Travel big part of life for cyclist

Bryony Botha looking to Commonwealth Games and Olympics as she chases dream

Bryony Botha is in Australia this week. Earlier this year, she was in Colombia. In August she’ll be in Kazakhstan. Her trusty track bike will be with her.

The 17-year-old, Year 13 Rangitoto College student gets to travel a lot because she’s good, one of the top young track cyclists in a nation with a strong cycling programme. She was a consistent rider last year, but her fourth in the individual pursuit and a bronze medal in the team pursuit at the junior world championships in South Korea helped her to win the ASB Award for girls’ cycling.

Botha will get another crack at the junior worlds when she heads to Kazakhstan.

“Since I’ve been there already [to the event], I know what to expect and how hard I have to work to get gold,’’ she says.

Her father Feyes Botha drives her to get out of bed and train.

Track is her thing, not so much road racing.

“Mainly because there are no hills on the track. I’m not particularly strong on the hills. On the track, I just put my power down and go fast.”

She is powerful through the hips and thighs, and that is crucial for a track sprinter. But Botha can race tactically, pursuit and sprint. She is far from one-dimensional.

This week’s event in Australia is the Anzac Cup, where the New Zea- land juniors will compete in the teams’ pursuit, the scratch race and the points race. It will be a prime chance for competition before Kazakhstan.

“We want to see where we are compared to the Aussies, because they are our main competition when we go to the junior worlds,” says Botha.

Her main opportunity for good track training comes at camps down at the new velodrome in Cambridge. The rest of the time her work is done on the road or a wind-trainer. That’s why she is eyeing up study at Waikato University next year, as she is moving to Cambridge to be near the best facilities and coaching. Then it will be all roads leading to Gold Coast 2018 and the Commonwealth Games, not to mention the 2020 Olympics in Tokyo. Her goals are set, her pathway mapped out. There will be drug testing ahead and stiff competition, but Botha is prepared for all that.

She had a taste of the elite cycling level when she competed with the New Zealand team pursuiters in Colombia.

“It was really cool, watching their technique and how they changed and how close they rode together.”

She will race in the North Island schools champs in Cambridge in a few weeks, and that will lead into her final junior worlds’ preparation. Her mantra as she lines up on the start line won’t change: “I self-talk a lot. I tell myself I have done the training and I can do it.”