Plenty of debate, for and against, in response to our post this morning, including several top current riders having their say (https://carbonaddiction.net/2014/01/13/same-same/).
What do you think? Should the Australian National Road Championship course remain effectively the same year on year at Buninyong? Or should organisers change things up a bit to give other riders a fighting chance to figure at the pointy end? There’s no right or wrong here. Just a bloody interesting subject.
Carbon Addiction 
What other major cycling country uses the same circuit for their national championship each year? I do not know of a single country other than Australia, that uses the same circuit and same finish year after year. Everybody else varies the circuit (and location) so different riders can win.
Imagine if in 2015 we had guys like Goss, Matthews, Von Hoff, Ewan and Renshaw all having a crack for the line in a bunch sprint. We get pumped watching it day after day for the first week of the Tour de France each July, why not at the Nationals every few years? And yes, GreenEDGE would still hold most of the cards. But it would sure be exciting.
I reckon the ultimate would be to have a course that doesn’t favour either sprinters or climbers. I imagine it’s real tough to get the balance right. this year obviously didn’t favour the fast men, but maybe wasn’t too unbalanced. Von Hoffe was holding on pretty well, and I think Matthews wasn’t too far gone either? Maybe more of a flattish last 50km to give sprinters and teams a chance to catch the climbers, dunno. there’s gotta be some climbing I reckon to make it interesting
pity we didn’t get to see the u23 road race. Caleb ewan is more of a sprinter, be interesting to see how he won it. also, if you had both the criterium championship and the road race championship being flattish, wouldn’t they be a bit too similar?
Someone referred to Ewan as a “Sagan Slayer” over the weekend. Fast and able to get up hills. Future Sanremo winner??? (among lots of other races/stages of course)
Hi Pete,
My 2 cents:
– We are in track season (according to cycling australia) – why are road nationals on now. Basically means that some serious contenders can’t do both. If we want road nationals now….lets change the road and track seasons around.
– Sprinters need a chance….or we will not have a true representation of was the best in years to come. Just think if Robbie was never an Australian champ….would that be fitting?
– Move it around to different cities. It’s not a classic or a tour….it’s a championship – and should be moved to give every state a chance.
cheers
Stu