Clarke in the ‘most aggressive rider’ jersey at the Suir Valley Three Day last weekend
By Brian Canty
He was third overall at the Suir Valley Three-Day last year and runner-up by a mere two seconds in the 2012 edition last weekend. But Castlebar native Paddy Clarke, riding for the Belgian-based Terra Footwear team, isn’t complaining.
He is full of praise for Blarney’s Barry Twohig on an awesome performance in winning last weekend’s event.
“I’m not too sickened,” explained Clarke after the race.
“It was hard to get rid of Barry Twohig. He was very strong. I went out in the first 10km with the mentality to just try and blow the race to pieces on the last day. I was the first to attack - from the drop of the flag I was gone.”
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“I got brought back again by a few Isle of Man lads and a few of the Dan Morrissey/Speedy Spokes lads. I knew they were strong enough but I just kept at it and I went again. I blew them all off my wheel and one by one they came across.”
“Paidi O’Brien brought a big group over and we worked well. We all took our turns and immediately started making ground. I knew it would be chaos behind because I knew Ryan would go into panic mode and he’d start chasing. I was hoping then that Sean Lacey might not be too bothered hunting us down too much so we continued pushing on and then we got a time gap of a minute and were told there was chaos back there so we continued pressing on.”
Indeed by the 20km mark they had a minute and a half on an eight-man chase group that contained GC contender Martin Mizjayski.
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“I was hoping they wouldn’t get across to us initially because I didn’t really know what the situation was at the time. I wasn’t sure if there were time bonuses for the stage but because I found out there wasn’t, I’m sorry I didn’t let them come across much sooner. So they joined us but the group was too big and got very negative. But then when we hit the climb it came down to a real flush group of us and I just rode tempo the whole way up the climb of Aherlow. I reckon I did about 70% of the riding there. I never left the front, I was just riding, riding, riding.”
“I knew, at the end of the day, the hill with just 500 metres to go would decide it. I thought, hill, attack. I couldn’t get time out of Barry on the road - you’d get away from him but he’d keep coming back. Then when Anthony Walsh attacked with 10km to go the Isle of Man guys got organised and started chasing so for the final 10km we didn’t have to do much. I reckon they thought they had a stage win in them. Thank God they never knew Darren Bell (second on GC) was on the way across. I said to them, ‘Lads if ye don’t chase him (Walsh) he will win the stage’, so they went to the front and drilled it’.”
“I did a few turns with them to keep them motivated and I said the same to Barry to ride and it will stay together. That’s what we wanted.”
What happened was truly enthralling with Twohig, Clarke and Mizjayski all together at the base of the climb going man-o-man for the win. Clarke needed two seconds on Twohig, Mizjayski needed seven on both and the Blarney man just needed to cling to both to be sure of the win.
Said Clarke: “We turned up the climb and then it went ‘boom’, every man for himself. Paidi was obviously the strongest – nobody could go with him. I gapped Barry but my legs blew. To take two seconds out of a man like that you need a considerable gap but it wasn’t to be. Maybe next year. Hopefully next year we will go a step further.”
It was a superb effort from a man with just his brother Ciarán for support. And the elder sibling did ride in two crucial breaks but not once was Paddy serviced during the race. He rode at the front and asked for few favours. Little wonder he won the overall award of most combative rider in honour of the late Paul Healion.
Clarke now switches his attention to trying to get a ride with the An Post-Sean Kelly team over the winter months.
“I’ve tried to get in with the An Post team but they’ve ignored my e-mails. I’m trying now with a few English teams, Metaltek-SCOTT and the UK Youths and things like that. I’m three years full time now and I love Ireland. When you come back here it’s still the same guys handing the beatings down – Lacey, Armstrong. If I can stay in Ireland, train here and ride a few Premier Calendar races maybe that could work. Irish racing is the best racing calendar out there. There’s been a stage race every weekend since February and there’s no end to it. It’s really high quality.”
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