Drew Christensen has won the 2019 NTT Pro Cycling Zwift Academy. The Kiwi will ride for NTT Continental Cycling Team in 2020 having gone through the arduous process that culminated with the NTT training camp.
Campbell Pithie from Christchurch, Drew Christensen from Hamilton and Mathijs Loman from the Netherlands arrived in Spain for a series of tests beginning with the Ramp Test on Zwift overseen by Zwift Academy Coach Kevin Poulton. These three were the finalists from over 68,000 riders from all around the world who had been monitored and assessed over several weeks. From a semi-final process that included riders from Croatia, Australia, the USA, Holland, South Africa, Canada and New Zealand Pithie, Christensen and Loman were selected for the final and for Christensen it was not the start that the selectors were looking for.
The ramp test saw Campbell Pithie produce the highest numbers with 445 watts compared to 420 for Mathijs and 367 for Drew. After a cafe ride on the second half of day 1 the start of the second day kicked off with a team ride that featured a good amount of climbing along with the likes of Vuelta a Espana stage winner Ben King. That was followed by an interview with a panel of three who grilled each of the riders individually on any number of questions from snoring roommates, pizza with pineapple to who they’d replace on the team if they had to, to what they’d do in a winning situation with a DS ordering you to drop back. This was where Drew began to show his mettle and impress not only the selectors but also the riders who had interviewed him.
Into day 3 a four and a half hour endurance ride was followed by a Zwift race. The endurance ride featured a hill climb led out by Ben King in a race scenario. King led out the climb before Pithie, Loman and Christensen took on the climb and each other. It was Loman who set the early tempo with Christensen and Pithie setting a solid chase effort behind. Loman managed to make the early attack stick and crest the climb first with Drew and Campbell just behind in what proved to be a much more marginal gap than had been anticipated.
The evening’s challenge saw the trio go through a Zwift Race watched by the World Tour team. In a room full of enthusiastic support it was Campbell who took the win ahead of Drew, with Mathjis now third. Because of the close nature of the finish it continued to leave the selectors scratching their heads as no one rider had soared above the rest on a day where cracks were expected to emerge.
Day 4 began with a sprint challenge that saw Drew, Campbell and Mathjis launching off of the wheel of Edvald Boasson Hagen. Across the three sprints the riders each took a win, leaving only the final announcement to come.
Drew’s racing attributes were praised by Team Coach Elliot Lipski who said, “Drew’s got potential. He’s really young, this year he was a junior and I think he’s got a racing instinct that you cannot teach; and he’s already shown that at a junior level. He’s got that cut-throat nature about him when it comes to the race. He’s not the strongest by any means and if we were picking purely on power Drew actually wouldn’t have even got through to the finals and maybe even the semi-finals but from his attitude, his experience, he’s got that something that makes him a potential.”
To watch the full highlights from the NTT Pro Cycling Zwift Academy finals click here.
