Orange Cycle and Triathlon Club continues its push for a third straight Central West Inter-Club Triathlon Series crown at Bathurst on Friday but, for the first time, the Piranhas might have more than a small challenge on their hands from the home club.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
While Bathurst has long been brimming with talent, Wallabies president James Kelly says this season is the first time his club is making a concerted effort to take top honours.
Following the opening two legs in Mudgee and Cowra, both the Piranhas and Wallabies are well on track to push for the title, making Friday’s leg a crucial one in terms of the overall standings.
“I’ve not seen the updated standings but if we’re not on top, then we’d be very close,” Kelly said.
“I don’t think we’ve ever won it in the past. The club has never really focused on it, we’ve been a part of it, but never tried to do much.
“This year one of our goals was to try and get more people to represent the club and get out more and do more as a club, as opposed to just doing our club races.
“We are really trying to push it … it’s always been a great series, it’s just unfortunate in the past a lot of Bathurst people haven’t travelled.”
Kelly is excited to see how Friday’s racing plays out, especially after Bathurst’s Nick North took overall honours at Mudgee and Mark Windsor finished second in last weekend’s leg at Cowra.
Helping the in-form men, Friday’s race will be in grand prix format, as Cowra’s was.
And those men will be all-important to the Wallabies’ push because, as they have in recent years, the Piranhas’ women have dominated the opening rounds of the 2017-18 series.
Orange has swept the women’s podiums in both the opening legs, Estelle Dean, Jess Richards and Jessie Dean taking the honours in Cowra last weekend – in that order.
“For those who can work transition out … it certainly makes a difference (in the grand prix format),” Kelly said, adding he hopes as many Wallabies as possible turn out because every athlete’s points count toward the inter-club totals.
“The males will head off first and the females will follow a couple of minutes later, it will help because we are expecting well over 100 people to come.
“We are also doing what we call an enticer, that will be the usual run, swim, bike and finish after the bike … it counts for the inter-club points too.”
Junior racing starts from 8am, before the seniors from 9.30am.
