The Goulburn Women’s cycling team of Michelle Crawford, Shannon Apps, Kylie Brooker and Nadine Moroney achieved a podium finish in the All Age Women’s event at the NSW Club Team Time Trial Championships at Nowra on Saturday. 

The team has only recently been formed and the women had put in quite an amount of training in a short time to prepare themselves for the event in which they were up against some of the State’s strongest clubs. 

The Goulburn team finished just one minute and five seconds behind the winning Illawarra Cycle Club team, with Sutherland one minute and 26 seconds further back in third.

 Fourth was a team from Dulwich Hill BC with teams from Southern Cross filling fifth and sixth positions. 

The team from Bathurst did not start probably because their route to Nowra was blocked by snow and ice closed roads. 

Kylie Brooker said the out and back ride from HMAS Albatross didn’t have any particularly steep climbs but it was a long uphill gradient virtually all the way out to the turnaround point, which meant a pretty solid ride with the women pushing hard all the way to maintain their speed. 

“It was about 17 km out and a hard slog then the 17 km back on the downhill run was also tricky.” 

Brooker said. “It was a pretty good effort considering this was our first interclub time trial as a team. 

”Our finish result of just over a minute behind Illawarra was pretty good considering they had the advantage of being more familiar with the course.” 

Goulburn Cycle Club president Adam Lambert said the club was thrilled with the result from the women. 

“It was even good that they had even decided to give the State Club Team Time Trial a go, but to gain a silver medal was a real testament to the amount of hard work and training these women have put in over the past 12 months,” Lambert said. 

“Illawarra is one of the State’s strongest clubs and has a large area to draw its members from. “Sutherland is also another particularly strong club with a long history of producing top riders. 

“Kylie and Shannon have been pushing hard to raise the profile of women’s cycling in Goulburn and Michelle Crawford puts every bit of her strength into her performance. 

“They encourage each other and this is certainly a well deserved reward for their effort. 

“With these women driving our women’s cycling program the club is looking forward to hosting some special training and camps specifically to help lift female cycling. 

“The Goulburn Cycle Club has 35 female members though it is not common to see anything like that number together at one time as they are spread over different disciplines and a wide range of ages from junior onward.

“There are also quite a number of women in the district who ride bikes or have ridden and we would like to encourage them to join or rejoin the club.”

Michelle Crawford was not satisfied with just cycling last weeken. On Sunday she participated in the Sutherland to Surf run and came 16th outright, but she was dissatisfied with her time for the event.

Kylie Brooker admitted that the ride toward Sassafras on Saturday was certainly tough and on Monday she was still feeling the aches and pains, but was really thrilled to have the silver medal as a reminder of the reward for effort