Winners crush crits

Friday night's Warragul Cycling Club Criterium Championships turned into a demolition job for racers Ben Patrick and Dan Barry, who took out the competition in dominant fashion.
With the 6:30pm mass start rolling exactly on time, a few late comers were left scrambling - some burning matches to get back on, others opting for a lap out, and a couple quietly calling it a night.
The wide spread of abilities meant the race was always going to fracture, but few expected it to explode within five laps.
Patrick and Barry simply rode off the front, their tempo immediately stretching the field.
Zac McEwin, Tom Edwards and Joel Watson briefly bridged, but the elastic snapped quickly.
McEwin and Edwards settled into a two-man chase, while Watson detonated spectacularly and drifted back to the familiar company of the "usual suspects" Dan Willis, George Tambassis, Brett Kennedy and Glenn Marriott.
This quartet became the de facto Masters 40+ leaders, content to let the Elite race disappear up the road.
Behind them, the chasing peloton - nominally led by Damien Smith - struggled for cohesion, with little help from Aaron Nash and even less from Jason Dastey, who had tactically fallen back to supervise the Juniors.
For the first half of the race, the Masters group worked smoothly and even dared to believe they might claw back McEwin and Edwards. Reality arrived harshly.
The younger pair were gaining time every lap, while the Masters' ambition slowly gave way to survival mode. By the closing laps, the chase had flipped entirely: it was no longer about catching anyone, but avoiding being lapped.
In the end, even that proved optimistic.
Patrick and Barry swept past first, followed soon after by Edwards and McEwin, completing a dominant display that left the field scattered across the circuit.
Brett Kennedy claimed the Masters title from Dan Willis while George Tambassis was awarded fastest over 50 and Alby Harrison made it back to back titles in the Juniors.