Twenty-year-old professional James Fouche showed a glimpse of his outstanding potential when he cleared out from a select group to claim the overall honours in the men’s road race at the Vantage Elite and Under 23 Road National Championships in Napier on Sunday.

Fouche, who has been re-signed with UCI continental Team Wiggins in UK, animated the race from the get-go, finally attacking on the infamous Napier Hill climb with two and a half laps of the city circuit remaining and from there he soloed to the overall honours in 4:01:02 for the 166km race.

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He defended his men’s under-23 crown that he won last year, and with it the New

World Tour rider Tom Scully (EF Education First), who had been a key driver of the early break that proved so decisive, claimed the elite title, after the chasers fell three minutes behind the winner. echo adrotate_group(4, array("fallback" => 0, "weight" => 0, "site" => "no"));

Fouche and Scully were key players in the break that went early on the first of two rural loops, with the 12-strong group working well to force the pivotal move of the race.

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“It was a long day out there but I was impressed that the group were motivated and all committed to the break and took it to the rest,” said Scully. “I told them to work hard for 10 minutes to establish the break and from there it worked well.

“James was very impressive and it shows good signs for the future. It was incredible when James went on the climb and put the sword in. It was too much for me. He is an impressive, strong young rider.”

Once back into the nine laps of the inner-city course that included the climb of Napier Hill, the group gradually whittled down until two-time champion Joe Cooper attacked on the third-to-last time up the climb. Fouche countered Cooper’s attack and opened a 28-second buffer by the time he reached the start-finish with two laps remaining. While Scully pushed hard initially to close the gap, the young Aucklander went into cruise mode to win comfortably.

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“I am thankful that Team Wiggins has re-signed me and it is cool to be able to thank them by taking the national jersey back to race for them this year,” said Fouche.

“I thought the key for me was to get an early break because I am not one of the best on the climbs. It worked out really well although I was sceptical to go with three laps left but I just went with it.

“I thought it would be a tester and I was surprised to open up the lead. I was not sure I could hold it. I’ve been doing quite a bit of training on the hills so I guess it paid off today and the race played into my hands.”

Scully took out the elite honours a minute ahead of fellow World Tour rider and time trial winner Patrick Bevin (Team CCC) with his fellow Waikato teammate Hayden McCormick third in the sprint ahead of world-ranked top-50 professional George Bennett.

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Fouche led the under-23 podium ahead of Otago’s Kees Duyvesteyn, who finished second overall, and Manawatu’s Joel Yates, riding for Team Skoda Fruzio.

Paul Wright won the King of the Mountain and Alex West the sprint jersey.

Results, Vantage Road Race, 166kms:

Under-23: James Fouche (Team Wiggins, Auckland) 4:01:02, 1; Kees Duyvesteyn (Otago) at 3:15, 2; Joel Yates (Skoda Fruzio, Manawatu) at 3:16, 3; Paul Wright (Southland) at 6:02, 4; Ben Hamilton (Auckland) at 9:41, 5.

Elite: Tom Scully (EF Education First, Southland) 4:04:17, 1; Patrick Bevin (Team CCC, Waikato BOP) at 56sec, 2; Hayden McCormick (Mobius BridgeLane, Waikato BOP) same time, 3; George Bennett (Team Jumbo-Visma, Nelson) same time, 4; James Oram (Skoda Fruzio, Auckland) at 1:05, 5.

Results:

Pos.	Rider	Category	Team	Time
1	James Fouche	U23	Auckland	4.01.02
2	Kees Duyvesteyn	U23	Cycling Otago	+3.14
3	Tom Scully	Elite	Cycling Southland	ST
4	Joel Yates	U23	Team Skoda Fruzio	+3.15
5	Patrick Bevin	Elite	Waikato Bay of Plenty	+4.11
6	Hayden McCormick	Elite	Waikato Bay of Plenty	ST
7	George Bennett	Elite	Tasman	ST
8	James Oram	Elite	Team Skoda Fruzio	+4.19
9	Michael Vink	Elite	Canterbury	+5.19
10	Paul Wright	U23	Cycling Southland	+6.02
11	Jason Christie	Elite	Tasman	+8.28
12	Joseph Cooper	Elite	Wellington	ST
13	Ben Hamilton	U23	Auckland	+9.40
14	Aaron Gate	Elite	Auckland	+9.41
15	Michael Torckler	Elite	GD Pringle Building/Spoken Cycles	+10.35
16	Theo Gilbertson	U23	Auckland	+11.44
17	Ben Oliver	Elite	Team Skoda Fruzio	+11.59
18	Luke Mudgway	Elite	East Coast North Island	+12.17
19	Ryan Christensen	Elite	Waikato Bay of Plenty	ST
20	Frank Sutton	Elite	Waikato Bay of Plenty	+12.18
21	Matias Fitzwater	U23	Waikato Bay of Plenty	ST
22	Carne Groube	U23	West Coast North Island	ST
23	Andrew Bidwell	U23	Tasman	+12.19
24	Brad Jones	Elite	Waikato Bay of Plenty	+12.30
25	Corbin Strong	U23	Cycling Southland	+13.04
26	Madi Hartley-Brown	U23	West Coast North Island	ST
27	Blake Sunde	U23	Auckland	+13.06
28	Jake Marryatt	Elite	Canterbury	+13.18
29	Hamish Schreurs	Elite	Canterbury	+13.43
DNF	Alex West	U23	Team Skoda Fruzio
DNF	Matthew Webb-Smith	Elite	Tank Guy Bikebox
DNF	Antony Nalder	Elite	Wellington
DNF	Glenn Haden	Elite	Tank Guy Bikebox
DNF	Toby Atkins	Elite	Waikato Bay of Plenty
DNF	Maxwell Wickens	U23	NextGEN Racing
DNF	Alex Heaney	Elite	GD Pringle Building/Spoken Cycles
DNF	Steve Nicholls	Elite	Tank Guy Bikebox
DNF	Jayden Kuijpers	U23	Team Skoda Fruzio
DNF	Taylor Johnston	U23	Tank Guy Bikebox
DNF	Laurence Kerby	U23	Auckland
DNF	Calvin Standrill	Elite	Wellington
DNF	Nicholas Magill	Elite	Waikato Bay of Plenty
DNF	James Krzanich	U23	Auckland
DNF	Sam Mobberley	Elite	Auckland
DNF	Aaron Wyllie	U23	Team Skoda Fruzio
DNF	Dan Cross	Elite	Auckland
DNF	Callum Gordon	Elite	East Coast North Island
DNF	Ethan Batt	U23	Tasman
DNF	Dion Smith	Elite	Auckland
DNF	Logan Griffin	Elite	GD Pringle Building/Spoken Cycles
DNF	Sam Gaze	Elite	Waikato Bay of Plenty
DNF	Henry Levett	U23	NextGEN Racing
DNF	Campbell Pithie	U23	Contract Consultants Cycle Surgery
DNF	Liam Cappel	U23	GD Pringle Building/Spoken Cycles
DNF	Jack Walsh	U23	Contract Consultants Cycle Surgery
DNF	William Green	Elite	Tank Guy Bikebox
DNF	Dylan Kennett	Elite	Waikato Bay of Plenty
DNF	Nick Miller	Elite	Auckland
DNF	Burnie McGrath	U23	Waikato Bay of Plenty
DNF	James Harvey	Elite	GD Pringle Building/Spoken Cycles
DNF	Josh Page	Elite	Tank Guy Bikebox
DNF	Rinze Schuurmans	Elite	Canterbury
DNF	Greg Taylor	Elite	NextGEN Racing
DNF	Vaughn Pretorius	Elite	NextGEN Racing
DNF	Ben Cannon	Elite	Contract Consultants Cycle Surgery
DNF	Matthew Frecklington	Elite	Tank Guy Bikebox
DNF	Winston Briggs	Elite	West Coast North Island
DNF	Oliver Young	U23	Auckland
DNF	Jack McNeely	U23	Auckland
DNF	Sam Dobbs	U23	GD Pringle Building/Spoken Cycles
DNF	Thomas Stannard	U23	West Coast North Island
DNF	Liam Morrison	U23	Canterbury
DNF	Nicholas Thornley	U23	Contract Consultants Cycle Surgery
DNF	John Wansink	U23	Cycling Otago
DNF	Ioan Fuller	U23	Cycling Otago
DNF	Luke Shaw	U23	East Coast North Island
DNF	Toby Fuller	U23	NextGEN Racing

James Fouche

Fouche and Southland’s Tom Scully Were Key Players In Napier Road National Championships