The winning escape at the Clonmel 2012 National Champs: Brammeier, Roche, Lavery and Irvine
Cycling Ireland has selected Louth-based Cuchulainn CC to host the elite National Championships next year, with the road and time trial (TT) title races to be held in either Blackrock or Carlingford, both in Co Louth.
Officials recently visited the proposed courses to review them for elite championship potential and the club has this morning, Monday, confirmed it will host the races next year.
Cuchulainn club secretary, Karl Dolan told stickybottle that both proposed courses have been approved by Cycling Ireland and when planning for the events progresses a little further, the club would settle on one venue.
“If it’s the Blackrock circuit, that’s the one where we had the junior and A3 road race championships this year. It’s about four or five kilometres south of Dundalk; a 16km lap with only around 40 metres or so of a climb.”
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“The Carlingford course is around 20kms from Dundalk. It’s a 14km loop and while it’s a bit more testing than the Blackrock course with a few more kicks, there’s only around 60 metres of climbing in it.”
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“Whatever course we pick, it will be big ring racing the whole way around and as Championships go this will be flat and fast.”
While Dolan is centrally involved in running the host club, it will be his colleague Pat O’Shaughnessy who takes on the role of race director for the events.
The TT course will be exactly 40km long and will be held on the same course as the vets and junior title races in Blackrock this year, or on the mainly flat Carlingford road.
Dolan said the elite men’s road race will be just over 160km while the elite women’s race will be around 90km.
The championships will be held as usual in late June and the club is planning to put on some social events and activities to create a festival weekend and bring spectators and families out for the occasion.
The awarding of the elite men’s and women’s title races to Cuchulainn follows its hosting of the junior and A3 road race championships this year, as well as the vets and junior TT championships.
The club also hosted the Leinster Hill Climb Championships this year and is set to host the National Cyclocross Championships in January.
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