ProVelo Super League launched with a Willunga HIll time trial on Saturday but Sunday was the first chance riders would have to work the bunch, with a one-hour criterium on Victoria Park delivering stage 2 of the opening round of racing at SA Kick It.
Blake Agnoletto (Team Brennan p/b TP32) claimed the men's criterium, which was started with a shot of the starting gun by Mark Cavendish, while Sophie Marr (Praties Cycling) won the women's stage 2.
Marr had gone long, getting the gap on the field before the final corner and then she kept putting power down to take a clear victory. Odette Lynch (Butterfields Ziptrack) was second while it was then Amelie Sanders (ARA Skip Capital) who was third.
"My teammates made it so easy, last two laps they were on the front, really showing our dominance there," said Marr, who just shifted to Praties this season, in an interview on the SBS Broadcast.
"It was a bit earlier than we expected ... and I looked back and there was a bit of a gap and I kicked again, thankfully those corners made it a bit easier to keep the gap,"
Riders in the men's race, with spectator numbers swelled by those in town for the Santos Tour Down Under, were strung out before the final corners. Agnoletto quickly found prime position while Josh Duffy (Tasmanian Institute of Sport) came second and 2024 National Road Series winner Graeme Frislie (CCACHE x Bodywrap) was third.
"It was just incredible how we pulled this team together in three weeks and how we are riding like we have been together for five years," Agnoletto said in an interview on ProVelo Super League social media. "Everyone just did their job perfectly,"
After the second stage, Appleton and Jack Ward (Team Brennan p/b TP32) were on top of the overall ladder.
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The racing in the ProVelo Super League's SA Kick It concludes on Monday at the Bend Motorsport Park, with a 93km race for the women and a 115km race for the men.
Simone is a degree-qualified journalist that has accumulated decades of wide-ranging experience while working across a variety of leading media organisations. She joined Cyclingnews as a Production Editor at the start of the 2021 season and has now moved into the role of Australia Editor. Previously she worked as a freelance writer, Australian Editor at Ella CyclingTips and as a correspondent for Reuters and Bloomberg. Cycling was initially purely a leisure pursuit for Simone, who started out as a business journalist, but in 2015 her career focus also shifted to the sport.
