Fern Hill local Lauretta Hanson, 26, placed third in the elite women’s road race at the 2021 Federation University Road National Championships held at Mount Buninyong earlier this month.
It was the first podium finish in the championships for Hanson who has been competing in the elite category since she was 19. Her mother Heather won the title at age 17 in 1981.
“This is my first elite national medal, which is pretty special, and to have my mum there to be able to celebrate with me was pretty emotional, especially because most of my racing is in Europe and my family can’t be there with me,” she told the Express.
“It’s a quite a tough, challenging course, it isn’t really suited to a rider like myself because I prefer flat, windy circuits whereas Mount Buninyong is a tough climb. This year we decided to be aggressive from the start and change our tactics and that really paid off.”
The professional cyclist spends most of the year racing in Europe with Trek Segafredo, an American registered team.
Based in Girona, an hour north of Barcelona, Hanson and her team race across Europe, competing in France, Italy, Germany, Belgium, the Netherlands and elsewhere.
Hanson also captained the Australian national team that won the Santos Tour Down Under in Adelaide in January.
“It was pretty cool to race with some different athletes and have such success, especially as the riders hadn’t raced together before,” she said.
“Usually we’re racing against each other instead of together.”
During pandemic restrictions last year, Hanson returned to Australia in October and spent two weeks in quarantine. She headed back to Spain last Saturday.
Hanson said positive cases of COVID-19 in Spain had been coming down in the past couple of weeks.
“I have faith in my team and the measures and protocols we have in place to keep us safe especially when we’re competing so that makes me a bit more comfortable in being able to travel over there,” she said.
