King Country's Murray claims set of medals on world stage

King Country para cyclist Nicole Murray continues to shine on the world stage.

She was over in Glasgow competing at the recently completed UCI Track and Road Cycling World Championships.

The nine-strong New Zealand para cycling team finished the championships with a record-breaking 12-medal haul for their efforts on the track and road.

Murray, now on her way back to New Zealand for a well-deserved rest, was pleased with how she performed throughout the championships.

“I’m proud and exhausted; it’s been a long racing season and I can’t wait to come home. We’ve all had to dig deep through the ups and downs of the last 11 days. We gave our absolute best. It’s been hard and I’m looking forward to some downtime. Thank you to everyone for the support.”

Paralympian #222 Murray has now won the C5 Omnium gold two years in a row, and it rates just as high as it did last year for the Ōtorohanga native.

“Stepping up to the top step on the podium is special every single time. This campaign I’ve worked for, race by race, and to finish on the top is just awesome. To hear the New Zealand anthem and see all the Kiwis in the crowd cheering me on and just feel that support.”

Her omnium medal completed the set. The 30-year-old was pipped at the post for a Scratch Race medal on the final day, finishing 4th, but the result was still enough for her to top the omnium points table.

Coach Damian Wiseman was incredibly proud of all his athletes who competed in Glasgow.

“Twelve medals across the team is a truly remarkable achievement. We’re over the moon. Our athletes here have shown incredible tenacity, grit and skill to get to where we are today, and we are so proud of them.

“We’ve never had back-to-back track and road Para Cycling World Championships before, with no rest days in between. Glasgow 2023 has been the test for the ‘Super Worlds’ model. That’s shown us some new challenges of 11 days of continuous racing, and we’ll take away learnings from it.”

In the road events – the individual time trial and individual road race – Murray finished sixth and fifth respectively to go with her gold, silver and bronze efforts on the track and a couple of fourth-place finishes in the C5 class.

Her gold medal came in the omnium, silver was in the 3-kilometre individual pursuit and her bronze came in the 500m time trial, which was also New Zealand’s first medal of the championships.

“The bronze in the 500m time trial was nice because it wasn’t one I was targeting.”

Murray admitted to being a bit disappointed with her efforts on the road and especially in the time trial as she won a gold medal at the Road World Cup in May.

“I’m a bit gutted – you win some, you lose some,” Murray said.

Wiseman said it was likely fatigue played a part in her ride with the new format of the championships.

“The team worked hard to bring full power to the [final day of] racing, but there were some signs of tiredness after a full schedule of track cycling. Of Nicole’s competitors, Dame Sarah Storey [the gold medal winner] didn’t race the track, neither did Brachtendorf, and Gaugain also only rode the pursuit on the track.”