Roche kicks-off with fifth-place finish in team time-trial

Nicolas Roche got Ireland’s UCI World Championships campaign underway in Ponferrada, Spain yesterday with a fifth-place finish in the Elite men’s team time-trial.

Roche’s six-man Tinkoff-Saxo team were 46 seconds off the winning time set by BMC with Orica-GreenEdge second at 31 seconds and Omega Pharma Quick Step third a further 35 seconds behind.

Roche, who is in great form, did much of the pace-setting and he’ll now turn his attention to Wednesday’s individual time-trial as well as next Sunday’s road race where he’ll make up a third of the Irish team alongside Dan Martin and Philip Deignan.