Peter Kennaugh wins the second edition of Cadel Evans race
Peter Kennaugh came up trumps in the second edition of the Cadel Evans Great Ocean Road Race following an aggressive final lap of the Geelong circuit. The British national champion jumped away on the Challambra climb and held off the peloton for Team Sky’s first win of 2016. Local lad Leigh Howard won the bunch sprint for second place six seconds back, after IAM Cycling worked hard for the chase as Niccolò Bonifazio crossed the line for third on his Trek-Segafredo debut.
“I have to thank Luke Rowe really. The whole race he was saying ‘stay calm, stay calm’. I went up the road with just over a lap to go with a couple of riders and right away he said ‘sit up, it’s not going to work.’ He just kept me calm during the race and said ‘hit it’, like Richie Porte did on Willunga, just don’t look back and I did it,” Kennaugh explained in a post-race television interview.
“To be honest, I didn’t want to look back once. I am quite an emotion rider, the littlest things if I’ve see them close to me, that’s all it would have took for me to crack. So I just thought ‘head down, don’t look back until you’re on the finishing straight’ and that’s what I did,” Kennaugh added when asked if he knew of the situation behind him.
