17 March 2008
Australians dominate Oceania MTB cross country mens event
The Australians dominated the cross country competition on the second day of the UCI Oceania Mountainbike Championships in Nelson. Both Australian National Cross Country Champions won their respective races with Adelaide's Chris Jongewaard and Melbourne's Dellys Starr reconfirming their current positions as two of only four Australian riders on the shadow team for the Beijing 2008 Olympics.
Jongewaard had to fight for the lead which was taken by former Athens Olympian, Sid Taberlay from Tasmania. Multi-Australian titleholder Taberlay, who finished sixth at the Commonwealth Games, led convincingly during the first four of six laps of the 8.4 km course - eventually opening up a 20 second lead on his rival. In the final two laps, Jongewaard not only made up the deficit and quickly reclaimed the lead with a 45 second advantage. He won in a record 2:00:19. Taberlay could not answer and placed second at 1:18 with Victorian Dan McConnell claiming third nearly four minutes down. All three riders are only Australia's shadow team for the Olympics. The top New Zealander was Invercargill's Marcus Roy in sixth place.
Source: Cyclingnews.com
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