Taupo-Napier Classic Race Report
Ben Evans has had another brilliant race at the Taupo-Napier classic finishing 9th over all.
The second race of the National Points Series: a hilly 140km Taupo-Napier along SH5.
This road is in excellent condition, with long smooth corners and straight fast descents (max speed 91kmh). It makes Northland’s SH1 seem like a country road.
We started in very cool conditions, with a strong tail-cross wind. The pace was hot from the gun, with several attacks, and most of us were in the red zone pretty quickly. Eventually a break of five riders got away. The 2 major climbs (this race climbs 1650m vertically – not far off the 2000m for K2) sorted out the chasing bunch from about 20 down to 6 after the first climb, and down to 2 (myself and Aaron Strong) on the second. We caught 2 riders dropped from the break to make four by the top of the last big climb. Unfortunately I was dropped in the feedzone at the top of the climb where the others didn’t take bottles, and put the gas on straight away. I chased for several kms, but had to be content with working with the two riders following up behind. We worked well, but all tired in the last 12km of strong cross-head wind. This was when the Tour of New Caledonia caught up with me, and I came in third out of our group, and 9th overall. All the other Kiwi riders who completed the Tour of New Caledonia either didn’t ride, or were dropped on the climbs.
The strength of the field, and the tailwind resulted in a fast race (41.6kmh average) – the winner beating the record by 10 minutes, and at least the top 10 also coming in faster than any previous time.
Jeremy Yates won with teammate (Subway) Tom Findlay second, and Auckland 1000 winner Karl Murray placing 4th.
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