New Zealand star Anton Cooper claimed his ninth UCI Oceania Mountain Bike elite cross-country title at in Brisbane yesterday.<\/p>\n
Cooper, who will ride for the new Lapierre PXR Racing team on the UCI world circuit this season, dominated the Oceania race to add further to his outstanding record.<\/p>\n
After missing the title last year, Cooper established an 11 second lead on the opening loop and never looked back. He built on his advantage every lap to finish in 1:25:33, over three minutes clear of Australians Brent Rees and Aiden Lefmann.<\/p>\n
Australian Rebecca Henderson won her seventh elite women\u2019s title building a gap on the opening lap with New Zealanders Amelie Mackay and two-time winner Samara Sheppard pushing through to complete the podium.<\/p>\n
Rotorua\u2019s Milla Phipps produced a stellar ride to claim the women\u2019s under-23 title, building a 10 second lead on the start loop, going on to dominate the five-lap race to claim the title in 1:10:32, over a minute clear.<\/p>\n
Kiwi Eddie Adams was third in the under 23 men\u2019s race behind Australians Jack Ward and Harry Doye.<\/p>\n
It proved back-to-back titles for Waikato\u2019s Kayley McMillian in the under 19 women\u2019s. The Morrinsville rider made her move on the first full lap, building a 49 second advantage and never looked back winning in 1:12:20 by over two minutes.<\/p>\n
Australian Connor Wright successfully defended his under 19 men\u2019s title. He opened a lead of over two minutes but had to hold off a late charge from Te Miro rider James Climo who reduced deficit to one minute to collect the silver medal.<\/p>\n
Results; Male, Elite: Anton Cooper (NZL) 1:25:33, 1; Brent Rees (AUS) 1:28:42, 2; Aiden Lefmann (AUS) 1:30:25, 3. Under 23: Jack Ward (AUS) 1:12:05, 1; Harry Doye (AUS) 1:12:29, 2; Eddie Adams (NZL), 3. Junior: Connor Wright (AUS) 1:15:27, 1; James Climo (NZL) 1:16:27, 2; Oliver Grande (AUS) 1:17:40, 3.<\/p>\n
Female, Elite: Rebecca Henderson (AUS) 1:26:06, 1; Amelie Mackay (NZL) 1:28:53, 2; Samara Sheppard (NZL) 1:29:20, 3. Under-23: Milla Phipps (NZL) 1:10:32, 1; Ella Menigoz (AUS) 1:11:40, 2; Katy Taylor (AUS) 1:13:31, 3; Junior: Kayley McMillan (NZL) 1:12:20, 1; Silver: Freya Buckmaster (AUS) 1:14:26, 2; Alana Fletcher (AUS) 1:14:28, 3.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"New Zealand star Anton Cooper claimed his ninth UCI Oceania Mountain Bike elite cross-country title at in Brisbane…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":318273,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[111,43,139,69],"class_list":{"0":"post-318272","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-zealand","8":"tag-new-zealand","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-newzealand","11":"tag-nz"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/318272","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=318272"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/318272\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/318273"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=318272"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=318272"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=318272"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}