Newest Superstar
Saturday, November 21, 2009
19-year-old Southlander, Tom Scully, stunned the New Zealand cycling fraternity at the weekend when he won not one but two gold medals at the track cycling World Cup meet in Melbourne.
Scully had expected to use the Points and Scratch races as experience in the lead-up to his big event, the Madison. But he cruised to win the Scratch race by five lengths to beat some well-performed and experienced riders, including world champion Chris Newton.
Scully's fairytale trip to Melbourne doesn't end with this remarkable win, just for good measure he claimed another gold medal when he teamed up with Marc Ryan to win the 40km Madison event.
As expected, BikeNZ high-performance director Mark Elliot lumped plenty of praise on the young Southlander. "We brought Tom here primarily for experience," Elliot said. "He has totally exceeded our expectations, for sure. It is a quite exceptional young prospect. He has come here as an unknown but he's bound to be a marked man from here in."