SHANE Perkins provided Australia with the perfect ending to the Melbourne round of track cycling’s World Cup when he claimed the sprint gold medal.
Source: The Australian
In the last event at the three-day meet, Perkins blitzed Frenchman Michael D’Almeida, the fastest qualifier, in two straight heats in the best-of-three final, stopping the clock at 10.7sec for the final 200m.
“I know I could have gone faster. I did a 10.1 in Manchester,” Perkins said. When pressed if he could break the magical 10 second barrier, he added: “I’ve still got a lot of work ahead of me, but I’ll never say never.
“I’m looking forward to racing against Robbie McEwen and Graeme Brown at the Revolution IV meet back in Melbourne next month before tackling the Christmas carnivals in Tasmania.
“It will be interesting to see how Robbie goes because he hasn’t ridden the track for a while, while Brownie has a strong background in the discipline.”
The 21-year-old from Chadstone in Melbourne’s southeast and son of Tokyo Olympian Daryl, credits fatherhood and a new coach in Sean Eadie for the rapid improvement after missing Olympic selection for Beijing.
He and wife Kristine Bayley, herself a former national track cyclist and sister of dual Athens gold medallist Ryan, have a baby boy, Aidan, and Perkins credits his family for helping settle him.
“The little bloke is just seven weeks old and with parenting comes added responsibility,” Perkins said.
“While Hilton Clarke turned me into a rider while I was at the VIS, credit must go to Sean (Eadie) for sharpening me up.
“At some point we’ve all got to grow up and it’s happening for me now,” Perkins said.
His convincing win gave Australia five gold medals for the round to top the medal tally.
After falling to Perkins in their semi-final, Jason Niblett settled for the bronze medal, beating Frenchman Francois Pervis in two straight heats.
Perkins missed selection for the Beijing Olympics and has had some disciplinary problems off the bike, but the two-time junior world champion has declared he is determined to make the most of his undoubted potential.
Australia also won silver on Saturday night in the women’s teams pursuit and the 40km madison, while Kaarle McCulloch finished third in the 500m time-trial.
Australian Emily Rosemond was nursing a sore hip and track burns down her right side after crashing in the keirin ride-off for seventh to 12th. New Zealander Natasha Hansen, who was disqualified, also crashed when they touched wheels only a few metres from the finish.
In the women’s teams pursuit final, the Australian trio of Ashlee Ankudinoff, Josephine Tomic and Sarah Kent could never quite match the British combination of Elizabeth Armistead, Katie Colclough and Joanne Rowsell.
The Brits clocked 3min 29.890sec to Australia’s 3:30.506.
The Spainish pair of Unai Elorriaga and David Muntaner won the madison from the Australian duo of Chris Sutton and Cameron Meyer.
Heading into the final sprint Spain had the gold medal locked up but, but the Sutton-Meyer combination was level on points with Germany.
Meyer attacked on the final lap and held on to fourth across the line to pick up the one point needed to edge Germany for silver.
Source: http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,24694853-2722,00.html
