Maeve Plouffe and Alyssa Polites conquer women's Madison National Championship

A pulsating women's 2022 AusCycling Madison National Championship has been won by Australian Cycling Team duo Maeve Plouffe and Alyssa Polites at Darebin International Sports Centre (DISC).

Racing in Melbourne as part of the Quest Ivanhoe 124th Austral Wheelrace event, the Madison National Championships marked the beginning of a blockbuster month of domestic track action, which will now transition to Brisbane for the 2022 AusCycling Track National Championships from March 26-30.

Plouffe and Polites overcome crash to win women’s Madison title

A three-team 120-lap tussle was the catalyst for an enthralling edition of the women’s Madison National Championship eventually won by Plouffe and Polites with a nine-point buffer.

Racing as team Quest Ivanhoe, Plouffe and Polites prevailed in the face of several attacks from their Australian Cycling Team peers.

Chloe Moran and Alexandra Martin-Wallace (TAC) finished in the silver medal position with 39 points, while chief animators of the race, Sophie Edwards and Amber Pate (Bayside Škoda) rounded out the podium on 35 points.

The Australian Cycling Team pairings separated themselves early as the dominant teams in the race courtesy of locking out the top three positions in the first four sprint laps.

Plouffe and Polites were the most consistent of the three teams, enabling the pair to follow wheels and maintain their lead for most of the race.

"This win was extra special, not only did I get to snatch my first elite win on the track pre-nationals, but I also get to share it with an Olympian and national individual pursuit record holder – it doesn’t get much better than that," Polites said.

"It was a thrilling race that brought lots of drama like any other Madison! I knew Maeve and I would have each other's back and can’t thank her enough for all her guidance and patience throughout the race."

All was going to plan for the leading team until a heavy crash caused by Plouffe drifting up into Edwards brought down several teams, resulting in a temporary halt to the race.

With the race resumed several minutes later it was Edwards and Pate who went on the attack in search of the all-important lap gain to shift the script of the race.

After 11 laps at the front of the race solo, Edwards and Pate’s quest to gain a lap would fall short, succumbing to the constant pace of the chasing bunch with nine laps remaining.

A final double-point sprint win was the icing on the cake for Plouffe and Polites, who led and controlled the race from start to finish.

"It’s incredible coming away with another elite Madison title, to do this twice now is incredible. It’s one of my favourite events of the year because of how hard it is with evenly matched teams," Plouffe said

"The crash upset our rhythm because we were relying on Moran and Martin-Wallace to start fatiguing at that stage of the race and we were going to launch those big attacks at the pointy end.

"We were still quite smart after the crash. Alyssa took care of me, and we slowly chased down moves because I was on Graeme Frislie’s bike after the crash, which didn’t fit me very well, so I was very uncomfortable in the sprints.

"I didn’t have that same power that I rely quite a lot on as a result, so we had to use our brain more than our legs in those last 40 laps."

Results

1. Maeve Plouffe and Alyssa Polites (Quest Ivanhoe)
2. Chloe Moran and Alex Martin-Wallace (TAC)
3. Sophie Edwards and Amber Pate (Bayside Skoda)

Full replay

Pictures: Con Chronis