Australian Road Championships: Grace Brown regains elite women's national time trial title

Grace Brown (FDJ Nouvelle-Aquitaine Futuroscope) has regained the elite women's individual time trial at the 2022 Federation University Road National Championships.

There were no rivals that could come close to Brown, as the rider who came fourth in the discipline at the Tokyo Olympic Games posted a time of 41:28.68 in the windy conditions late on a warm Wednesday afternoon in Victoria. That was more than a minute ahead of her nearest rival Amber Pate (InForm TMX MAKE) while there was just over ten seconds further back to third, with the final spot on the podium taken by Lisa Jacob (Knights of Suburbia).

"I really wanted to get this for FDJ so it's nice to have that done now," said Brown after the podium presentation. "It was a pretty hard race actually, it didn't come easy, but I'm proud of the effort and happy to have the jersey for the year."

Brown was previously the national champion in the race against the clock in 2019, but over the next two years U23 rider Sarah Gigante took out both that category and the elite title. Gigante, however, didn't defend her time trial crown this year as she works her way back to fitness as she steps up into WorldTour team Movistar in 2022.

The elite women's and U23 women's time trial was run over two laps, totalling 28.6km, in a course that started and finished at the Federation University’s Mount Helen campus, starting and finishing with some sharp turns and around 180 metres of elevation gain across each lap.

It was Anya Louw who took out the U23 women's title, with the 21-year-old finishing just over two minutes back from Brown.

"I feel really very lucky, I've been waiting a long time to get a national championship as I've come second a number of times now," Louw told Cyclingnews. "I've been dialling my position for months now and doing lots of specific sessions so this one means a lot, a lot of preparation went into it."

The time trials open up the racing in the Australian National Championships so there are still more national titles up for grabs, with Brown now turning her attention to the road race on Sunday, an event where she has stood on the podium the last two years. 

“I’m fairly confident in my form at the moment, I’ve put in some good work. I hope to ride a little bit stronger than today,” said Brown, who this year switched to FDJ Nouvelle-Aquitaine Futuroscope from Team BikeExchange, which usually turns out in force at Australian Nationals. “I’m out on my own without any teammates on Sunday so I’ll just have to race by instinct and see what I can do.”