Blackgrove leads, Roulston out of PowerNet Tour of Southland

US-based kiwi professional Heath Blackgrove has the yellow jersey after a tumultuous opening day of the PowerNet Tour of Southland today.

Blackgrove (Waimate) was 14th in the morning prologue and second in the climb to the top of Bluff Hill in the afternoon to be top of the general classification in the six-day tour.

The first day was dominated by a major pile-up involving more than 40 riders midway through the second stage, the 82km stage from Invercargill to Bluff Hill. The crash brought down a number of key riders, none more so than defending champion Hayden Roulston, who was forced to withdraw with a knee injury.

The despondent Roulston was bidding for a fourth straight win in the country’s premier road tour before he moves to the Columbia Highroad team which will make him ineligible for the Southland event for at least the next two years.

“I’m gutted really. I have trained really well for this event. It was my last chance possibly ever to win it again and to crash out when it is none of your own fault is absolutely gutting,” Roulston said.

“It happened because you have riders not knowing what to do and how to handle the conditions. I got going again but knew straight away that something was wrong. My knee is really sore and it left me with no alternative. “

The riders had to cope with fierce crosswinds in thesecond stage to Bluff Hill with the crash occurring on a narrow bridge near Wallacetown around 30kms out of Invercargill.

Organisers stopped the race for 25 minutes to tend to the injured riders and allow teams the chance to sort out the carnage of machinery, with some teams to ship in replacement bikes overnight.

Once the race restarted a break left Cantabrians Michael Vink (Southland Times) and Alan Williams (Winton’s Middle Pub) with a break. The race broke up with 10kms remaining as Karl Moore (Hamilton, KIA Motors) and Dylan Newell (Australia, Praties Cycling) joining them to open a 50 second advantage.

Nelson’s Jack Bauer, second in last week’s national club championship, pushed up from the third pack to join Blackgrove (Zookeepers Cycle Surgery) in the attack up the gruelling climb over the final 3km up Bluff Hill.

Bauer managed to edge ahead in the last attack to claim the biggest win in his career, with Blackgrove in second and Vink holding on for third 21 seconds behind.

Blackgrove holds a 14 second buffer over Bauer in general classification after two stages with Olympian Marc Ryan (Timaru, ColourPlus) third at 24 seconds after leading home the team time trial in the morning.

Hawkes Bay’s Jeremy Vennell (Team Bissell) is poised in fourth place at 29 seconds ahead of American team-mate Ben Jacques-Maynes after the pair rode strongly up Bluff Hill, with American Floyd Landis (cyclingnzshop.com-Biosport) out of the top 25 after the first day.

Earlier Ryan’s ColourPlus team dominated the morning team time trial around an 8.4km course in Invercargill with Ryan leading team-mates Roulston (Ashburton) and Jesse Sergent (Feilding) across the line 12 seconds faster than Subway Avanti, led by 2008 world ominium champion Hayden Godfrey (Christchurch).

It will be a busy night for team mechanics repairing damaged bikes and preparing replacement machinery for stage three, 165km from Invercargill to Gore via Riversdale.

Results to follow.

Full information: www.tourofsouthland.com