Cyclists eye world titles

THE Irish U-23 and junior teams for the world cycling championships in Belgium will be the best prepared ever according to Ciaran McKenna who heads the High Performance Committee responsible for team preparation those days.

Listowel man Eugene Moriarty, who was handed the responsibility of looking after the various squads at the new Team Ireland base in Belgium, has already been leading by example with one win, a second placing and a fifth placing.

“Already the scheme is being heralded as an overwhelming success,” Ciaran McKenna said. “Hopefully we will reap the benefits at the world championships in October.”

This year the High Performance Committee drew up a set of proposals which were presented to the Irish Sports Council, met with approval and won funding to the tune of 20,000.

“We set up the house in Belgium and, so far, some 30 riders have gone through. Eugene (Moriarty) has been excellent in looking after them, advising them on training and providing them with suitable racing in the area where he has them racing three days a week,” he said. “Obviously we will be focusing on Mark Scanlon in the lead up to the world championships but, for the first time ever, we will have teams that have been well prepared.”

That preparation continues over the coming weeks. The junior squad comes to Limerick this week for testing at the NCTC and they will be followed by the under-23 hopefuls.

Mark Scanlon’s new team is gearing his season towards the world championships and Dermot Nally is in the same situation. They will be joined on the under-23 team by Corkman Denis Lynch (Kanturk Credit Union) who has been based in France all season and there are at least six riders battling it out for the remaining two places.

There are two definites for the junior team, Stephen Roche’s son, Nicholas, who won the Junior Tour, and another Kanturk man, Paudie O’Brien.

“Right now Mark is totally focused on the world championships,” Ciaran McKenna said. “He was terribly unlucky in the European championships. He would have finished in the top three in the time trial were it not for the fact that his handlebars broke and he possibly went a lap too early in the road race.

“He will learn from all those experiences but the fact of the matter is that, while in the past we went out there hoping, maybe with a bit of luck, that we would win a medal we are now going out expecting to win a medal.”

Eugene Moriarty will have the riders training on the circuit in the lead up to the world championships.

“Zolder, where the championships are being held, is only 20k away. In fact we will be going down there this week,” said Moriarty, who is a Physics graduate from Trinity College.

“From that point of view we are perfectly based.”

After a couple of weeks putting all the plans in place he got down to training and racing himself and showed that he is quite prepared to lead by example. He won a 110k race at Kotem on the Belgian/Dutch border where a star-studded field included a number of Tour de France riders who were riding in Holland as well as a lot of Belgians.

Then he finished second in Zichen Reimst, near Liege before finishing fifth in a big race in Belgium the day after the Belgian championships when he got into a 20-man break and was there for the sprint when it was eventually whittled down to less than 10 riders including three from each of two teams who were determined not to let him win.

“We are making a name for ourselves over here. We are going from strength to strength,” he said. “All the riders are extremely happy with the set-up but then it is something we always wanted.

“Since I began racing as a 10-year-old I had been hearing talk about something like this. It was a fantastic idea but the resources were not there. This year it became a reality and it is like a dream fulfilled. And it has provided me with a new lease of life.

“There are always people coming and going so it is always interesting. It provides riders with an opportunity to race on the Continent and gain experience they would never otherwise get unless they got into a team over there.”

After some spectacular performances in Malaysia fans will be hoping for more of the same when the Tour of Hokkaido gets under way on September 11. The teak tough Tralee man, Paul Griffin, will be back in action along with Stephen O’Sullivan, Paddy Moriarty, John O’Shea from Waterford and David O’Loughlin.

Six of the under-23 hopefuls will be in action in the upcoming GP Tell in Switzerland where Denis Lynch will be joined by Gary McQuaid, Conor Murphy, Brian Aherne, Stephen Gallagher and Timothy Cassidy.