AusCycling welcomes four new inductees to Hall of Fame at 2024 Road Nationals

Liz Hepple, Iddo "Snowy" Munro, Donna Rae-Szalinski and Don Kirkham were last Sunday announced as the newest inductees to the AusCycling Hall of Fame, at the 2024 AusCycling Road National Championships in Ballarat.

The four inductees are the first new additions to the revamped multi-discipline AusCycling Hall of Fame, combining mountain biking, track cycling, road cycling and BMX. BMX Hall of Famers will continue to be recognised by the Australian BMX Hall of Fame.

Hepple, Munro, Rae-Szalinski and Kirkham join 55 hall of famers anointed by Cycling Australia and Mountain Bike Australia before the formation of AusCycling in 2020.

Both Hepple and Rae-Szalinski were on hand to celebrate their induction into the Hall of Fame during a ceremony between the women's and men's elite road race national championships, with Kate Bates, Oceania Cycling executive board member and AusCycling History and Heritage committee member Tracey Gaudry, and AusCycling Chair Craig Bingham leading the presentations.

Munro's induction was received by his grandson Brent Munro and great-grandson Dean Munro.

Kirkham's induction was received by his grandson Paul Trevenen and great-granddaughter Kate.

The four new additions to the AusCycling Hall of Fame are:

Liz Hepple

Liz Hepple receives her AusCycling Hall of Fame induction from Craig Bingham and Tracey Gaudry. Picture: Josh Chadwick

The 1980s were a breakthrough period in women’s cycling.

In 1984, at the Olympic Games in Los Angeles, women's racing was first added to the cycling program via a road race.

For track cycling, that introduction would come four years later at the 1988 Olympic Games in Seoul.

Cycling was playing catch up and it was group of pioneers who were leading the charge.

For Australian women, that push was led by Queensland's Liz Hepple, a member of the University of Queensland Cycling Club.

Liz was a world class athlete, as she showed by winning the first edition of the Noosa Triathlon in 1983.

But on a bike she needed a platform to show it.

That platform came in 1988 on the biggest stage in world cycling, the Tour de France.

Across 12 stages, Hepple put down a groundbreaking performance, finishing third in the general classification behind two legends of the sport, French woman Jeannie Longo and Italian Maria Canins.

With that result, Hepple became the first Australian ever to finish on the podium in the general classification of Le Tour.

In the same year, she finished second in the inaugural women's Giro d’Italia, won by Canins.

That same year, Liz became an Olympian after racing the road race in Seoul alongside Australian teammates Donna Gould and Kathleen Shannon.

All three would finish on the same time as Dutch gold medallist Monique Knol, with Hepple leading the trio in 22nd.

But Liz’s contribution to cycling, and sport more broadly, didn’t end on the bike when she retired.

She joined the Queensland Academy of Sport as a scholarship coach in 1992 and then transitioned to athlete wellbeing and engagement in 2007.

In the 22 years that have followed, Liz has guided many of the best in Australian cycling and sport from Queensland.

Iddo "Snowy" Munro

Brent and Dean Munro receive Iddo "Snowy" Munro's AusCycling Hall of Fame induction from Craig Bingham and Tracey Gaudry. Picture: Josh Chadwick

Even before creating history by riding alongside Don Kirkham as the first Australians to race the Tour de France in 1914, Iddo "Snowy" Munro had already established himself as a record breaker.

In the early days of Australian cycling, the iconic Melbourne to Warrnambool was often ridden the other way, Warrnambool to Melbourne.

Riding on rough roads, often gravel, and with no gears, the big challenge was how would riders measure up against the train that would leave Warrnambool when the top riders did.

In 1909, 21-year-old Munro turned in arguably the greatest ride in the race's long history, causing a nationwide sensation by setting a record time that would stand until 1931.

His time of seven hours, 12 minutes and 51 seconds proved an embarrassment for the Victorian Railways Commission as he pulled into Melbourne five minutes before the steam train.

Munro, drew level with the train at Werribee and put a gap of five minutes between it and himself over the last 20 miles in the famous 1909 race.

Fitting for a man born in Warrnambool, but who would later move to the Melbourne suburb of Coburg.

Not content with making history on home soil, Iddo joined his mate Kirkham and four other Australians on a seven-week boat trip to Europe in a bid to ride the 12th edition of the Tour de France.

Munro and Kirkham emerged from the travelling group of six to become the first Australians to ride Le Tour.

They were selected by the French Phebus-Dunlop team as domestiques for Frenchman Georges Passerieu, who finished second in the 1906 Tour.

There were 143 starters of the race in 1914 when it got underway in Paris.

5,380km later the race returned to finish in the French capital and Munro marked himself as one of the world’s best, finishing 20th overall.

Munro and Kirkham were the only non-Europeans among the 54 finishers.

Snowy then had a lifelong association with cycling, including as an administrator and being one of the driving forces behind the creation of the Sun Tour in 1952, which for almost 50 years was the premier road tour in Australia.

Snowy Munro’s legacy is one that set the wheels in motion for Australian cyclists taking on the world.

Donna Rae-Szalinski

Donna Rae-Szalinski (far right) as part of the Australian national team at the women's Tour de France. Picture: Supplied 

Many people’s contribution to cycling goes way beyond the results page.

They’re the people who knock down barriers and forge the pathways for the next generations.

Donna Rae-Szalinski is one of those people.

On the bike she was a world-class athlete.

She was a member of the first Australian women’s team to compete in the Tour de France in 1986, and on her way to finishing 27th in the 1988 Tour, played a key support role in helping Liz Hepple create Australian cycling history, when she finished third overall.

Donna represented Australian at multiple world championships, finishing 25th in the road race in 1991.

The national road race championships were also a major target for Donna, her best result coming in 1990, when she won the bronze medal.

But it’s off the bike where Donna has had her biggest impact in cycling, as a coach, a mentor, and to many, a second mum, so much so that she’s often referred to as Mama Bear by Australia’s elite road riders.

From guiding Jessica Allen to a one-second win in the junior time trial at the 2011 UCI Road World Championships to being the sports director for some of the best, including Italian dual world champion Giorgia Bronzini during her time with the Wiggle High5 Pro Cycling team, and being the voice from the car when Amanda Spratt won silver and bronze medals in the road races at the 2018 and 2019 UCI Road World Championships.

Donna is revered by the international cycling community.

For more than two decades she’s been one of Australia’s leading coaches, first as an independent coach, then with the Victorian Institute of Sport and now as the Director of Pathways with AusCycling.

In 2021, Donna was awarded the Medal of the Order of Australia for her services to cycling. To generations of riders, she’s simply been the rock they can always rely on

Don Kirkham

Paul Trevenen and Don's great-granddaughter Kate receive Don Kirkham's AusCycling Hall of Fame induction from Craig Bingham and Tracey Gaudry. Picture: Josh Chadwick

The 1914 Tour de France was a significant step in the history of Australian cycling.

The Tour, in its 12th edition, was already cycling’s premier race worldwide and would be the last edition before the beginning of World War I.

Don Kirkham and Iddo “Snowy” Munro, along with four other Australians, travelled by ship for seven weeks, from Melbourne to Toulon, in the south of France, to race their bikes in the hope of a Tour start.

Kirkham, a strong diary farmer, and Munro, a diminutive tinsmith, emerged from the travelling group of six to become the first Australians to ride the Tour de France.

They were selected by the French Phebus-Dunlop team as domestiques to support Frenchman Georges Passerieu, who finished second in the 1906 Tour.

There were 143 starters of the race in 1914 when it departed Paris.

5,380km later, when the race returned to finish in the French capital, Don Kirkham marked himself as one of the world’s best, finishing 17th overall.

Of the 54 finishers, only two were non-European, Kirkham and Munro.

A key stepping stone to Don making the start of that Tour was his brilliant performance in the 1914 Milan-San Remo, when he finished ninth in Italy’s biggest one day race.

In 1924, Kirkham's career sadly came to an end two weeks before he had intended it to after a last attempt at winning the Warrnambool to Melbourne in 1924, when he was hit by a motorist on his bike while returning from the Victorian Cycle Traders' 100 miles road race. His injuries from the accident forced him to retire.

Kirkham continued to have a significant influence on Australian cycling in retirement by coaching one of Australia's cycling icons, Sir Hubert Opperman.

Working on his farm in Carrum, south-east of Melbourne, he become the training partner and the first coach of "Oppy".

Opperman was like a sponge as he listened to Kirkham's tales of the Tour and his advice, which led him to becoming the next Australian to ride the Tour de France in 1928.

Don has left a legacy that will live on forever.

AusCycling Hall of Fame