World champions 2014: Greg Henderson

Greg Henderson and his team have their eyes on the world champs.

World Tour professional rider Greg Henderson will head a New Zealand team in the annual Mitchelton Bay Cycling Classic near Melbourne in the new year.

Henderson, who rides for Lotto Belisol, based in Europe, will lead a group of mostly endurance track riders who will use the four-day tour as a foundation for next month's all-important Skoda Elite National Track Championships in Cambridge to press their claims for selection to February's UCI World Championships.

Henderson, who lives in Melbourne, will be joined by double Olympic medallists Aaron Gate and Marc Ryan, their fellow Cycling New Zealand track teammates Cameron Karwowski and Pieter Bulling, and Canterbury's Alex Frame, who rides for the development team of World Pro Tour's Giant-Shimano.

They will be joined by Cycling NZ elite endurance track riders Racquel Sheath and Georgia Williams.

Gate, Ryan and Frame, with Williams, will also compete in the Calder Stewart elite road nationals in Christchurch early next month.

The Mitchelton Bay Cycling Classic, in its 25th year and known formerly as the Bay Crits, is a series of criterium races. They are 45 minutes long for elite women and 60 minutes for elite men.

Geelong's eastern beach is the venue for races on January 2-3, before the action moves to the historic coastal town of Portarlington on the Bellarine Peninsula for stage three.

The final stage is at Williamstown, near the Melbourne central business district, on January 4.