Giddens takes elite Flyer title - April 2015
RAIN RACE: Former Wanganui High School student Hayley Giddens (centre) comes home as the first woman to finish the Active Post Taupo to Rotorua 100km Flyer in horrible conditions on Saturday.
Wanganui's Hayley Giddens did not enjoy the return journey from Taupo to Rotorua as much as the ride down.
The professional cyclist won the elite women's section of the Active Post Taupo to Rotorua 100km Flyer on Saturday in atrocious wet weather conditions.
Traditionally, the annual flyer is raced in the other direction from Rotorua to Taupo, with Giddens being a previous women's winner of that version.
"I'm not sure which way I prefer," she said yesterday after a tough weekend.
The route was reversed for just the second time to accommodate forestry companies working on the back roads.
Expecting between 1500-2000 riders on Saturday, a smaller field turned out to brave the miserable conditions as 30mm of rain fell.
Giddens' hand for changing gears went numb during the ride.
"I was smacking my hand on the handle bar to wake it up."
She stayed with the leading group of elite men's riders until the 65-70km mark, where the race turned off State Highway 5 at Tumunui Rd to head through the Waikite Valley countryside.
"I went with them until the second hill, I got dropped.
"I ran the whole race. It was miserable for everyone."
Giddens crossed the finish line on Fenton St in Rotorua in 2h 43.05m, just 4s ahead of Auckland's Laura Newman-Watt and Taupo's Sam Warriner, the former Olympian and Commonwealth Games silver medallist in triathlon.
Her winning time in the other direction had been 2h 32m, in much better weather conditions. Giddens will return to her professional team in America in three weeks,
Having been based in the north-central area of the United States, racing out of Wisconsin, while also undertaking tours of Central and South America, Giddens is intending to race more in the southern part of the country this year. She has visited 18 states in the union and plans to increase that to 30 in 2015.
Giddens is also studying extramurally through Massey University, so will be sitting her exams in Atlanta, Georgia at the end of the year.