Another Kiwi win in Belgium

Myron Simpson ©Graham Watson

Aug 6th, 11. Following from his teammate's win a few days ago, today it was Myron Simpson's turn to take a Kiwi victory in Belgium.

The Aucklander's third victory of the international season was a 120km race in Lokeren, 16 laps of 7.5km.  

The 20 year old joined a four rider break, tried his chance with an attack and then countered when he was caught by leading out the sprint, and winning. 

"I've been really happy with my international season this year, third win of the year," Simpson told RoadCycling.co.nz today.

"I came here hoping to possibly get a result in one of the bigger races - I exceeded my expectations when I won Stage 5 at the Ras in Ireland, then won a Kermesse a few weeks later in Belgium."

Simpson is based in Belgium with the NZ U23 Development team, a team of predominantly track riders who are looking for the benefits a season of road riding can give to their track form.

"I think from this season my strength on the road has come up a lot, and it will in-turn help with the track when it's time to get into our work in October!"

Like many in the team, the Olympics are Simpson's ultimate goal, but while some of the young riders are targeting the 2016 edition, Simpson is doing all he can ahead of London 2012.

"It's going to be hard - not just for me but for all the guys wanting to be part of the team for the London Olympics next year, but each rider knows it and surely it can only be a good thing for the team as a unit to push each other to see just how fast we can go!"

Simpson's report on today's road win

I sat last wheel for the first six laps, let the Belgian riders attack. I was just cruising on the back, waiting for my time to move up and get amongst it. With ten laps to go a big group was away, I moved up and they were caught with 3km.

I followed an An Post rider down the left, he attacked and I sat on him. First time at the front and I was off the front. He rode across to his teammate, and two more joined us. We stayed away for the next 80km - until the end.

The gap got up to 1m25s at one stage, but mostly hovered around 1min. We all rolled well, it was good to be off the front. There were quite a few corners and one tight 90degree S-Bend with less than 1km to go.

With two laps to go the gap was coming down, but we continued to roll. We could now see the chasing bunch behind us.

Out of the S-Bend with just over a lap to go I attacked the group of five -  if we got caught I knew there would be fresher guys in the bunch who would beat me in the sprint, so I decided to have ago.

I stayed away for just over a kilometre but the other four chased hard and it came back together.

Both the An Post guys attacked in the next few kilometres, as did the other two guys in the group. It seemed no one was getting away. With about 4km to go I was yelling at the Belgians, they were yelling at each other - we had to roll at some sort of decent pace otherwise the bunch would catch us.

They were coming fast.

We all rolled, until the last S-Bend. Out of it I was on the front, and decided that I was going to lead out. We had a right hander over some cobbles, then around 400m to the finish line.

Out of the corner I slowly wound it up like a track sprint, looking behind. Nothing... then again, no one wanted to jump past me.

I kept winding it up until I started sprinting just as I hit a speed bump, about 200m before the finish. I slowly sprinted away from the other four riders and took the win. Peter Latham rolled in the next bunch for 6th.

Related

• Aaron Gate wins in Belgium