Mersey Valley & Tour de Perth Highlights

Michael Vink (Budget) in the opening timetrial of the Mersey Valley Tour..

Ben Johnson (Drapac) leading a breakaway group on Mersey's second day..

Brendan Canty (search2) and James Szollosi (Data#3) attacking..

Breakaway in Mersey's final stage: fighting for KoM-sprint..

O'Brien, Johnson and Cupitt attacking.. race-leader Meyer following!

Drapac kicking off the bunch sprint on Rottnest Island (Perth)..

Johnson (Charter) and Clarke (Drapac) fighting for line honours..

Early breakaway with Perth in the background..

Gillett, Roe and van der Ploeg battling for the queen stage!

Bunch sprint on final day in Perth..

Timothy Roe's consecutive 2nd places in Mersey Valley and Perth will make him leading the individual's rankings after two events. It's a narrow lead over Joe Cooper and Meyer, who both scored a GC-win and added nice points in the other race as well. Other top-favorites like O'Brien (only raced Mersey Valley though) couldn't score as big time as Roe/Cooper, but of course it's too early to count anyone off at this point.

Same goes for the team's competition, where Avanti Racing goes for the lead ahead of Budget and Drapac. No surprise. Already quite a gap for Budget with Avanti winning both team's classifications in the two races so far, but we've seen the team bouncing back from "losses" in the past two years. Anyway, Avanti definitely looks like the team to beat and could well repeat it's overall win from last season.

#INDIVIDUAL RANKINGS

Rk	Name	Team	Points
1	Thimothy Roe	Budget Forklifts	26
2	Joe Cooper	Avanti Racing Team	25
3	Travis Meyer	Drapac Cycling	21
4	Neil Van der Ploeg	Avanti Racing Team	10
5	Daniel Fitter	Charter Mason	9
6	Mark O'Brien	Avanti Racing Team	8
	Michael Vink	Budget Forklifts	8
	Will Clarke	Drapac Cycling	8
9	Jason Spencer	African Wildlife Safaris	7
	Rhys Gillett	African Wildlife Safaris	7
11	Ben Dyball	Avanti Racing Team	6
12	Taylor Gunman	Avanti Racing Team	5
13	Kristian Juel	Budget Forklifts	4
14	Stuart Smith	search2retain	3
	Shannon Johnson	Charter Mason	3
16	Sam Sautelle	Suzuki Bontrager	2
	Brad Hannaford	SUVelo Racing	2
	Jack Anderson	Drapac Cycling	2
19	Alex Wohler	Budget Forklifts	1
	Aaron Donnelly	Avanti Racing Team	1

#TEAM'S RANKINGS

Rk	Team	Points
1	Avanti Racing Team	35
2	Budget Forklifts	27
3	Drapac Cycling	26
4	African Wildlife Safaris	16
	Charter Mason Giant Racing	16
6	search2retain	13
7	Data#3 Symantec RT	9
8	Satalyst Giant Racing Team	5
9	GPM Data#3	3
	SUVelo Racing	3
11	St George Skoda HP Team	2
	Suzuki Bontrager	2

Tour of Toowoomba Preview

The FKG Tour of Toowoomba will be the third round of the 2015 Subaru National Road Series and is the only NRS Teams event to be staged in Queensland. It will comprise of three gruelling road stages, the challenging Team Time Trial and the inner city Criterium.

Top-favorite has to be Mark O'Brien, who is back to NRS-racing after skipping the Tour de Perth: the premium climber won the previous three editions of this race and simply loves the challenging profiles here!






A well known picture from the Tour of Toowoomba in the previous three years: Mark O'Brien completed a hattrick last year, when he rode for Euride Racing and slipped into the purple leader-shirt for the third consecutive year! Thanks to a stage-win on second day and a strong TTT, the climber took over the GC-lead from Bayly, who stormed to a stunning solo-victory on the opening day.

[img-l]https://i1176.photobucket.com/albums/x323/tsmoha/NRS_Portraits/15NRS_OBrien_zps4070731d.jpg[/img-l][img-l]https://i1176.photobucket.com/albums/x323/tsmoha/NRS_Portraits/NRS_Platzhalter_zps31ed228a.png[/img-l]Mark O'Brien (Avanti Racing)
Had not exactly the perfect start into the NRS-season, but this is without any questions one of his most favorite races on the schedule. Leading yet another extraordinary Avanti-squad here.

[img-l]https://i1176.photobucket.com/albums/x323/tsmoha/NRS_Portraits/15NRS_Haig_zps1b14a724.jpg[/img-l][img-l]https://i1176.photobucket.com/albums/x323/tsmoha/NRS_Portraits/NRS_Platzhalter_zps31ed228a.png[/img-l]Jack Haig (Avanti Racing)
Should be considered a top-favorite wherever he will be at the start in the NRS this season. This will be his first appearance and it will be interesting to see, how Avanti plays it's best cards.

[img-l]https://i1176.photobucket.com/albums/x323/tsmoha/NRS_Portraits/15NRS_Roe_zps457900ee.jpg[/img-l][img-l]https://i1176.photobucket.com/albums/x323/tsmoha/NRS_Portraits/NRS_Platzhalter_zps31ed228a.png[/img-l]Timothy Roe (Budget Forklifts)
Current NRS-leader after two runner-ups in Mersey Valley and Perth, Roe once again should be expected to be the undisputed leader for Budget. Will aim for the first two stages in particular.

[img-l]https://i1176.photobucket.com/albums/x323/tsmoha/NRS_Portraits/15NRS_KentSpark_zpse50545d7.jpg[/img-l][img-l]https://i1176.photobucket.com/albums/x323/tsmoha/NRS_Portraits/NRS_Platzhalter_zps31ed228a.png[/img-l]Oliver Kent-Spark (search2)
Search2retain lines up with a promising duo in Kent-Spark and Canty, while the first should be a real threat thanks to his allround skills here. The TTT though will be the key to limit the losses.

[img-l]https://i1176.photobucket.com/albums/x323/tsmoha/NRS_Portraits/15NRS_NZL2_Vink_zps26638c49.jpg[/img-l][img-l]https://i1176.photobucket.com/albums/x323/tsmoha/NRS_Portraits/NRS_Platzhalter_zps31ed228a.png[/img-l]Michael Vink (Budget Forklifts)
After two Top-10's in the first two GC's this season, Vink may be his team's second option whenever Roe has an off-day. Strong on hills and the powerhorse for Budget in the TTT. And a darkhorse for the GC?

[img-l]https://i1176.photobucket.com/albums/x323/tsmoha/NRS_Portraits/15NRS_Girdlestone_zps8952e244.jpg[/img-l][img-l]https://i1176.photobucket.com/albums/x323/tsmoha/NRS_Portraits/NRS_Platzhalter_zps31ed228a.png[/img-l]Keagan Girdlestone (Charter Mason)
Charter Mason had a great start into the season with Daniel Fitter's podium in Mersey Valley and Johnson's stage-win in Perth. South African born Kiwi Girdlestone is worth a closer look in stage races this year!

[img-l]https://i1176.photobucket.com/albums/x323/tsmoha/NRS_Portraits/15NRS_vdPloeg_zps97b4ae0b.jpg[/img-l][img-l]https://i1176.photobucket.com/albums/x323/tsmoha/NRS_Portraits/NRS_Platzhalter_zps31ed228a.png[/img-l]Neil van der Ploeg (Avanti Racing)
And Avanti with a third option: van der Ploeg is coming off a strong 3rd place in Tour de Perth and is one dangerous allrounder. Given the team's TTT-strength, he could repeat his Perth-performance.

Tour of Toowoomba Recap

Avanti Racing and Budget Forklifts keep dominating the NRS with nine riders in Toowoomba's Top-10 and Neil van der Ploeg (Avanti) claiming the second consecutive GC-victory for his team! Teammate Jack Haig (Avanti) missed the win by 20 seconds and Timmy Roe (Budget) completed the podium for another very good result.

The opening hilly stage was the key-day for van der Ploeg and his overall victory: attacking the bunch 16km before finish to bridge across an early breakaway, the former NRS-champion held off a small group of favorites by more than a minute. Timmy Roe, Oliver Kent-Spark, Michael Cupitt and Mark O'Brien gained some valuable seconds on the peloton, too.

The second stage - featuring a challenging hilltop finish up "Crows Nest" - wasn't as selective as it used to be in the past two years: while Jack Haig launched his winning move 5km to the line and Roe losing 46 seconds on his solo-chase, a group of 30 riders (led by O'Brien) would again lose a minute on the stage-winner. Van der Ploeg defended his GC-lead by 16 seconds on Haig.

Avanti would continue to dominate this race by also taking out the TTT with quite a margin: 42 seconds faster than Budget, the Tasmanian based equipe underlined it's strength in style. Roe kept his 3rd place in the GC though.

No more major changes inside the GC's Top-10 on the further two (flat rated) stages: Nick Aitkin (Seight) and Trent Derecourt (Bianchi) took line honours out of breakaways there, while Neil van der Ploeg secured his GC-win thanks to minor bonifications as 3rd on final day.. Triple-Toowoomba-winner Mark O'Brien had to settle for 4th in GC eventually, just ahead of Joe Cooper and a bunch of Budget-riders. A "lonely" Thomas Hamilton (Jayco) finished 10th as the only rider not riding for Avanti or Budget here..

Van der Ploeg attacking the bunch 16km before finish on first day..

..and holding on to a minutes-gap til the line!

NRS-leader Roe, Kent-Spark and Cupitt with a small gap on the bunch..

Haig and Talbot go with 5km remaining on Crows Nest..

Roe attacking the bunch to solo-chase Haig..

..who celebrated another win for Avanti here!

Avanti makes it three in a row with a dominating TTT!

Aitkin celebrating a nice win for a new team in the NRS..

Derecourt held off van der Ploeg on final day's criterium through Toowoomba!

Van der Ploeg claims the overall victory ahead of teammate Haig!

the_hoyle wrote:
Well it seems that very strange things happen with Drapac aren't racing!

Timmy Roe keeps the lead in the individual's rankings thanks to another podium in Toowoomba. Cooper as the most consistent Avanti-rider so far ain't too far behind, with also Van der Ploeg going strongly in the past two events. O'Brien, with one race less than Roe, with already quite a disadvantage on the first place and maybe already fearing that Avanti's overall strength may hurt one individual's points-production.

Avanti (23pts) and Budget (16) were the only teams to score double digits in Toowoomba, unsurprisingly. Another huge race for Avanti in particular, which looks set to build a comfortable lead here early into the season.

#INDIVIDUAL RANKINGS

Rk	Name	Team	Points
1	Timothy Roe	Budget Forklifts	38
2	Joe Cooper	Avanti Racing Team	31
3	Neil Van der Ploeg	Avanti Racing Team	26
4	Travis Meyer	Drapac Cycling	21
5	Mark O'Brien	Avanti Racing Team	16
6	Jack Haig	Avanti Racing Team	13
7	Michael Vink	Budget Forklifts	12
8	Daniel Fitter	Charter Mason Giant Racing	9
9	Will Clarke	Drapac Cycling	8
10	Jason Spencer	African Wildlife Safaris	7
	Rhys Gillett	African Wildlife Safaris	7
12	Ben Dyball	Avanti Racing Team	6
13	Michael Cupitt	Budget Forklifts	5
	Taylor Gunman	Avanti Racing Team	5
15	Kristian Juel	Budget Forklifts	4

#TEAM'S RANKINGS

Rk	Team	Points
1	Avanti Racing Team	58
2	Budget Forklifts	43
3	Drapac Cycling	26
4	African Wildlife Safaris	23
5	Charter Mason Giant Racing	21
6	search2retain	18
7	Data#3 Symantec RT	15
8	Jayco VIS - Apollo	9
9	Satalyst Giant Racing Team	7
10	St George Skoda HP Team	5
	Bianchi Lotto Arbitrage	5
12	GPM Data#3	4
13	SUVelo Racing	3
	Seight Test Team	3
	Suzuki Bontrager	3
16	Paradice Investment	2