Jones’ train wins A grade
Warragul Cycling Club’s A grade race was a story of young verses old.
Young brothers Brenton, Mitchell and Jarrod Jones took to the start line with veteran racers Chris Joustra, Graeme Parker, George Tambassis, Brett Kennedy, Jason Fritzlaff and Jayman Prestidge.
The veterans were colluding pre-race start on how they could try and beat the young Jones brothers. Should they attack early and isolate Jarrod and Mitchell from their professional brother Brenton, or should they just sit on and try and go with the inevitable “steam train” like attack when it happened?
Jayman chose the former and got a gap on the first climb of the King Street hill. His strategy was to entice one of the Jones brothers into the break so the others would sit up and not chase. But after five laps burning valuable energy, neither brother was tempted. Instead the brothers wound back the deficit at the end of lap five and Jayman was brought back to the pack.
After a lap at a relatively moderate pace, Brenton Jones and Chris Joustra created a small gap on the Wills Street rollers, and within a minute their lead was out to 200 metres.
At the 40-minute mark Jarrod Jones attacked with a full head of steam on the King Street hill and commenced to bridge across to his brother. Seeing that he was only 100 metres back, his brother slowed Chris Joustra down so that Jarrod could get on board the train.
At this point the chasing veterans were in a do or die situation.
They either worked together as a unified team to close the deficit or their race was over. But their ageing legs couldn’t bring the gap closer despite some solid turns from Brett Kennedy, Jason Fritzlaff and Jayman Prestidge. One thing that was apparent - the youngest Jones racer was not going to be helping to bring his two brothers back. He sat in at the back of the pack and rested his legs.
At the 50-minute mark, the final link to the Jones train made his move on the third last lap up the King Street hill with a very strong attack by Mitch. Once again, the steam train that is Brenton Jones dropped back from the lead break of Chris Joustra and Jarrod Jones when he saw his youngest brother trying to get across. He then dragged Mitchell back to the front and immediately picked up the pace of the front group to ensure the veterans following could not reconnect to contest for the victory.
With Mitchell taking the caboose role, the Jones train was complete. They stoked up the boilers and went full steam ahead for the remaining laps, taking out the podium. Jarrod first, Brenton second and Mitchell third. Chris Joustra time trialled in for fourth.
The remaining veterans had no chance at all when George Tambassis suffered a puncture with a lap to go. This left Jayman, Brett, Jason and Graeme to finish the race a minute back on the Jones lead steam train
The B grade race started at a pedestrian pace with no-one prepared to do anything much in the first 15 minutes. Rob Monk decided to animate the race with a lap off the front. He was joined by Pete Whelan and the field was strung out and in the red zone chasing them down.
Glenn Marriott had conserved energy in the chase and, as soon as Timmer Arrends had caught the breakaway, Marriott attacked. He took off up the King St hill. When big Jim jumped across to him on the decent, it was danger time for the chasers. Big Jim went full steam ahead from that point on and Marriott did well just to hang on and contribute a little on the hill each lap.
Connor Bagot tried to jump across to them on the next time up the hill but he didn’t make it.
Rob Monk was keen and did the lion’s share of work for the next 30 minutes. Pete McDonald chimed in regularly but seemed to tire of the task easily.
Roland Elsdon came good with 15 minutes to race and started to contribute strongly. Marriott and Timmer Arrends maintained their break and eventually went away to contest the major prize. Marriott had been towed around by Jim for the majority of the race and did the honourable thing and let Jim have the sprint. Marriott was second.
Paul Yeatman achieved his aim of coming third. Monk was fourth and Bagot fifth.
The C Grade race was looking to be a onesided affair, with in-form Ross Henry as well as Bryce Edhouse and up and comer Jacob de Klerk always going to push the rest of the bunch, particularly up the hill.
Shell Scurr, in her return to WCC racing after a period of track-specific riding, was strong, holding her own and doing it easily. This was not quite the case for De Mac and Danny Dilger, who were required to pull almost superhuman feats to contain the whippets, on each and every lap into King St.
The race started off at adagio pace, but after a handful of laps, de Klerk flew off the front of the bunch up King St, with the others struggling to maintain an ever-widening gap. When the bunch came together at the top of the rise, Edhouse kicked hard and drilled it for an entire lap, with Dilger and Bruce Evanson the unfortunate victims of this B-Grade-esque pace, being dropped.
It was de Klerk who jumped first, with the other riders winding it up, slowly but surely. Brown seemed to hit the rev-limiter early, as did de Klerk. The pace proved too fast for Scurr, who hung on valiantly, but did not figure in the deciding push.
It was de Klerk first over the line and, with that win, he secured enough series points to take the win.
Second past the post was a very strongly finishing Ross Henry, with steam-train Edhouse taking third place, his sprint improving each week.