Cycling: Gutsy effort earns battered rider bronze

Gordon McCauley wins the Bronze medal in the Men's Individual Time Trial. Picture / Brett Phibbs

Winning a Commonwealth Games medal was the furthest thing from Gordon McCauley's thoughts as he lay in the gutter after being run off the road by a hit-and-run driver on New Year's Eve.

"All I wanted to do was wring the neck of the bastard who had hit me," the 34-year-old said yesterday as he proudly displayed the bronze medal he won in a gutsy 40km road time trial ride in Melbourne.

After the New Year's Eve training ride to Waihi ended with him in agony nursing a broken wrist and a "smashed up face", McCauley probably deserved some sympathy.

But there was none.

"My fiancee told me to toughen up, it's only a broken wrist," McCauley said after yesterday's race.

Within a couple of days he was back on his wind trainer. Not much later he was back on his bike.

"This race had always been my goal," he said after claiming third behind Australians Nathan O'Neill (gold) and Ben Day.

"I have done time trial-specific training for only two months, which leaves me asking, 'What can I do in the 18 months before Beijing?' "

It is a remarkable comeback, helped in no small part by Invercargill-based veteran coach Doug Bath and the very best racing machine.

With $15,000 of the best frame and other components under him - the same Trek bike ridden by Lance Armstrong and his Discovery Channel team - McCauley was given every chance.

He repaid that debt yesterday, averaging more than 48km/h on the course along the St Kilda foreshore.

"I came over here in August and rode the course. I knew then I would have to ride under 50 minutes to have any chance," he said.

As it transpired, McCauley was spot on.

Only the three medallists managed that. "To tell you the truth, I'm glad there were not three Aussies in it."

Basically still without strength in his injured wrist - he can't arm wrestle or do press-ups - McCauley has shown amazing resilience.

He is now preparing to do it all again in Sunday's 15-lap, 166.95km road race, when he is expected to take the domestique role supporting Greg Henderson and Hayden Roulston.

Given the way he has bounced back and continued his recovery, it would not be a great surprise if McCauley, a former Southlander now based in Auckland, is not thereabouts at the finish.

"I also rode that course when I was over last year," he said. "It suits me. It is a lot like the courses I rode many, many times when I was racing professionally in Belgium."

He would love to add another medal to the one he deservedly took yesterday and put the disappointments of Kuala Lumpur and Manchester further behind him.

The other New Zealanders in Sunday's road race are Robin Reid, Peter Latham and Glen Mitchell.