A brave attempt by Julian Dean and Hayden Roulston came to nought in a fiercely fought elite men’s road race at the UCI World Championships in Geelong today.
Roulston worked hard to cover the breaks at the front of the peloton as they chased down an early break that was allowed to stretch to a significant 14 minutes after the start from downtown Melbourne.
The peloton brought back the break once they attacked the hilly circuit around Geelong, negotiated 11 times in the 263km race.
Kiwi Greg Henderson was dropped mid-race while Roulston, having covered key breaks early, dropped off by the 200km mark.
Dean also found the torrid pace up the climbs too tough as a stellar group of 25 riders caught the break to put 45 seconds on the chasing bunch including the kiwi.
They were unable to chase down the leaders with the powerful Dane Thor Hushovd, who will rejoin Dean at Garmin-Transitions pro team next year, showing his strength and speed to win the sprint for the title. Denmark’s Matti Breschel was second and Australia’s Allan Davis third in the bunch sprint.
Dean said he was bitterly disappointed that he was unable to fire today.
“It’s a bitter pill to swallow because I have sacrificed so much for this race. My wife and kids have sacrificed so that I could go away to prepare for this,” Dean said. “On the day I just did not have the legs. I felt pretty ordinary and when the race moved up a gear I could not go.
“I had left no stone unturned to prepare for this and I know that on my day that I could have been there with that group. That makes it doubly gutting really.
“That is the thing about one day races that you have to be 100 per cent on at that time. I had felt much better in the few days before the race. It’s been a long, long season and maybe this was too much.
“I’ve been top 10 before and really wanted it today. No doubt though that Thor was the best man out there today and he will be a good world champion.”
Dean returns to his base in Spain tomorrow to help pack up their home before returning to Rotorua with his family in two weeks, while a number of the road squad will leave for Delhi to compete in the Commonwealth Games.
