The format of the Australian worldwide racing season has confronted challenges in current seasons, the most important in fact being the COVID-19 cancellations, however now with the early-season racing block again for a second 12 months. the evolution and enchancment continues.
The Australian Highway Nationwide Championships, the Tour Down Below and Cadel Evans Nice Ocean Highway Race stay however there was a shuffling of the deck with regards to the themes, different occasions and timings. We are able to count on a captivating few weeks of racing.
Sadly the Bay Crits, which started in 1989, have disappeared from the calendar and the Jayco Herald Solar Tour is also but to make its return from the COVID-19 cancellations that began in 2021. Nonetheless, there are some additions, with gravel on the agenda across the Tour Down Below and in February, whereas the mid-week racing can be again within the days earlier than the Cadel Evans Nice Ocean Highway Race.
There may be additionally some new observe racing, with Adelaide internet hosting the opening spherical of the UCI Observe Nations Cup simply 5 months earlier than the Paris Olympics. Count on Filippo Ganna and others to remain on in Australia for February 2-4 observe racing.
Cyclingnews might be on the bottom to cowl the Australian racing, from Ballarat to Adelaide and onto Geelong within the warmth of the southern hemisphere summer time.
Get limitless entry to all of our protection of the Tour Down Below and Girls’s Tour Down Below, together with reporting from Australia, breaking information and evaluation. Discover out extra.
Final dance in Ballarat, for now
Australian Highway Nationwide Championships, Ballarat
- Time trials from January 3 to 4
- Criteriums on January 5
- Highway Races from January 6 to 7
The Australian Highway Nationwide Championships have been held in Ballarat since 2002, with the climb of Mount Buninyong drawing an ever-growing crowd and establishing its place as an important element of the race that decides who will put on the inexperienced and gold striped jersey of the Australian street champion for the 12 months.
“The enduring dedication from Ballarat and the difficult Buninyong course have ensured the occasion has world recognition, giving all our nationwide champions prompt credibility all through the biking group,” stated race director Scott McGrory.
“It’s a privilege to have been the race director for thus a few years in Ballarat, and I’m assured 2024 will give us one other incredible version – one to not be missed.”
This 12 months, nonetheless, might be Ballarat’s final – for some time not less than – giving the riders who’ve loved the parcours further incentive to take advantage of this final dance. The riders who do not like Mount Buninyong can have the reduction of realizing they’re going to solely need to grit their enamel on that repeated ascent for one final 12 months.
The time trials start the proceedings, with Grace Brown (FDJ-Suez) the recent favorite to take out the ladies’s elite title once more however she will not be with out challengers, maybe that could possibly be 2020 and 2021 title holder Sarah Gigante.
Within the males’s elite time trial, Jay Vine (UAE Group Emirates) won’t defend his title however Luke Plapp might be there, with the 2021 title holder decided to deliver a contact of inexperienced and gold to his new workforce package of Jayco-AlUla.
Then there would be the criterium on Friday afternoon by to the night, with the riders battling on the central Ballarat scorching canine circuit to take the jersey that Amber Pate and Kelland O’Brien of Jayco-AlUla claimed in 2023.
Within the street race, Plapp has held the inexperienced and gold jersey for 2 years, taking it regardless of being the lone consultant of his workforce.
That may all change along with his shift to Jayco-AlUla, which could possibly be a double-edged sword as whereas he can have teammates to assist this time, he’ll even have teammates he could have to sacrifice his probabilities for.
Brodie Chapman (Lidl-Trek) broke away to take the ladies’s elite victory in 2023, however with three-time winner Amanda Spratt on the workforce, they’re going to be capable to break up the gaze of their rivals. Brown, nonetheless, is a podium common and might be looking for that high step whereas the Australian Jayco-AlUla squad might be pushing to recapture the title, with Ruby Roseman-Gannon and Alex Manly each critical contenders.
The Tour Down Below: a return of Willunga and a gravel twist
Santos Tour Down Below, South Australia
- Girls’s Tour Down Below, January 12-14
- Males’s Down Below Traditional (criterium), January 13
- Males’s Tour Down Below, January 16-21
- Girls’s Down Below Criterium, January 18
- RADL GRVL, January 19
- Willunga Hill Time Trial, January 20
WorldTour riders from Europe and across the globe will as soon as once more escape the winter climate and head to sunny Australia, the place the one ice within the ice-stuffed stockings the riders put down the necks of their jerseys to try to discover some reduction from the Australian summer time warmth.
Within the second version of the Tour Down Below racing after the COVID-19 cancellations, issues are again to regular.
Willunga Hill is again within the males’s race and even a retired Richie Porte might be charging up the ascent the place he reigned for thus many editions of the race, in a enjoyable time trial model occasion the place he might be making an attempt to catch members of the general public who’ve signed up for the problem.
The Girls’s Tour Down Below will see a powerful trio of former winners in motion, with 2023 victor Grace Brown lining up, in addition to Ruth Edwards (née Winder) who claimed the ochre chief’s jersey in 2020 and Amanda Spratt, who gained the earlier three editions.
Within the Males’s Tour Down Below, 2023 winner Jay Vine might be lacking however it seems just like the Australian based mostly WorldTour workforce Jayco-AlUla might be going all out to reassert their dominance on the residence race, with a line up that features Caleb Ewan, 2023 runner up Simon Yates and Luke Plapp.
There are additionally some distinct new twists throughout the occasion.
For a begin Willunga will for the very first time be integrated into the Girls’s WorldTour race, offering what’s sure to be an thrilling crowd-lined finale for the three stage race.
There has additionally been a change within the move of occasions, with the crossover between the lads’s and ladies’s WorldTour occasion eradicated and because of the timing shift the ladies additionally get a weekend end, so the crowds are more likely to be out in drive to witness the crowning of the brand new queen of Willunga Hill, and the lads’s and ladies’s criteriums have been placed on separate days.
On high of that, the occasion can be throwing in some unpaved motion, with the already offered out RADL GRVL delivering a 108km race by McLaren Vale on Friday January 19.
One-day WorldTour racing with a mid-week bonus
Cadel Evans Nice Ocean Highway Race, Geelong
- Geelong Traditional, girls’s Professional Criterium, January 24
- Surf Coast Traditional, males’s 1.1 race, January 25
- Girls’s Cadel Evans Nice Ocean Highway Race, January 27
- Males’s Cadel Evans Nice Ocean Highway Race, January 28
The Cadel Evans Nice Ocean Highway Race added a robust, and ever unpredictable, someday occasion to the Australian January race calendar in 2015.
Since then it has stepped as much as WorldTour and Girls’s WorldTour degree and in addition experimented with numerous totally different codecs of shorter hit out races throughout the run up. These have been absent from the road up in 2023, however in 2024 they are going to be again.
Meaning after the riders journey from South Australia to Victoria the ladies will even have an opportunity to line up on the Geelong Traditional Professional Criterium on Wednesday January 24. The boys can then tackle the 1.1 ranked 158.6km Surf Coast Traditional on Thursday January 25, with a course that begins in Lorne earlier than sweeping inland to the Otways and again towards the coast for a Torquay end.
The highest tier motion then begins on Saturday with the 143km Girls’s WorldTour occasion, which – like the subsequent days males’s race – heads out from Geelong towards Bells Seashore earlier than heading right into a loop round Geelong that features the quick however steep Challambra climb.
It’s a course that may be hit by cross winds, searing warmth or driving rain, and simply because the situations could be unpredictable, so can the winner. This occasion has a behavior of throwing up new and surprising names, with the ladies’s race specifically usually rewarding these riders prepared to take an opportunity by leaping off the entrance in a small group, with Loes Adegeest (FDJ-Suez) in 2023 outsprinting Amanda Spratt (Lidl-Trek) after the duo hit the entrance collectively after the Challambra climb.
It was, nonetheless a diminished peloton that headed to the road within the 176km males’s race because the attackers failed to achieve a enough hole, and Marius Mayrhofer (Group DSM) launched to assert victory.
Given the combo of riders which have taken victory on the race, it’s a robust name to slender down the favourites. Meaning many riders will justifiably suppose they are going to be in with an opportunity, so the straightforward bit to foretell is that with loads prepared to probability their hand it will likely be aggressive racing proper to the road.