Sokol strongest as brave Irish challenge falls short
Dromore, Co Down man Roger Aiken of the Louth North team and Mullingar’s Damien Shaw, riding for the Cork-based Aquablue squad, both came agonisingly close to ending the race’s long wait for a county rider stage win, but had to settle for fourth and eighth, respectively.
Not since Sam Bennett in 2009 has a county rider won a stage of the race but when Aiken and Shaw infiltrated the day’s nine-man breakaway and pulled out a gap of almost four minutes on the peloton, many felt that five-year wait could be about to end.
The breakaway was well represented with nine riders from nine different teams there — meaning the onus was on the team of the yellow jersey to do the chasing, as they were not in the break.
But with Shaw and Aiken — along with Sokol, Pierrick Naud (Canada), Oliver Wood (Great Britain), David Wohrer (Austria Tirol Cycling), Andre Benoit (Germany Team Kuota), Riccardo Pichetta (Italy Team IDEA 2010 ASD) and Sunday’s stage winner Robert Jon McCarthy (An Post Chainreaction Sean Kelly) all keeping the pace higher, Bevin’s team of international track riders had their work cut out behind.
Aiken was in particularly awesome form and having won a stage in the past, the former Irish international mopped up the day’s two King of the Mountain sprints (after 63k and 72k) and the sole Hot Spot intermediate sprint at Hospital (at 127k), and still had the legs to attack in the closing kilometres in pursuit of stage honours.
The break’s lead began to tumble inside the final 25kms as the New Zealand team — helped by the Subaru Albion team from Australia — ramped up the pace, but the margin was still around 1’30” with 10kms to go.
Aiken waited and waited, and sensing his group was tiring, he struck out for home at 3kms, only to be brought back. That was the catalyst for Shaw to try his luck and though he managed to get some daylight, he too was reeled in before Aiken tried once more.
A moment of hesitation from the others looked to have given him the slightest chance but he was closed down within sight of the line, and Sokol dived into the final bend and outsprinted Pichetta and Wood for first.
“I was a wee bit disappointed,” admitted Aiken. “Maybe it was the wrong move attacking with a kilometre to go but it’s alright looking back on things and being wise now. When I saw the 5k to go sign, I was pleased to hear we had 48 seconds on the bunch because I knew it was going to stay away. Maybe I should have waited until closer to the finish to attack but I was worried about some of the more renowned sprinters in the group.”
Shaw said it was disappointing not to get on the podium but he had the satisfaction of taking the county rider prize, the second day in succession that the Aquablue team won it after teammate Sean Lacey took it a day before in Lisdoonvarna.
“The Baku guy (Sokol) rode hard and he can obviously sprint but the guys who came second and third just ahead of me, they did the least amount of work in the break, so that’s disappointing. I wanted to try and get rid of them with around 20 kilometres to go so I was attacking to try to shake them but they were clung to me. But I have to be happy, this is a very high level and we were gone pretty much all day. It has been a great week for the team so far and hopefully it can continue.”
Interestingly, Sokol’s team boasts a strong Irish interest, with former Rás winner David McCann its directeur sportif this week, David McQuaid (son of former UCI President, Pat) the squad’s general manager and last year’s Rás runner-up Connor McConvey their main hope for the overall honours this year.
In their first season last year they came to the Rás and took two stages, with yesterday’s victory was a welcome boost after McConvey lost nearly 11 minutes the day before.
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