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Let’s say, hypothetically, that you had to make a choice between establishing yourself as a professional road cyclist, and winning an Olympic medal on the track. An unlikely scenario for most of us, but a realistic one this year for several of Australia’s young guns.
This past week has seen several of the young stars of the Tour Down Under return to the track for the Subaru Australian Track Championships and the Berlin Six Day event.
GreenEdge’s double world madison champions Cameron Meyer and Leigh Howard won the prestigious Berlin Six Day event, while team-mate Jack Bobridge was busy winning three gold medals at the national titles.
Bobridge holds the world record for the 4000m individual pursuit.
All three are strong gold medal chances at the Olympics.
Luke Durbridge and Michael Hepburn will also balance GreenEdge commitments with their goal of winning the team pursuit (possibly joined by Bobridge and Rohan Dennis, or Meyer) in London. Again, a realistic goal, given they won the world title in 2011.
The track season will gather momentum through the London World Cup from 17 February, then onto the UCI World Championships in Melbourne at the beginning of April, and then back to London for the Olympic Games in July and August.
The problem is, the period from March to July happens to coincide with some of the biggest races on the professional road racing calendar.
In March, it’s Milan-San Remo. In April, the Spring classics on the cobbles of Belgium and Northern France, and the Ardennes Classics.
GreenEdge team management has these races listed as primary season goals, and the strength and opportunism of Bobridge, Meyer, Durbridge, and Howard will be vital to the team’s chances of victory.
The Giro d’Italia (5-27 May); the Critérium du Dauphiné (June); and of course the Tour de France (30 June-22 July) follow.
This group of young track endurance riders is one of the most talented Australia has taken to an Olympics, and the chance to win back pride from the British track team that dominated the Beijing Olympics is enormous.
The sprint squad is also strong, but the endurance events are where the challenges of balancing road and track come into sharp focus.
Bobridge, Meyer, Durbridge, and Hepburn are genuine track guns, but will need to be in absolute peak form if they want to win gold.
I was living in Britain during the Beijing Olympics, watching the BBC go wild over British gold, so it would give me a huge thrill to see the Australian team demoralise the Poms on their own soil (yes, I’m still bitter about the months of constant ribbing I copped over the 2009 Ashes defeat).
But I’m torn between wanting a gold medal bonanza to make Roy and HG weep, and wanting GreenEdge to have a successful debut year. This is the year that this talented generation could show the professional world what they’re capable of, and set the team up for years while they’re at it.
Is it realistic to hope they can achieve both? Should we go for gold this year, and let Paris-Roubaix wait?
I don’t know, but I’m bloody excited.
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