Eoin wins Australian MTBO Title

Eoin Rothery won the sprint discipline at the Aus MTBO champs by 20 seconds from fellow Waleman Andrew Power.

Eoin, Cath and Patrik (pictured above) were 75% of the Big Foot contingent who travelled down to Geelong for a weekend of MTBO madness.

Eoin describes the sprint race on Torquay Foreshore:

I went into this fit, no injuries, with solid training for the last month and new mech, so I probably should have been expecting better. As it was I knew the field was very strong; I didn't place in 2014 and Long champ Duncan Sullivan was missing, but all the other place getters were here with Malcolm Roberts, Rob Garden and Rob Vincent in addition.
Had a kerfuffle before starting and had to hire an e-stick as I had left mine in the accomodation. That probably helped the warm up and adrenaline. Started fast and had the lead till 3, and still only 6 seconds down after 6. That was after a couple of wobbles (took a wrong turn at 3 -10s, and bad route choice to 4 -10s).
Held up at the road crossing as a guy I'd passed jumped out in front of a car to get ahead of me on the single track. Then overshot 9 (-15s). I was still in second place here, but Andrew Power had a good lead of 50 seconds. He then proceeded to blow 27 seconds of that on the next - 100m across an open field.
None of the contenders mucked up the next (43) that caught out several of the elites but three failed the easier next one (possibly getting them out of order?). Rob Garden was one of those who was coming back after a slow start.
I started to gain on Andrew at 15, my next fastest split after no. 3, but was still 17 seconds down.
The small park made the difference as I took back 12s on 17, 11s on 18 and another 4s on 19 - another fastest split after a turbo charge to get past two riders. All up a win by 20 seconds and my 5th MTBO Aus Championship win (a trifecta in 2006 and the Middle in 2007 - all in M50!).

Patrik was the IOF controller - the long champs was a world ranking event - good effort Patrik.

Cath and Greg both rode 21E and the competition was a match for them.

After a disappointing sprint result, Bennelongs Marina Iskhakova was delighted to find out that the long course was really, really long: