Irish duo fighting fit for Rás tilt

TWO of Ireland’s leading hopes for the FBD Insurance Rás, Brian Kenneally and Paul Griffin, have been out of sorts recently but expect to go to the line in Kilcullen for Sunday’s opening stage to Wexford town with all guns blazing.

When they crossed paths in the Kerry Group Rás Mumhan at Easter, there were just a couple of seconds between the pair, who shared an apartment when they rode together in France 12 years earlier.

Both had ambitions for the Easter Weekend showpiece when Kenneally claimed the marginal advantage on the Conor Pass stage, which will feature in the FBD Insurance Rás next week as well.

Griffin had the Tour of Ulster as his target but was recovering from illness and was a shadow of the powerhouse he was when riding Rás Mumhan in his native county a few weeks earlier.

Kenneally, on he other hand, was brilliant in victory in his final preparatory race in Dungarvan. Since last weekend, however, he has been off the bike nursing a severe head cold and sore throat.

“Thank God for the Giro d’Italia,” he said. “I have been lying on the couch all week watching it and hoping I will be feeling a bit better by next weekend. I feel a bit better already.

“I intended to take an easy week anyway. Maybe it’s a blessing in disguise.”

Since Rás Mumhan he has had people sitting up and taking notice, as has Paul Griffin. But there was something about Kenneally who had that air of confidence about him supported by a powerful display by the members of the Engravit.ie/BDBC team who will be supporting him again next week.

The Piltown man has cut himself off from any race predictions or, indeed, any talk about next week’s assignment.

“People ask me about the other riders and about the route but I have not looked at the entry or the route so far,” he said. “As regards the other riders – I have no control over them. All I can do is control my own performance. And for the route – I know every inch of the road until I leave Kerry.

“I would know the UK riders and they would know me and I am told there are a couple of very good continental teams taking part.”

Mark Cassidy, whose father Philip won the Rás in 1983 and came back in 1999 to win it again, has been handed the final place on the An Post/Sean Kelly/M Donnelly team.

The young Cassidy was in the yellow jersey last year when he hit a rock in atrocious conditions outside Limerick and had to abandon the race with a badly injured wrist.

“It was very disappointing,” he recalled yesterday. “I was enjoying fighting for the jersey. It was good to have, if only for a day. It gives me the appetite to ride hard and achieve more of the same this year.” Cassidy joins fellow Irish riders Páidí O’Brien and David O’Loughlin, the latter riding in the green of An Post for the first time. Mayo’s Olympic track cyclist won the final stage in last year’s Rás. Last year the An Post team provided the overall winner in Stephen Gallagher who is not defending the title but they have a very good prospect for victory in Nicko Eeckhout, one of two Belgians in the team.