Newry Wheelers man Gareth O’Neill sits 2nd overall at the Tour of the North with just one stage remaining. The 22-year-old credits hard but sensible training for his great form so far this year.
O’Neill has always been a quality rider
and started this season as an A1 thanks to his results from last season. Since the start of the year he has been
ever-present in the results. As well as winning the Carn Classic he has
finished on the podium five times and is fifth in the Cycling Ireland A1
rankings.
But this weekend as the racing has gotten harder, and the opposition is better, he has come into his own even more. On the opening stage O’Neill was part of the 28-rider group that gained over a minute on the next group home, and much more on many others in the field.
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On Sunday morning
in the stage 2 TT he was 13th, some 33 seconds off stage winner Zeb Kyffin; the
Ribble Pro Cycling man going into yellow.
And while it fell
to Ribble to control the racing on today’s stage, the racing got away from them
on the fifth lap of the Roguery circuit; with a 15 per cent climb each
lap.
It was there that O’Neill really showed he was one of the strongest in a race with a very classy field from Ireland and the Britain.
He told stickybottle the day “couldn’t have gone any better”, though with one stage remaining he was not counting his chickens. “I went full gas in the early morning TT to set me up for the general classification,” he said.
And in the
afternoon road race he was active throughout, though had to wait a long time
for the winning move to go.
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Indeed, rather
than waiting for others to force the pace, it was O’Neill himself who took the
race into his own hands despite seasoned internationals and many top British
riders making up what it is a quality field this weekend.
“About 1km to the climb on the last lap a small
group got a slight gap; Angus
Fyffe and David Montgomery were in it,” he explained. “I rode across to it on my own the then attacked them straight away,” added of an instrumental
attack at the hardest moment in the stage.
“Though I went up the climb on my own, I was followed by two riders and at the top went we kept going,” he added. “We were then joined by one more rider and that was the break formed,” he said of himself, Mazzone, Jobber and new race leader Draper.
“The gap went out very quickly, up to 1:45,” he said of the maximum time check he and his fellow escapees were given. "With about 6km to go the winner got a gap and maintained it."
“The three
of us kept riding hard as the yellow
was in sight. And of course I have to mention the team (Newry Wheelers) who
rode so hard,” he added, explaining he was happy with his ride.
O’Neill was also quick to mention his coach Bryan McKinney, saying he had been the key to his development over the winter. “I’m really grateful for all the work Bryan has done with me and we eyed this race and the Tour of Ulster at the start of the year as my main targets."
Asked why he has been going so well, he was playing his cards close to his chest in terms of the training he has been doing.
“It’s all down to hard work from myself and my coach throughout the winter," he said. "It had a good season last year but we worked even harder to improve and it’s paying off at the minute.”
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