The hills of Xi’an play host to the 2015 Chinese National Championships, where the country’s best puncheurs will be looking to lock horns in the fight for the National Jersey.
A total of 11 riders lined up on the start list, with 3 circuits of the hilly route laying ahead. Jianhua Ji, Pengda Jiao and Meiyin Wang all topped the favourite’s list, but you should not discount Chen Shikai and Peilun Wu today.
A group of three formed the day’s break, with Libin Chen, Zhihui Jiang and Haijun Ma all present. With none of them the strongest on this terrain, all had a good chance if this made it to the finish.
The bigger names in the peleton did not seem to be too bothered chasing the leading group, and it was a real shame that they could not work as one. There could have been real fireworks at the finish if this had been brought back together.
Jumping to the final kilometres, and it would be Ma who made the first move. A strong TT rider, the other pair could not afford to let him go. He opened up a small gap very quickly, and there was no organisation behind.
Onto the climb to the line, under the flame rouge, and the Oz rider still had a nice gap on the chasing duo. Had he done enough?
What a victory for Ma! He went off hard before the climb, and put in enough of a gap to take the National Road Race Title. Behind, the battle for 2nd place goes to Chen, with Jiang settling for third place.
The rest of the peleton crossed the line as one group, no accelerations, no change in pace… nothing. It was a long way outside of the time limit at over 22 minutes.
Following Haijun Ma’s victory in the Road Race, he had a big chance of becoming a double Chinese Champion. Standing in his way was Chen Shikai and teammate Wen Hao Li. Who would be the strongest at the end…
Defending Champion Ma was first out on the course, and he was certainly in some fine form. At the early checkpoints, he was up on the early set times, and he even caught his two minute man, Jianhua Ji, at the halfway marker.
Chen Shikai was next on the route, and he started slow. He was down by over 45” on Ma at the halfway point, and had a lot of making up to do over the final kilometres.
Last down the ramp is Wen Hao Li, who was looking to get the better of his Oz teammate. He hit the course hard, and matched Ma over the the first half of the route.
Approaching the line, it was looking like Ma had this in the bag. In the final 5km, he passed his 4 minute man, Meiyin Wang, and is within 8” of catching Pengda Jiao, who started 6 minutes ahead of him! A great ride from the new RR champion -- 1h06'00
We said that Shikai started slowly, but sadly it got worse from there. Losing time across the entire course to Ma, he finished nearly two minutes down on him. It is good enough for at least a podium, but would it be 2nd or 3rd spot? -- 1h07’44
At the last checkpoint, Li was just 22” down on his teammate. He was riding strongly, but did he have too much time to make up? Crossing the line, he was 19” slower, giving him 2nd place on the podium -- 1h06’19
And so Haijun Ma is crowned the Chinese Time Trial Champion, defending his title and giving him the double victory. Teammate Wen Hao Li takes silver, with Chen Shikai comfortably winning the bronze medal.
Haijun Ma
