{"id":573328,"date":"2026-03-30T02:59:13","date_gmt":"2026-03-30T02:59:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/573328\/"},"modified":"2026-03-30T02:59:13","modified_gmt":"2026-03-30T02:59:13","slug":"cornish-proves-a-cut-above-the-rest","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/573328\/","title":{"rendered":"Cornish proves a cut above the rest"},"content":{"rendered":"

With his skin and NSW blue lycra cycling outfit ripped and torn from a crash at Brisbane\u2019s Anna Meares Velodrome, Thomas Cornish recorded a courageous victory to capture his first national title in five years.<\/p>\n

The latest stage of the 26-year-old\u2019s metamorphosis from sprint star to endurance rider saw Cornish \u2013 a New South Wales Institute of Sport (NSWIS) scholarship holder \u2013 outsprint reigning champion, and NSW teammate, Kurt Eather in a thrilling final lap. <\/p>\n

\u201cI made a bit of a mistake at the start,\u201d Cornish told AustCycling\u2019s Andrew Bryan when quizzed about the early crash, while photographer Con Chronis captured the aftermath of the spill. \u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

\u201cI was trying to reposition, and I wasn\u2019t watching the wheel in front of me and came down. Luckily it was only a bit of skin, and I was fine, and the bike was fine, and I was able to get back in.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI was probably a bit more cautious after that, and I sort of rode from the back.\u201d<\/p>\n

Cornish, who came to prominence in 2018 when he broke the junior world record and won gold in the kilometre time trial at the UCI Junior Track World Championships, didn\u2019t hide the significance of his title-clinching victory.<\/p>\n

\u201cI can\u2019t remember the last time I won a national title, so to do it now, my first time as an endurance rider, I\u2019m pretty happy with that.\u201d<\/p>\n

The cherished national title now sits alongside the Oceania scratch race championship crown he seized earlier this year.<\/p>\n

Fellow NSWIS scholarship holder, \u00a0Nicole Duncan \u2013 who once described pushing herself through the pain barrier as going through \u2018hell\u2019 on two wheels because everything feels as though it\u2019s on fire \u2013 won her first individual national title in the elite women\u2019s elimination race.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

The 20-year-old held her nerve in a strategic ride, before sprinting past South Australia\u2019s Sophie Edwards in the final lap.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m pretty speechless, I was sore from three days of racing,\u201d Duncan told AusCycling. \u201cI was hoping she didn\u2019t go long, my legs were pretty sore, so when she went to the front it was my kind of sprint.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is where I thrive, I left it as late as possible because I knew I could get the kick on her.\u201d<\/p>\n

Photos: Con Chronis<\/p>\n

Words: Daniel Lane, NSWIS and Andrew Bryan<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"With his skin and NSW blue lycra cycling outfit ripped and torn from a crash at Brisbane\u2019s Anna…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":573329,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[569],"tags":[64,63,784,85],"class_list":["post-573328","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cycling","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-cycling","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/573328","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=573328"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/573328\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/573329"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=573328"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=573328"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=573328"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}