Sean Lacey drives the pace during the North Down GP last weekend, the 12th and final race of the National Road Series. After finishing runner-up to Bryan McCrystal in 2015, the Aquablue man went one better this time around. (Photo: David McVeigh - The Belgian Project)
By Brian Canty
Sean Lacey was crowned winner of the National Road Series at the weekend after another top performance against the country’s top domestic riders.
The Aquablue man was second to Mark Dowling (ASEA-Wheelworx) in the North Down GP and though he had victory all but wrapped up when he travelled the long journey north last weekend, he made sure of the title in some style.
Lacey, to his immense credit, rode 11 of the 12 rounds of the series where his worst result was eighth in the Davis Cup, though he didn’t need to count the 39 points he got for that anyway.
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Riders’ final scores are the top five results across the 12 rounds of the series – but riders must have raced in at least three provinces.
Lacey’s impressive tally of 280 was achieved by four runner-up finishes, namely Rás Luimní (57), the Stamullen GP (57), the North Down GP (57), the Donamon GP (57) as well as third in the Killorglin GP (52).
Lacey has won a huge number of big races down the years and now he adds the season-long series to his palmares (Photo: David McVeigh - The Belgian Project)
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That was 18 points better than his teammate Conor Hennebry who amassed 262 points.
Those came from his win in the John Beggs Memorial (63), runner-up in the VisitNenagh Classic (57) third in the Shay Elliott Memorial (52), fifth at Rás Luimní (45) and fifth in the Des Hanlon Memorial (45).
He didn’t race last weekend as he was in Belgium, as was Daire Feeley (iTap) who took third overall.
His tally of 254 points came from wins in the Brian McNamara Memorial (63) and Donamon GP (63), fourth in the Stamullen GP (48), eighth in the Des Hanlon Memorial (39) and seventh at Rás Luimní.
Funnily enough, father-of-two Lacey said he hadn’t even been really targeting the Series outright.
“I think it’s hard to target it given its structure,” he said.
“I said the races that are part of it are good races so it was a case of doing them regardless and then I’d assess them after the Rás to see where I was.
“It was great after the Rás then to give me a focus for the end of the season.
“I was in the lead after the third round but the structure of it, the best 5 results, you can’t say you’re really in the lead because someone could win the last five rounds and take it all.”
We’ll have a longer interview with Lacey later in the week where he discusses the improvements he’s made as a rider, how he regards 2016 as one of his best and how he reckons he could still offer a lot to Irish national teams.
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