Riders gear up at time trials

Prologue

IT TAKES some coaxing from Wayne Jamieson to entice his teenage daughter to take the cellphone for a snap interview last night.

"She's a little shy," he says before Amanda Jamieson hesitantly opens her account not long after the 6km individual time-trial in the annual The Hub Three-day Tour prologue in Hastings.

As Hawke's Bay Today raced towards its own deadline official results weren't available from the six-grade prologue but the 15-year-old suspected she was somewhere in the vicinity of finishing in fourth place with Aucklander Lydia Rippon expected to grab the limelight on the podium for the under-17 women's grade.

"I've never been good at time trials," said the Central Hawke's Bay College student who ditched triathlons to focus on just burning her calf muscles and quadriceps on the tarmac although she still does the odd triathlon at secondary school level.

"I like the 60km events where I can race when everyone starts getting a little tired," Jamieson said after the prologue last night from Ngatarawa Wines gateway headed south towards Bridge Pa Aerodrome with a turn at the 2.8km to finish a stone's throw away from the starting point.

The tour's Rock Solid Plastering stage one, involving Open men and women to Under-17 men/women, was scheduled to start today with the Open men doing three laps over 99km at 9am in the Taihape/Crownthorpe Settlement Rd Circuit.

B and C grade men/women were doing two laps over 66km while the U17s were doing a lap covering 33km. It began at Pukehamoamoa School on Matapiro Rd.

Mudgeway Enterprises stage two will begin at 1pm with the Whakatu Coolstores Criterium from the novices to the experienced riders with 20-minute to 50-minute laps with a lap of about 700m.

Tinelli stage three begins at 9.30am tomorrow in the valley/Raukawa Circuit with a finish for all grades at Torran Hill after starting at Ngatarawa Wines driveway. Cycling CHB member Jamieson was fourth in the NZ U15s two years ago in Wanganui and was in the national development squad last year.

Her sister, Ella, 11, of Waipukurau School, rides for the club once a week but "is more of a swimmer" while mum Glennis still rides.