Russell Nant

Russell Nant was born in Palmerston North in 1952. He was a brilliant schoolboy cyclist and had a demanding series of races as a junior against Anthony Cuff, who was his age and equally talented.

Nant’s first major international outing was the 1974 Christchurch Commonwealth Games, where he, Blair Stockwell, Paul Brydon and René Heyde rose to the occasion and came away with a bronze medal in the team pursuit.

In their first ride, they qualified second fastest with 4min 50.40s. Despite having gone more than 3 seconds faster than Australia in their heat, the New Zealanders lost their semi-final to Australia and were timed at a disappointing 4min 58.05s. New Zealand made a false start, which was not recalled as they’d expected it to be, and Australia rode smoothly into the final.

However, in the ride-off for the bronze it all came together well and the New Zealanders swept to victory in 4min 45.90s, beating Scotland by 12 seconds.

Nant also rode in the 4000m individual pursuit in Christchurch. He won his first qualifying race in 5min 25.24, beating Northern Irishman Bill Hudson by 15 seconds. However, Nant’s time needed to be four seconds quicker for him to advance to the quarter-finals.

Nant later did a lot of road racing and had some especially good results in 1978, winning two stages of the Tour of Victoria. He earned the sprint ace title in the following year’s Tour of Southland.

Nant settled in Tauranga and opened his own plumbing business. He continued to ride competitively, taking part is veterans races all around the country.