Mel Spath felt her positioning let her down at the World Championships in Florence yesterday, Saturday (Photo: Brendan Slattery)
Having secured a place on US pro squad Team TIBCO this season and won the last two national road race titles, Mel Spath went into yesterday’s World Road Championships in Florence, Italy, well fancied by many observers to do a ride on a very hilly course that should have suited her.
However, a combination of bad positioning, nerves and inexperience at this top level saw her get distanced on the first of five passages of the two climbs on the course.
She then rode in a large group with team mate Olivia Dillon for the next three laps before being pulled out as they were due to go out onto the last lap.
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Riding her first road World Championships, Spath described as “uneventful” the 60km of racing before the riders entered the circuit for five laps of the 16.6km course.
“My plan was to stay safe at the back and it was pretty much uneventful,” she said of the early part of the race.
“I was planning to work my way to the front when I came to the town, but it didn’t really work out like that,” she laughed.
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“I didn’t manage to get to the front at all, it was really lined out. Before that it was fine, I was really just saving my legs. But I completely messed up in not moving up earlier, I left it way, way too late.”
“Once we hit the circuit, from the first time up the climb, the pace was absolutely mental. I can climb well enough, but I was just so far back…. I did manage to pick up places but I ended up making the second group I think.”
“That was really the race (over), I never caught back on. Some riders caught us from behind but in the group we were in everyone had people up the road so nobody was riding. So that was it unfortunately.”
Spath said the race was not as hard as she had expected, purely because after one big effort first time up the climb the race was over for her.
“Going up that climb was really, really hard. But then I didn’t make the split and in the group we were in, nobody was riding hard.”
She said she expected to be stopped on the last lap and did not seem unduly stressed about it, saying her race was long over before her group was prevented from going out onto the last loop.
“I have raced in the US (with Team TIBCO) and in a lot of countries this year, but I need to improve my positioning,” was her honest appraisal.
The former MTB champion who had ridden a marathon MTB Worlds said her issue with positioning was a combination of nerves and relative inexperience on the road.
“I was quite nervous in the bunch, I was not comfortable. I think in my head I was telling myself ‘this is the Worlds’ and maybe I just didn’t want to do anything wrong. I was on the brakes the whole time, that’s something I really need to work on.”
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