Cycling: Rowers take to cycles for lake challenge

Lucy Spoors (left), Emma Twigg and Rebecca Scown (right) see the circuit as a good training ground. Photo / Christine Cornege

It'll be training, but not as they've come to know it for a group of elite rowers when they tackle the Lake Taupo Cycle Challenge today.

Emma Twigg, Rebecca Scown and Lucy Spoors are taking part in the 160km ride, along with the men's lightweight squad.

Twigg, world championship single sculling silver medallist this year, has done the ride once before, clocking 4h 59min in 2010. Scown, twice world champion in the pair and Olympic bronze medallist last year, and Spoors, who won bronze at the world under 23 champs in the quad, are new to the event. The three share a house, so there's likely some serious bragging rights to be sorted out.

"Normally we'd do a long ride on a Saturday so we thought we'd have some fun and do something a bit different," Twigg said.

"I guess for us it's the training we would be doing anyway, just adding on another hour or so. But it's definitely something to keep the mind fresh."

Twigg is taking a bike mechanics course, with Olympic champion Joseph Sullivan,

"We're given time to study during the day but instead of spending your time doing nothing between sessions it's nice to be able to pick something else up that's hopefully a skill I'll have forever."

So is the plan to ride the journey together, or beat the others to the finish?

"We're pretty competitive beings so no doubt there will be an element of keeping it together, but also an element of wanting to go as fast as we can around the course."