CYCLING: Peta Mullens showed her future could be on the road rather than the dirt and Heinrich Haussler was so happy in green and gold, as the Road Cycling Nationals at Buninyong in Victoria concluded with the gruelling and exciting road race events.
See below for the men’s and women’s race reports:
Mullens re-thinks plans after road win
CYCLING: Peta Mullens' barnstorming win at the Australian road cycling championships means a massive reassessment of her plans ahead of the Rio Olympics.
The mountain biker capitalised on strong road form to join Rachel Neylan in the key break near the end of Saturday's 102km race.
Mullens then predictably outsprinted Neylan at Buninyong, near Ballarat to win her first senior road title.
Two days after regaining the time trial championship, Shara Gillow also rode superbly to finish by herself 22 seconds after Mullens and Neylan to take the bronze medal.
Mullens immediately admitted she would have to reassess her 2015 plans - Saturday was originally going to be the last time she competes on the road this year.
But it is a big deal for a rider to wear the national road champion's jersey in Europe.
Longer-term, Mullens and Australian women's road coach Martin Barras will reopen a discussion they had last year about her proposal to aim for mountain bike and road selection at the Rio Games.
Right now, Mullens is focusing on trying to make the Rio mountain bike team.
"Now that I've won the (green and gold) stripes I might have to change my plans," Mullens said of this year.
"I always say I want someone to win the jersey who is going to take it over to the European peloton so it can be seen.
"Like I said, Rio Olympics is my goal.
"Last year I made a phone call to Martin Barras and I said to him 'I want to go to the Olympics on the mountain bike and the road'.
"He pretty much laughed at me and said 'that's not possible and we don't necessarily support that sort of thing’."
Barras, who is also a sports director at the Orica-AIS team, said his reaction to Mullens' proposal was despondence, not laughter.
He stressed he would entertain another conversation with her.
Barras said they had discussion about Mullens possibly joining Orica-AIS, the women's arm of Orica-GreenEDGE.
"Obviously as the national coach, I wish she would dedicate herself to road riding full-time," he said.
"I appreciate why she doesn't want to do that.
"Would we be interested in a bike rider like Peta Mullens? Yes, we were talking with her last year.
"We're still talking about it."
Barras added there were serious logistical obstacles to Mullens competing in road and mountain bike for Orica-AIS in the lead-up to Rio.
Silver was a crucial result for Neylan, who has struggled with injury since finishing second at the 2012 world road championships.
Earlier on Saturday, Miles Scotson added the under-23 road race championship to his time trial win in the category. Shannon Malseed finished 11th in the women's elite race to take out the under-23 title.
Roger Vaughan
AAP
Haussler outmuscles strong field
In the final race of the Road National Championships, Heinrich Haussler (IAM Cycling) thrilled the 25,000 strong crowd that lined the streets of Buninyong by edging pocket rocket Caleb Ewan (Orica GreenEDGE) in a sprint to the line to finish the 182km men's road race.
Victoria's Neil van der Ploeg (Avanti Racing) claimed bronze.
“To be honest I still can’t believe it, it’s seriously the best day of my life,” said Haussler who’s chain came off in his sprint to the line.
Born in Australia, Haussler took advantage of his German heritage by beginning his racing career racing for that country. In 2010, he gave up his citizenship in the hope of being selected for Australia for the Geelong UCI Road World Championships.
“It means everything. To start the season off like this and to have the jersey now, it just puts you on a different level," Haussler said.
“It was just a tough sprint and the lactic acid was just coming out of my ears in that last one hundred metres. Thank god the line came and I got there first, I just couldn’t believe it,” said Haussler who’s resume also boasts Tour de France and Tour of Spain stage victories.
On a humid but sunny day, 149 riders set off for 18 laps of the tough Mt Buninyong 10.2 kilometre circuit.
Haussler was part of a larger breakaway group which formed inside the final 40 kilometres before a select nine were left to fight it out for line honours.
Ewan and teammate Michael Hepburn, van der Ploeg, Campbell Flakemore on debut for BMC, Sam Spokes and Darren Lapthorne (Drapac), Jack Bobridge (Budget Forklifts) and Angus Morton (Jelly Belly) began to attack one another on the final climb up Mt Buninyong with sprint ace Ewan the one left to do all the chasing.
With three kilometres left to race, Ewan went on the offensive and launched a blistering attack with van der Ploeg the one to match his power.
However a lull in the tempo saw Haussler return to the fore and in the end, his sprint was too much for a visibly exhausted Ewan.
“To be honest, I’m devastated,” said an emotional Ewan who added a second silver medal to his tally for the week after finding the podium in Wednesday's criterium.
“That would have been such a dream start to my career winning the green and gold in my first year as a professional and to come so close is really gutting," Ewan, 20, added.
“I really tried to keep that little group together in the end to make sure it came down to the sprint, I gave it my all.”
Van der Ploeg, who finished fourth in 2013, realised the significance of his result.
“Oh man, there was a lot of action on the last lap. It was a pretty awesome race actually," said Van Der Ploeg, 27, of Mount Beauty.
“It’s obviously a very quality podium. I think everyone knows Caleb has got bucket-loads of talent. To come third to Heinrich Haussler and Caleb, I can’t be too down.”
Cadel Evans in his final National Championship road race finished in the peleton.
Cycling Australia Release
