Sapphire Tour: Katelyn Nicholson leads BridgeLane sweep on Stage 1

Katelyn Nicholson (Team BridgeLane) has won Stage 1 of the Sapphire Tour today, arriving solo in Inverell at the head of a BridgeLane podium sweep.

The South Australian went clear in the final 10 kilometres after Team BridgeLane dominated the 109-kilometre race from Mt Mitchell to Inverell.

BridgeLane were always the favourites at this new two-day tour, which is part of the Squadron Energy Grafton to Inverell Cycle Classic.

They applied their strength from the get-go, putting riders into multiple moves off the front. Despite the absence of Gibraltar Range, BridgeLane were intent on making the race hard, splitting the field into smaller and smaller groups.

Their aggression paid dividends: when the decisive selection of five riders was made, four of them were from BridgeLane: Nicholson, Lillee Pollock, Keely Bennett and Talia Appleton.

Nicholson leads a reduced front group during the stage, with five BridgeLane teammates present.

Cycling Development Foundation offered the strongest resistance: they’d had riders towards the front throughout the race, and in the final mix, West Australian Savannah Coupland was the only one able to follow the BridgeLane quartet.

However, with such a numerical disadvantage, Coupland’s chances were always going to be unlikely.

Her BridgeLane rivals traded blows until Nicholson broke free with around 8 kilometres to go. Nicholson put her time-trialling skills to perfect use, finishing 1 minute and 26 seconds ahead of the chase group.

Pollock sprinted to the runner-up spot ahead of Bennett and Appleton to complete a Team Bridgelane 1-2-3-4. Amazingly, the result replicates the team’s dominance at last year’s equivalent of this event, where Mia Hayden took the win.

This year, Ricardo and Amanda Poulsen led home the next group on the road to place six BridgeLane riders inside the top seven.

Nicholson, Pollock and Bennett locked out the podium for Team BridgeLane.

Today’s victory is the latest in a series of successes for Nicholson, who became the Oceania road champion two weeks ago.

“We wanted to make the race hard,” the 24-year-old said. “We had girls going up the road. It came back together, but when the final break went away, we were well-represented.”

Once the decisive split was made, it was simply a matter of which rider in blue would win.

“We knew we had to attack to get rid of her [Coupland],” Nicholson said, “And it just so happened I was the lucky one to get away.”

The Sapphire Tour concludes tomorrow morning with a circuit race at Lake Inverell.

Results – Sapphire Tour Stage 1

1. Katelyn NICHOLSON (TBL) 3h11:22
2. Lillee POLLOCK (TBL) +1:26
3. Keely BENNETT (TBL) +1:26
4. Talia APPLETON (TBL) +1:26
5. Savannah COUPLAND (CDF) +1:26
6. Gina RICARDO (TBL) +3:00
7. Amanda POULSEN (TBL) +3:00
8. Angela GATES +3:00
9. Miriam SINNERBRINK (CDF) +3:00
10. Imogen FRANCIS +3:00

Click for full results

Photos: Bear Liange and Mat Gilfedder