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Shayne Bannan - Cycling
There are tough customers and there are tough characters. Many would say that former AIS Head Coach and Men's National Coach Charlie Walsh fell into the former category. His replacement, Shayne Bannan could be described as falling into the latter. Bannan's love for cycling began as a teenager living in Darwin. His family moved to Victoria to give the promising cyclist more competition and he progressed through Australia's junior ranks, later joining the Fanini Primaueri Cycling Club in Italy where he competed on the European circuit. Bannan was selected in the squad for the 1984 Olympics in Los Angeles, but while competing in Europe that year, learned he had been omitted from the Olympic squad and was told only a world-class effort would secure a berth. He raced in the 150km Matteotti Trophy Race in Italy and beat 160 riders to win the event, but the Olympic selectors were unmoved. A year later, glandular fever saw his career as an athlete end, but Bannan turned his energies to coaching and in 1989 became coach of the AIS Adelaide Women's Cycling Program. Within two years he was assistant men's track coach under Charlie Walsh and at the Sydney Olympics held the title of men's road coach. Bannan, currently in Italy preparing for the arrival of the AIS/national under-23 and women's teams, admits there is pressure to live up to the legacy left by Walsh. 'Charlie has been the national coach since 1980 and in that time changed the face of Australian cycling from a hobby sport to a professional structure. It will certainly be a challenge to maintain and improve what he has put in place.' In spite of the coaching shake-up, Bannan says it has pretty much been 'business as usual' for Australia's top cyclists after the Olympics. 'Most of them have rejoined their professional teams and are predominantly based in Europe. We have many challenges ahead in the coordination between the national program and the professional teams if we are to be successful in 2004.' He says Australia has a huge advantage with support from the AIS's Sport Science and Sports Medicine services. Support he says is the envy of many professional teams. 'There's no doubt that the long-term efficiency of the use of Sports Science/Sports Medicine and closer coordination with professional teams is going to be the key to our future success.'
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