Brammeier notches remarkable double

MATT BRAMMEIER (HTC Highroad) completed a remarkable weekend when he reclaimed the elite road race championship title yesterday while also taking the national time-trial crown on Friday night at Emyvale, Monaghan.

The Liverpool-born Irishman, whose grandmother hails from Connemara, out-sprinted Dan Martin (Team Garmin Transitions) to the line after seven laps of a testing 25-kilometre circuit.

David McCann (Giant Kenda Asia) rounded out the podium with a fine third place while Nicolas Roche, Ireland’s sole participant in this year’s Tour de France, was next in fourth.

Roche spoke to the Irish Examiner last week about having ‘extreme motivation’ to win the race he last won in 2009 but yesterday he had no answer when his first cousin Martin accelerated on a short climb on the final lap and only Brammeier had the strength to go with him.

McCann led the chase with Sam Bennett (An Post Sean Kelly) and Roche in pursuit but the front duo clipped away and opened up a gap of 25 seconds with less than five kilometres to race.

Martin had been fancied to take the sprint having shown good form to win the Giro della Toscana in Italy last week but his gears slipped coming in towards the line and he had to settle for second, though it took a photo finish to decide the winner.

The race was aggressive from the start with several groups trying to get clear but the aforementioned quintet instigated the days main break after less than 20 kilometres.

They were later joined by An Post Sean Kelly riders Philip Lavery and Mark Cassidy while Martyn Irvine (Giant Kenda Asia), Connor McConvey (XMTB), Philip Deignan (Team Radioshack) and Stephen O’Sullivan completed the days nine-man break that at one stage held a lead of over two minutes on the peloton.

Martin set a blistering tempo at the front which fragmented the group on the final lap to make way for the late drama.

Brammeier also won the time-trial title on Friday evening, covering the 40 kilometre distance in a time of 50 minutes 15 seconds. He beat multiple champion David McCann (Giant Kenda) by six seconds. Greg Swinand (Usher IRC) won the veteran’s title while Siobhan Horgan (The Edge CC) was victorious in the women’s race. Caroline Ryan (Garda CC) won the women’s time-trial.