Cycling: Kiwi youngsters on road to greatness

Jesse Sergent (L) and Sam Bewley won medals at last year's Commonwealth Games. Photo / Brett Phibbs

In future years, when Jesse Sergent and Sam Bewley maybe come to be regarded as New Zealand's best road cyclists in history, the story of stuffing a tyre with grass in Spain may have settled into legend.

Bewley (23) and Sergent (22) are making names for themselves in Europe's demanding and lucrative road cycling competitions.

Yes, they're Olympic team pursuit bronze medallists with the prospect of doing better in London 2012 - but their long-term fame may be best found riding the grand Tours of France, Spain and Italy.

They ride for the same pro team - the Lance Armstrong-founded RadioShack - which is how they found themselves in the barren hills around Girona, during Spain's siesta time.

The two Kiwis were busy training; putting miles in their legs while most of Spain slept - but three flat tyres, only two tubes and the silence of siesta posed a problem that needed Kiwi No 8 wire ingenuity.

"We were fixing the second puncture and then out of nowhere Jesse's other wheel went 'bang'," says Bewley. "We ended up bursting into laughter, it was a ridiculous situation ... just me and Jesse out there in the hills with no parents to ring to come and pick us up."

"I suppose you'd call it Kiwi ingenuity," Sergent says about Bewley's old mountain bike trick of forcing grass under the rubber to fill the tyre. "We were in survival mode for a while."

They will have more in mind than survival when they begin the five-day Tour of Luxembourg, starting Wednesday.

The pair have the potential to be New Zealand's best road cyclists; better than Julian Dean, Hayden Roulston or Greg Henderson, to mention just three forebears with abundant talent.

Bewley appears to have been a model domestique, a role designed to help more senior riders in the peloton. Sergent is also a domestique - although he broke through with a rare first year win in the Three Days of West Flanders race in early March.

That win cannot be under-estimated for a first-year pro.

"I happened to win the first stage time trial so then I was effectively leading the team. They were with me, enabling me to hold on even in a breakaway group for much of the final day.

Sergent's inclination is to downplay his achievements but Bike NZ high performance manager Mark Elliott holds high hopes.

"He got the whole team behind him and then had the capacity to hang on, which will be great for his long term development.

"Jesse is generally such a laid back guy who looks like he is meandering along, barely getting out of first gear. Then he gets on his bike and holy moley ... he just switches on."

RadioShack policy says first-year riders do not race grand tours. But, once London is out of the way, expect the pair to be racing on the roads of Spain and Italy and maybe even France in 2013.

"You could do one early when your muscles aren't ready," says Sergent. "Just training 21 days is a big feat so racing that many could end your career. Shorter tours like Luxembourg, Switzerland and Austria are perfect for now."

With some rivals weighing in jockey-like at 47kg, one of Bewley's goals is to lose a couple more kilograms to bring him to what he sees as an optimum weight of 76kg on his 1.91m frame.

"I want to be light but not super-light because I border on getting sick. I'm not as serious as the likes of Alberto Contador - he weighs out his food; I just need to avoid the chocolates and lollies, even if it makes me grumpy."

Armstrong is no longer racing or part of the Radio Shack team but his spectre remains. Bewley idolised Armstrong growing up and once spent time mountain biking with him in Arizona - but both athletes decline to comment on his defence against drug allegations.