Double victory for USA's Amber Neben

Feb 26th, 10. Amber Neben reminded the field of her class when she won the 11km time trial at the NZCT Women's Tour of NZ and became the new leader of the five day tour.

Neben gets underway in today's time trial ©RoadCycling.co.nz

The American has had success in most of the famous women's races across the world and is possibly the most decorated rider in this tour's peloton.

In 2005 and 2006 she won the women's equivalent of the Tour de France.  In 2008 she went one step better becoming the UCI World Time Trial Champion and in the same year won the Tour Cycliste Féminin International Ardèche.

In 2009 she had many stage wins, all in the time trial disciplines, including at the Giro but she also had a few crashes which hampered her chance for further success.

In 2010 the season is very young, but the 35 year old who lives in Irvine, 80km south of Los Angeles, can add the time trial of the NZCT Women's Tour of NZ to her palmares.

"For me February is early. So today was a day where my head remembered what I feel like when I time trial in September, but my body feels like 'what's going on?'" Neben said after today's success.

"I was happy with the rhythm I found. I was able to manage the distractions at the beginning with the issues with the start time."

"It made things a little tricky and I ended up doing a longer warmup than I wanted, but overall I can't complain," she said about the decision to delay the start by half an hour, and then a further ten minutes due to traffic congestion.

Neben reins in yellow ©RoadCycling.co.nz

When she crossed the finish line back on busy Fitzherbert Street, her time of 17m11s was 24sec faster than every rider before her, and every rider who finished after her.

With the win, Neben also took over the lead in the General Classification from her USA National teammate Shelley Evans and while she likes to be leading, the overall goal is clear.

"Honestly, I will be so excited if anybody on the team wins it. That is the number one goal," she said.

"The goal is for the team to win the race, so however that happens, whether it's me or Shelley or Janel [Holcomb], it will be fine.  If it stays on my shoulders, obviously it's always fun to win, but we pride ourselves on being a team," she said.

The other jersey to change hands in today's second stage was for the U23 rider classification where Tiffany Cromwell (AIS Australia Women's Cycling) took the lead from Cherise Taylor (Nashua Ladies Pro Cycling Team).

Top 10 time trial times 

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Tomorrow's penultimate stage takes the riders back over Stage 2's route, from Palmerston North, back over the Pahiatua track and finishing 112km later in Masterton.