favorites: Simon Gerrans, Cadel Evans, Heinrich Haussler
outsiders: Richie Porte, Allan Davis, Matthew Goss, Mark Renshaw
The first race of the year. A peloton of 61 riders prepare for the official start of the new cycling season.
Heinrich Haussler showing off the new Carrefour gear
Orica-GreenEdge take their responsibility early to keep the breakaways in check, as they are one of only three teams with a full squad of 8 riders in this race, and the only one with a clear favorite to take the victory.
Even one of Evans´ teammates joins in the chace.
The gap is closed to the chase group, but these four are let go, and a one lap later they have over 3 minutes on the peloton. Amongst them are the fast sprinters Renshaw (Rabo) and Sutton (SKY).
And on top of the climb they´re joined by another quartet.
A long stretched peloton, that must mean a high speed after all.
Too bad it´s only with about 25km to go.
The breakaway got a maximum advantage of about ten minutes, and it will produce the next Australian champion. Too little too late from the Orica-GreenEdge men, who seemed so aggressive in the openings two laps.
It seems useless, but there are actually attacks from the peloton:
Unrecognizable here but Cadel Evans is one of them on the attack.
Patrick Lane isn´t content to go to the finish with Renshaw and Sutton.
Up front where it matters. Inside the final lap now.
They don´t let him get too far away:
Lane is caught just before the final sprint:
The smart money has got to be on Renshaw now. He looks in great position to take this. Sutton is not in his wheel but on the other side of the road.
But it is Chris Sutton who beats Renshaw to the punch on the last 300 meters. Renshaw even gets beaten for silver by Aaron Kemps of Champion Systems. Stuart Shaw (DRA) is fourth.
Renshaw has to be kicking himself. He probably got into the lead too early if anything. Will he ever have a better chance to win the Australian championships on a course like this?
Cycleman123 wrote:
Not a good start for Carrefour Remember that you can press CTRL+U and " to make the screenshot look way better.
Yeah I´ll try to do that more often
Australian Time Trial Championships
1. Richie Porte - SKY
2. Bobridge - Orica 11"
3. Rogers - SKY 15"
4. Michael Hepburn - Orica 18"
5. O´Grady - Orica 20"
6. Ben Day - UHC 21"
7. Evans - BMC 23"
An extremely close time trial despite the distance being over 50 kms.
Richie Porte made it a SKY double for the Australian championships after Bobridge had bested his teammate Rogers, who was in the lead for most of the race.
Romain Bacon
Connor O´Leary
Australian Championships 
Remember that you can press CTRL+U and " to make the screenshot look way better.
