Tenth Place Finish for Travis Meyer in Tour of Japan

AIS-WAIS cyclist Travis Meyer has finished tenth overall in the Tour of Japan with his Team AIS finishing second in the teams category.

The tour was a successful one for the Australian contingent, with the team winning five of the seven stages in Japan.

In the seventh and final stage – the riders were pitted against a 112.7km stage which began in Tokyo and rode out to the Oi Wharf precinct where the riders contested 14 laps of a dead flat seven kilometre circuit.

The stage suited Aussie pair Jack Bobridge and Leigh Howard perfectly, and they put their sprinting prowess to good use, earning Team AIS the stage win with Leigh Howard crossing the line in 2:16.25hours.

Team Director Brian Stephens said he was pleased with the efforts of the Team AIS cyclists across the seven stage tour.

“I’m really happy with the performances of everyone on the team this week,” said Stephens. “We did as well as we could without a really specialist climber which you need to win this Tour.”

The young Australian line up placed second on the teams classification, 5min50sec behind the Kazakhstan National Team.

Overall race honours went to Spaniard Sergio Bellon Pardilla (Carmiooro – A Style) who finished 1min51sec ahead of Korean National Team rider Hyo Suk Gong with Kazakhstan’s Dmitriy Fofonov third at 2min12sec. Fellow WAIS cyclist Adam Semple also competed for Team AIS and captured a top 20 position in the sixth stage.

Bobridge was the best placed of the Australians on the general classification in seventh place at 4min37sec while Michael Matthews placed ninth at 5min11sec and Meyer tenth at 7min29sec to give the Australians three in the final top ten.

The riders have flown back to the Cycling Australia/AIS High Performance base in Varese and will contest two one day races in Italy ahead of the International Thuringen U23 Tour in Germany that runs from 7-13 June.