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Last Updated: Jan 31st, 2008 - 16:25:03 |
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| Siobhan Dervan wins |
Defending champion Siobhan Dervan put in an excellent performance yesterday in Carrick on Suir, taking her third successive road race title. The Lotto – Belisol rider was clearly strongest of the women in the 80 kilometre event, joining up to lone breakway rider Jenny Fay halfway around the second of three laps, then pressing on ahead with approximately fourteen kilometres to go.
Dervan rode Fay off her wheel on the long climb of Carney’s Road and then time-trialed from there to the finish. She crossed the line 3 minutes and 30 seconds ahead of the Rapha Condor rider Fay.
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| Fay is happy with second |
Approximately four minutes later last year’s runner-up Louise Moriarty (UCD Global Racing Winning Solutions) outsprinted Julie O’Hagan (Rapha Condor) and Heather Wilson (Maryland Wheelers) to secure bronze. Roisin Kennedy (Stagg’s Lucan) and Jane Kilmartin (Rapha Condor) were sixth and seventh.
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| Moriarty sprints in for bronze |
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| Roisin Kennedy takes sixth |
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| Seventh for Jane Kilmartin |
Dervan agreed that this was the most dominant of the three. “I guess so…last year I barely won it [in a sprint] and the year before I think the gap was just over a minute, a minute five or ten or something like that.” [editor’s note – in 2005 she was 1 minute and 2 seconds ahead of Trudy Brown (Northern Dave Kane). Bronze medallist Moriarty was six seconds further back.]
“I knew that if I could pick the course beforehand, this would have been perhaps my ideal circuit. The only thing I would have changed is to put in an uphill finish as well. But I was happy with the circuit anyway, I knew I would have a good chance here.”
Dervan, Rapha Condor team-mates Fay, O’Hagan and Jane Kilamartin, Moriarty and Wilson went clear of the rest of the field approximately halfway around the first of three laps. Roisin Kennedy (Stagg’s Lucan) and Francine Meehan (Laois) were chasing hard together until the latter crashed on a corner; Kennedy managed to close the remainder of the gap by herself.
Fay had escaped before the second ascent of the tough Carney’s Road climb and, not wanting her to build up too big a lead, Dervan pushed the pace on the hill. Kennedy was first to lose contact, then Kilmartin also had to let go.
Dervan continued to push hard and her strength was apparent when she rode the others off her wheel just before the top, then quickly closed up on Fay.
Moriarty set off on pursuit on the descent after the climb but she was closed down by O’Hagan and Wilson . There was a clear lack of co-operation in this second group, with O’Hagan softpedalling through [due to her team-mate up the road] and Moriarty shouting at Wilson to ride with her.
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| Julie O'Hagan and Heather Wilson |
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| Heather Wilson and Louise Moriarty |
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| The three riders in the chase group behind Dervan and Fay |
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| Louise Moriarty |
The gap was 1 minute and 5 seconds at start of last lap and continued to grow. Dervan and Fay were working well together but this co-operation ended when the defending champion ramped up the speed on the climb, hitting the top 45 seconds clear and then riding strongly from there until the finish.
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| Siobhan Dervan was in her best-ever nationals condition |
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| Jenny Fay has improved a lot this season |
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| Dervan goes clear of Fay on the climb |
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“Jenny attacked very early on in the second lap and nobody would do any riding,” she explained. “I felt I was doing most of the work behind, to be honest, and Louise did a bit too. I was shouting at everybody to try and ride. Obviously her team-mates wouldn't, which is fair enough. When I got to the bottom of the climb I rode on the front the whole way up to the top. I said to myself, ‘ well, why am I dragging these around?’, so that is why I attacked and went across to her by myself.
“I was confident enough that I was going well. The first time of the climb I felt very strong…I gathered I was probably the strongest at that point. The next time round, Jenny had been out on her own for half a lap by that stage. I could see her ahead and knew from her position on the bike that she was suffering on the climb. I felt comfortable so I jumped across to her no problem. In fairness we rode fairly well together; she rode hard on the downhills and the flats, and I rode on the uphills.”
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| Dervan savours the moment |
Dervan said that she hadn’t originally intended to drop her the last time up the hill. “We had said that we would ride together until the turn off the main road and then we would see what happened. But as it turned out, I think her team instructions were not to ride with me because they knew I would be stronger than her on the hill. I didn't actually attack, I just upped the tempo a small bit. But I am absolutely thrilled that she was able to hold off the main bunch and get second.”
Fay said she was very pleased with silver, her second such medal in two days. “I am overwhelmed, I am absolutely delighted with today’s result. I think after racing last week in France for five days, my body was adjusted so that after the time trial last night I had the legs to come out again and have form today.
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| Jenny Fay |
“Today and yesterday were probably my big goals of the year, apart from getting to the worlds. I had to prove myself after the year I have had and I am happy to have realised that.
“We were working has a team today, myself, Julie and Jane. We decided that one of us would go early and make everybody else work. I probably went a bit early, but I was prepared to bury myself if I had every else working in the group behind me to get across. The plan worked anyway. I just kept riding and stayed away, and when Siobhan got across to me, we worked together. Then in the end, she was just stronger than me on the climb.”
She also said that they had been planning to stay together until closer to the finish. “But because I had gone early and spent a long time away on my own, I was beginning to wither a bit. She just rode away from me on the hill. I probably did the majority of the stronger work on the flats because I'm not exactly a mountain goat. She was doing the hills. We worked pretty well together and then I was getting gaps towards the end. When Siobhan had gone it was just up to me then to time trial and to stay away.”
Moriarty was second last year but had to settle for bronze this time. However she won Friday’s time trial ahead of Fay and Wilson; two medals made the weekend a success.
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| Louise Moriarty |
“It was really nice to get the win in the time trial. I was very surprised to have been in front of Siobhan in the time trial, given what happened in the road race.
“Today, I think the strongest two people came out in front of me,” she said graciously. “Siobhan was climbing the strongest of everyone, and Rapha Condor had it sewn up with three in the initial break. I guess they worked us over a bit, it was hard to get a rhythm going behind. But Jenny was very strong as well, they fully deserved it.”
Like many of the riders in the women’s and veteran’s championships, Moriarty wasn’t sure of the logic of having the time trial on Friday evening and the road race less than 24 hours later. “I didn't sleep very well, so that wouldn’t have helped. But I think they are bit too close together, to have the time trial so late. Even if they have the time trial in the afternoon it might give people a better chance.
“But I guess all the women were in the same boat, it is whoever recovers the best,” she added.
Moriarty next does a track race in Italy on July 4th and then goes to the European track championships on July 11th and 12th. As she and the other women have shown, the standard now is considerably higher than it was two or three years ago.
Irish road race championships, Carrick on Suir:
Women (3 laps)
1, Siobhan Dervan (Lotto – Belisol) 80 kilometres in 2 hours 28 mins
2, Jenny Fay (Rapha Condor) at 3 mins 34 secs
3, Louise Moriarty (UCD Global Racing Winning Solutions) at 7 mins 26 secs
4, Julie O’Hagan (Rapha Condor)
5, Heather Wilson (Maryland Wheelers)
6, Roisin Kennedy (Stagg’s Lucan) at 9 mins 20 secs
7, Jane Kilmartin (Rapha Condor) at 9 mins 24 secs
8, Adrienne McCarthy (Limerick) at ?
9, Sarah Piner (Mullingar Wheelers)
10, Heather Boyle (Ravens)
11, Fiona Meade (St. Finbarr’s)
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