After fourth and third places in the last two years, Jason Christie (Kenyan Riders Down Under) took his first New Zealand road race title when he claimed an impressive solo win at today’s race in Napier. After bridging across to an early breakaway, he made it into a six-rider group before taking off in a successful solo move. Dion Smith (ONE) won the four-rider sprint for second, with Hamish Shreurs crossing the line in third to win the U23 title and Robin Reid taking the elite bronze medal.

In 2014 Jason Christie proved that he was getting closer to the level of the best in New Zealand when he finished a fine fourth at his national championships. One year later he was third as he was part of a dominant Avanti performance that saw the local team make it a clean sweep of the podium.

For 2016, however, Christie has moved to the new Kenyan Riders Down Under team, meaning that it would be hard to repeat that result in a race that was set to be dominated by the WorldTour riders and the big teams of Avanti and One. However, Christie defied expectations as he rode to a fantastic solo win on the new and very course in Napier.

Things didn’t look promising for Christie early in the race as he had missed a big early breakaway that had representation from both Avanti and ONE. Most importantly, the latter team had both James Oram and Dion Smith in the group and those two pre-race favourites did a big job to build a two-minute gap over the peloton.

Christie refused to give up though and he joined WorldTour rider Jesse Sergent when the Ag2r tried to bridge across. Surprisingly, it was the continental rider who made the junction after leaving his companion behind and he found himself in the leading group at a point when it had started to split up. He reached the three leaders of Smith, George Bennett (LottoNL-Jumbo) and Hamish Shreurs and when Oram and Robin Reid also made it across, a six-rider group had former.

In the peloton, the WorldTour riders worked hard to bring it back, with pre-race favourite and time trial champion Patrick Bevin (Cannondale) doing a massive amount of work. However, the break was too strong and with little help from his tiring companions in the six- rider group that was left of the peloton, it was game over for Bevin.

Bennett was taken out of contention by a mechanical, leaving five riders to decide the race. Christie saw his chance with 25km to go when he launched a solo move and he would quickly build an advantage of 30 seconds.

With two riders in the chase group, ONE did a massive amount of work to bring Christie back and it turned into a nail-biting finale. With four kilometres to go, Christie was less than 20 seconds ahead and he passed the flamme rouge with just 16 seconds in hand. However, it was enough to claim the win before Smith beat Shreurs and Reid in the sprint for second. Bevin was the best of the rest as he crossed the line in sixth. As a U23 rider, Shreurs was awarded the U23 title while Reid claimed the bronze medal.

Most of the WorldTour riders will now travel to Australia for the Tour Down Under but racing in New Zealand is not over yet. Later this month Christie will debut his new jersey and the New Zealand Cycle Classic, the country’s premier stage race, which will have a strong field that is led by the ONE Pro Cycling team from the pro continental ranks.

A hilly course

The 2016 New Zealand National Championships were held on a new course in Napier. The first part of the 180km race was made up of a tough circuit in the rural area close to the city where the riders would tackle a tough climb twice. Having returned to the city, 7.5 laps of a challenging city circuit with a short, steep climb would set the scene for a tough finale before the riders ended the race by doing one lap of a flat 13km circuit.

With a rather small field and no big teams to control things, it was no surprise that it was a very animated start to the race when the riders headed out in sunny and very windy conditions. The many attacks soon led to the formation of a group with Clair Treymane, Josh Page, Reid, Nick Miller and Fraser Gough (Avanti) which build an advantage of 1.22.

A strong front group is formed

ONE had missed the move and so sent Oram off in lone pursuit. More riders followed suit and several made the junction. In the end, it was a group with Greg Taylor, Daniel Molyneux, Reid, Miller, Smith, Oram, am Horgan, Page, Joshua Aldrige, Gough, Treymane and Tom Carter that formed. The latter two were distanced before the move increased their advantage to more than 2 minutes.

In the peloton, the WorldTour riders tried to keep the situation under control as they did most of the chase work. The gap stayed between the 2- and 3-minute marks which prompted Michael Torckler, Shreus, Brad Evans and Bennett to try to bridge the gap. At the 46km mark, they made the junction and a little later Grayson Napier and Andy Hagan also joined the leading group.

Christie makes his move

The gap stayed around 2.30 as the pro riders continued to lead the chase and gradually whittling doen the peloton. The next WorldTour rider to make a move was Greg Henderson (Lotto Soudal) who joined forces with ONE’s Hayden McCormick. However, the latter had two teammates up the road and with no cooperation, Henderson had to give up the move.

Instead, Sergent decided to give it a go and Christie was quick to respond. It soon became apparent that the latter was the stronger of the pair and Sergent was clearly suffering on the climb. As they crossed the finish line after the first lap of the city circuit, they were 41 seconds behind the leaders while the peloton was at 1.30.

The break splits up

Bennett upped the pace on the climb and only Shreurs and Smith managed to stay with him. The original break splintered to pieces and was passed by an impressive Christie who dropped Sergent, the Ag2r rider dropping back to the peloton which was 1.40 behind.

Christie made the junction at the end of the next lap and moments later Oram and Reid also regained contact. The six riders worked well together while Evans, Sam Bewley (Orica-GreenEDGE) and Torckler attacked from the peloton. They got a 20-second advantage but with Bevin, Tom Scully (Drapac) and defending champion Joe Cooper (Avanti) working hard in the peloton, they were brought back.

Christie takes off again

Henderson, Bewley and Sergent were all dropped and later Cooper would also lose contact. Bevin, Evans, Scully and McCormick were still in the six-rider chase group that had caught the remnants of the early break but were not really closing in on the leaders.

With two laps to go, the gap was still 1.57 and looked likely that it was over for the peloton. That’s when Christie made his move and as he started the final lap of the city circuit, he had a 20-second advantage. The Bevin-led peloton was at 1.44 and were out of contention. Meanwhile, Bennett had a mechanical which took him out of contention at a point when he was preparing a finale attack.

Christie did well to hold off his chasers but as he hit the final flat 13km circuit, he started to lose ground. The gap came down to 10 seconds but he had enough left in the tank to take a solo win. 16 seconds later Smith beat Shreurs, Reid and Oram in the sprint for second while Bevin had escaped in a solo move to round out the top 5