Hell On Wheels: All The World's A Stage

Sydney Morning Herald

Friday October 25, 1996

JEFF WELLS

To understand road cycling is to know that it is mostly rolling repertory.

Yes, there are the obvious leading men. But on a brutal day between Wollongong and Nowra yesterday the bit players, too, trod the boards with great panache.

There is no production without them. But if the result sheet is the review - albeit just a cluster of cold, hard numbers - they must often live with obscurity. They are sometimes only shooting stars - but how they dazzle in their moments; how they hold the plot together. Or, if they try to chew the scenery, how quickly they can bring it undone.

The cycle classic ends in Canberra tomorrow. It looks like another win for the Bosch team - the German machine which has dominated the race this decade. Even down to four men - and one of them, Mike Weissmann, suffering - this is repertory work at its best.

On Thursday, on the 120km around Centennial Park, New Zealand spear-carriers Glen Mitchell and Gordon McCauley had their moment in the spotlight. They made the running, they were let go by the field, and they ran one-two.

But yesterday they needed to get Ric Reid, sitting second in the bike race, up two category- one climbs. First, in the 93.4km stage, was the famed 9.7km wrencher up Macquarie Pass. Then, at 77km, there was a 3.5km grind up Cambewarra Mountain - a new horror feature about as merciless as Bumble Hill on the Wednesday.

And Reid? His men were spent from the day before. He got dropped on Macquarie almost immediately.

In the Darling Harbour criterium on Thursday night, in a rare show of Aussie ensemble riding, four AIS riders charged to the front with two laps to go and set up a scintillating win for sprinter Jay Sweet.

But yesterday they needed the sap to get Nick Gates, sitting third, through the day. Rodney McGee, who had worked hardest in that criterium, showed up early, heading the field up the pass. But halfway up he stopped and got spat back through the field like a cherry pip.

In the end, only unsung Matt White was left to nurse Gates home among the chasers, 46s behind. Gates is second at 3min 16s and still with some chance.

And then there were the Germans. For days two of them had hogged the hype.

Sven Teutenberg started as the race leader yesterday. He was the leading man, even if the soap operas aren't phoning.

Supposedly wise heads shook in doubt. He is the fastest sprinter in the race, built like a keg. How was fatso supposed to get over those hills? Sitting sixth was 1994 winner Jens Voigt, tall and regal - but 8min 44s back.

Still, the theory was that Reid, unknown Australian Damon Simpson and German sprinter Marcel Wust would all fade out of the top five, and clear his path to take over from Teutenberg when the gristle came into play and the lard melted in the Kangaroo Valley sauna. And Reid, Simpson and Wust did disappear early yesterday.

But then there was veteran Stephan Gottschling, all 59kg of sinew, maybe the smallest man in the field, and a spider of a climber. At the end of the day, when the applause died, he had the stage win, Teutenberg had kept his leader's yellow jersey, Voigt had wrestled the king of the mountains jersey from Australian Bart Hickson, and Bosch had an unbeatable teams lead.

But without young Canberra rider Peter Rogers, starting the day 10th, who knows how any of it would have come out.

He got over Macquarie Pass with Voigt and Dutchman Max Van Heeswyk, with a chasing bunch of only 14 a minute behind, as the field disintegrated. Among the chasers, Gottschling was towing Teutenberg and White laboured for Gates.

The race then flattened out and the lead 17 riders got back together. But on the perilous descent, before the climb up Cambewarra, Teutenberg, the leading man grabbing centre stage, burst away, clocking 100km/h, to get a head start.

Only Rogers had the nerve to grab his wheel, but then Teutenberg sat on him for a free ride up the hill. So Rogers chauffeured him half-way up the climb and then blew a gasket.

Gottschling, Voigt and 20-year-old Australian hope Marcel Gono then tacked on, as Rogers fell away.

Then Gottschling, having done all that navvy work, put his little goateed head down and waved goodbye, to earn a 13s win from Gono, Voigt and Teutenberg. Gates and his group were a further 33s back.

Gottschling stripped off his jersey, showing a weedy chalk-white body. A Phar Lap heart in a greyhound's frame. Australian road coach Heiko Salzwedel has been smart enough to sign Gottschling and Voigt to ride with the AIS team in China.

The young Aussies - even if they now have six in the top 10 in this race - will, then, continue to learn much about role-playing from these Germans, even as they go back today up Cambewarra, headed for Goulburn.

"You must ride with your eyes," says Gottschling.

Meanwhile, for the high drama of this showcase of Australian road-cycling, nobody from the Australian Cycling Federation has shown up. If this is the way one of the world's biggest sports is to be treated here, the Australian Olympic Committee and the Australian Sports Commission are entitled to play the enraged critic.