One of Australia’s most successful and popular cycling coaches, Dave Sanders, is ending his 26 year VIS career to move to the Orica-Scott team.
The list of cyclists Sanders has worked with over the last quarter of a century reads like a roll call of Australian cycling royalty- Cadel Evans, Baden Cooke, Simon Gerrans, Simon Clarke, Brett Lancaster and Anna Wilson to name just a few.
Sanders has had an extraordinary career in the sport riding in Australia in the early 70s before heading overseas to the rough and tumble circuits in Great Britain and Europe.
He famously rode with the colourful Gary Wiggins, father of GB’s five time Olympic champion Sir Bradley Wiggins.
It was a tough life back then, young Aussie cyclists were “on their own” once they arrived at Heathrow.
At one stage after being admitted to hospital following a track accident it was discovered that Sanders was also suffering from malnutrition.
He says of that period it was all about proving you were a “hard man”, whereas these days it’s about being a “smart man”.
So instead of training to the point of exhaustion with, for example, two blocks of six hours riding in a day it’s now about training for a specific event.
Sanders’ anecdotes about his life in cycling could fill up a major portion of this website so instead we’ll leave you with just one little gold nugget about the life and times of Dave Sanders.
He recalls a mountain biker contacting him before the Sydney Olympics and asking if he could train with the VIS team.
Sanders welcomed the 22 year old into their High Country training camp based at Bright and was shocked to see just how good this guy was on the road.
So the coach introduced more road work into the youngster’s training regime and after Sydney he joined the European Tour. A decade later the young guy, Cadel Evans, won the Tour De France.
That’s just one of many Australian cycling triumphs that Sanders contributed to in a love affair with the sport that is now approaching its fifth decade.
Thank you Davo for all you have done for the VIS during your years of service and for your ongoing commitment to our success.
(The pic shows Dave with his son Ben Sanders- both winners of the famous Austral Wheel Race).
