The club will shortly be asking for nominations for the 2019 JHS. The annual scholarship supports a promising MCC member develop their cycling potential by offering support including coaching, race fees, club kit, and well as massage and sports therapy treatment.
We hear from our 2018 recipient Jack Marshall on how the JHS has helped his cycling journey.
Huge thanks to our 2018 JHS supporters Brad@ https://morningtoncycles.com, Paul Field@Momentum Massage, Andrew Cook@ https://www.peninsulafootclinic.com.au, White Bike Foundation https://whitebikefoundation.org.au , and all our MCC members that support the JHS each year.
Over to you Jack!
“My year as the 2019 Joel Hawkins Memorial scholarship recipient has been an amazing time. It’s hard to believe we are already at the pointy end of the year, but also so much has happened in the last 10 months. Personally, my cycling has developed more than I could have hoped, both in racing and training improvements, and that is largely due to the amazing support I have received from the club and the people in it. I started the year still a relatively new member of the club (about 6 months or so) and it took no time at all to feel right at home. Starting the year off with my first Nationals in January made for a steep learning curve, and kicked off an awesome summer of training and racing.
After Nationals, I was lucky enough to be put in touch through the scholarship with Brad and the crew at Mornington Cycles in early February, who helped me out massively with setting me up on my new Specialized Tarmac shortly before the next block of racing. My first ride on it was the clubs Liam Davidson Memorial Handicap the next day. After some solid training I also got to do the Melbourne To Warrnambool with a large handful of MCC members, which was an awesome experience. The race highlight was probably seeing club president Bruce Trew use his massive diesel engine to help a group of 30 of us get back to the main bunch, 100km into a 270km day. The rest of summer with the club was great, and I was able to get some good training in before starting my first year at Uni in March.
After a good block I managed to snag my first VRS podium in the Fred Icke Memorial in Creswick, which I was pretty happy with – but not as happy as I was when I found out the club would be running crits in Dromana, which were probably the highlight of summer.
Amongst races and big training rides for the year I have also had the opportunity to see Paul Field from Momentum Massage on a regular basis. He has been an amazing resource to learn from and has helped me deal with injury, and recover properly from high loads on the bike. As well as this, I was lucky enough to get some custom cycling orthotics made, from club member Andrew Cook at the Peninsula Foot Clinic. Through the scholarship, both the support from Paul and Cookie helped me through some knee injuries in Autumn and Winter and allowed me to get back to some good training after an inconsistent month or two.
Shortly after this I raced the Tour of East Gippsland with some other members, and took my first VRS stage win, and moved into the series leaders jersey – I was super stoked with how the tour panned out and it definitely would not have been possible without the help I received from Paul and Cookie.
Following this, I was able to do some racing in different parts of Victoria throughout June and July, hosted by various different clubs. At almost every one of these races was another MCC member who offered to give me a lift and help me out with logistics and travel, which was incredibly helpful and kind.
After that, most racing stopped over Winter, but it has been some of the best training I’ve ever done with some great mates. Since this time last year, I’ve gained around 100 watts on my power threshold, and learnt a lot more about racing. During the past few months especially, getting out of bed in the morning to go training in horrendous Melbourne weather has been made so much easier, knowing I have the support of a great club that is home to some truly great people. I would very much like to thank everyone involved at the club in regards to the Joel Hawkins scholarship, because it has been a huge help to my cycling this year.
I’m really looking forward to the rest of the year with the club, and the summer racing calendar where I’m hoping to have a really good ride at Nationals and go on to do the Warnie again, as well as some NRS racing in 2020.”
https://pakenham.starcommunity.com.au/sport/2019-01-16/marshall-is-on-the-road-to-success/
https://pakenham.starcommunity.com.au/news/2019-04-02/wheels-turn-for-cycle-scholar/
