the sport in the south. I planned to do a single column, but the sheer volume of performance mean I have had to split this over two. So let's get started

JANUARY
Cycling Southland members Nicky Samuels and James Williamson complete a remarkable double in winning both the elite titles at the Road Nationals in Christchurch. Matt Archibald and Eddie Dawkins earn World Cup bronze in the Team Sprint in Beijing while Cam Karwowski earns the same coloured medal in the Team Pursuit. Canterbury's Dylan Kennett takes out the Gore to Invercargill Road classic.

FEBRUARY
Eddie Dawkins and Natasha Hansen are the star-turns at the Elite Track Nationals in Invercargill winning the trophies for most points by male and female riders while Phillipa Gray and Laura Fairweather give us a taste of things to come by winning bronze at the Para-Cycling World Championships in Los Angeles.

MARCH
Southland again dominates the Age Group Track Championships, earning 144 points to comfortably defend the National Points Shield, 63 points ahead of its closest region. Kylie Young takes out the Gore to Waikiwi classic while Sophie Williamson and Tom Vessey both earn podium finishes at the Oceania Road Championships, hosted in Queenstown. In the space of 48 hours eight Southlanders are named in World championship squads (three for the Elites and five for the Juniors) and just to top off a busy month we hand out 10 Southland road racing titles across various age groups.

APRIL
In what ranks at the top of my personal highlight list, Eddie Dawkins becomes the first man to break the 10 second mark in the Men's Sprint on one of the biggest stages imaginable - the UCI World Championships in Melbourne. Eddie and Matt Archibald finish qualifying in the top 12 in the world. Eddie also earns New Zealand's first World Championship sprint medal, winning bronze in the Team Sprint. I feel very privileged to have watched it from the infield at Hisense Arena. Another 14 titles are handed out at the Southland Time Trial Champs and Eddie Dawkins and Natasha Hansen are named in NZ's Olympic team.

MAY
Sophie Williamson goes back-to-back in winning both the road race and time trial at the Club Road Nationals while Laura Heywood, Jennifer Muhl , Phillipa Gray, Laura Fairweather and Kylie Young also all stand on the medal dais. Tom Scully becomes the first New Zealander to finish in the top three of the prestigious Paris-Roubaix U23 race and somehow I cycle from Queenstown to Invercargill (or most of the way anyway) as part of Westpac's Chopper Appeal.
Until our June to December review next week, from all of us at Cycling Southland, a merry Christmas to you and yours.

Nick Jeffrey is Cycling Southland's Chief Executive

Busy start to 2013 beckons

There's little doubt that 2012 has been a massive year for Cycling Southland, headlined by our hosting of the UCI Juniors Track World Championships in August and by a large number of stand-out performances at national and international by the south's elite and junior riders.
 

Next week, in my final column for the year I will relive the craziness of the last twelve months, but today it is a quick look forward to what the New Year holds.

The first month of the year is chock full of championship racing the Elite Road and Track Championships scheduled. First up, the Elite Road Championships in Christchurch from January 11 to 13. Last year Cycling Southland's James Williamson and Nicky Samuels doubled-up for an unprecedented double in winning both elite men's and women's road racing titles, Southland's first national road title since 1968.

Closer to home, we hit the ground running with our annual ILT New Year Cycling Series. This begins on January 18 and 19 with the traditional New Year Track Carnival starting at 7pm both nights. This event is always a great way to get the year underway and with the Track Nationals to follow just over ten days later it is a crucial build-up event.

The Elite and Under 19 Track Nationals will be held from January 31 to February 3. In recent years, some members of the High Performance squad have had limited campaigns. No so in 2013. The national selectors have been very clear that performances at these nationals will dictate selections for the international campaigns for the remainder of the year. It is the key selection event and we'll get the benefit.

With a pared back international programme in 2013 as the first year in a new Olympic cycle, riders will have precious few competition opportunities to show why they should have a spot in the squad building to Rio in 2016. Next month's Track nationals and the Oceania Championships in Invercargill in November will benefit as the best in the business will have to fire to earn spots in the black skin suit throughout the year.

Last weekend's Southland Track Champs really fired us up for the upcoming championship season. To have over 120 riders racing at our local championships is easily a record and underlines the continued growth in the sport.

A number of new names have earned selection in the Nationals training squads directly on the back of their performances last weekend and the quality of riding, along with depth of talent which is developing across all our age groups from under-15 to Masters is heartening.

The World Championships are to be held in Minsk, Belarus in mid-February and then our Age Group athletes take centre stage from February 26 to March 2.

And just because we would hate for you to think we weren't busy enough, the Club Road nationals - the biggest national cycling championship in number-terms, is this year being held in Queenstown in April.

Better rest up over Christmas then!