Watching closely is the eight-year-old's proud father and fellow cycling enthusiast Andy.

After a successful first season of road racing, where the Port Fairy Cycling Club member scored a number of top finishes, Asha scored an invitation to the Cadel Evans Great Ocean Road Race in February.

The Our Lady Help of Christians Primary School student will join Australia's most decorated cyclist to lead out the elite men's race.

Andy shed a proud tear when reading the email confirming his daughter would ride alongside the 2011 Tour De France winner, something he did in the early 2000s when Evans was finding his feet on the road.

The tears were also because Asha is fighting a chronic lung condition.

"She has had a rough last couple of years with close to 10 hospital admissions and cycling has been good for the therapy for her lungs," Andy said.

"She gets freedom from riding a bike and the enjoyment from riding is just a great release from all those nasty things that have happened so we are over the moon for the opportunity she has got."

READ MORE:

Andy said the invitation to ride with Cadel is just another one of Asha's adventures.

"She deals with it (the condition) so well and adults could learn from her," the PFCC president said.

"I've never heard her complain about it or cry while she is a human pin cushion for tests. She takes it in her stride and turns into an adventure.

"That is indicative of the way she goes about life and her cycling is just another adventure."

Asha's curiosity went to another level after Andy told her the news.

"It took her a while to digest what was going on and we could see her thinking about it and then she started asking questions," he said.

"We then went on YouTube and showed her videos of Cadel and talked about his history and from there the excitement built.

"It was quite funny because we were talking about how Cadel was only Australian to win the Tour and she turned around and asked 'will this be on TV in France?'."

Have you signed up to The Standard's daily newsletter and breaking news emails? You can register below and make sure you are up to date with everything that's happening in the south-west.