General News
23 January, 2020
McDonald scores first criterium win
CAMPERDOWN teenager Bailey McDonald has enjoyed a breakthrough success on the bike earlier this week.
CAMPERDOWN teenager Bailey McDonald has enjoyed a breakthrough success on the bike earlier this week.
The 16 year-old claimed victory in the A grade division of Geelong Cycling Club’s summer criterium series staged in Belmont on Tuesday night.
In just his second start with the club, McDonald led home a quality field which featured three American athletes who are in the country training over the southern hemisphere summer as part of the Triathlon Gold program.
McDonald said he was pleased with the result, which saw him go one better than in his previous start with the series where he finished runner-up.
“It’s about a 1.5 kilometre course and you race for 40 minutes plus three laps,” he said.
“We covered about 28.5 k’s for the night and averaged around 39kph.
“There were about 10 of us in the field and my aim at the start was just to stay close to the front and keep out of trouble.”
He managed to do just that, but the race did not come without its challenges throughout.
“With a couple of laps to go the pace went up, but I just shut down all attacks and tried to keep things so the race would finish in a sprint,” McDonald said.
“Coming to the finish, the guy who was leading peeled away and it sort of opened up and I just went for home on the sprint.”
McDonald went on to win by around 20 metres ahead of American Clayton Hutchins.
It capped off a big week for the Camperdown local, who rode off the scratch mark in last Thursday’s annual Saul Pasque Memorial.