Three-sport international Kate McIlroy has slammed Cycling New Zealand as "incompetent" over its lack of communication on world championship selection.
After a career that has seen her contest athletics, triathlon and cycling at Commonwealth Games, the former world mountain-running champion has lashed out on social media at the national body's failure to fill seven spots at this month's road cycling event in Austria.
"I've been involved with three sports at high performance level," she posted on Instagram. "It's not until you experience an incompetent sporting organisation that you realise how good the other two sports you've been involved in were."
McIlroy, 37, cycled for New Zealand at the Gold Coast Commonwealth Games in April, finishing 19th in the road race. She has stepped back from competing as a full-time athlete, but rode for Australian-based Team Specialized and finished eighth at the Santos Women's Tour and Cadel Evans Great Ocean Road Race this year.
Her outburst comes days after a similar complain from Commonwealth Games teammate Sharlotte Lucas, who initially missed world championships selection, appealed, was added to the squad before her appeal was heard, but then withdrew when she discovered the event would cost her thousands of dollars.
Lucas finished fourth at the Gold Coast and is the reigning Oceania champion.
Neither McIlroy nor Lucas fulfilled Cycling New Zealand's selection criteria, requiring riders to spend three months with a professional team in Europe or undertake a similar approved programme.
But both are disgruntled that their efforts to communicate with the national body have apparently gone unanswered.
"The responsibility to communicate plans lay with the raiders," assistant high performance director Jacques Landry told Stuff.
"No information or correspondence was received from either Kate or Sharlotte about any such plans to race at a high level for a UCI professional team in Europe this year."
Georgia Williams, Mikayla Harvey and Grace Anderson will contest the women's world championship road race, with the latter two paying their own way.
"Their communication is terrible, putting it mildly," McIlroy told Stuff. "The worlds are in Europe, so to prepare properly, you need to be over there.
"I've been in high performance sport for quite a while and I didn't just put my name forward to go to world champs. I did that because the course suits me as a rider and I think I would've gone well, if I was selected, but it's super hilly and suits my style of riding."
This attack on the road programme comes a couple of months after track cycling bore the brunt of complaints over bullying and inappropriate relationships, which saw the resignation of former Halbergs Coach of the Year Anthony Peden.
Newshub.
