National road race champion Matt Brammeier will likely get to show off his shamrock jersey at the An Post Rás next month before defending his title in Mullingar in June.
By Gerard Cromwell
National road race champion Matt Brammeier started the season with a bang for his new Synergy Baku squad, an aggressive ride earning him the king of the mountains title at the 2.HC ranked Tour of Langkawai.
Since then however, Brammeier has had little or no racing and his form took a dip when he suffered some adverse affects to a vaccination prior to riding the Mzansi Tour in Africa the week before last.
“I’m not feeling on top of the world to be honest,” he said ahead of starting the week-long Tour de Bretagne in France today, Friday.
Advertisement
“I had a pretty bad reaction to a vaccination I was told I needed, that eventually I didn't, and just didn't have the best lead up to the race.”
Despite this, Brammeier was aggressive on the opening road stage, finding himself in a six strong breakaway group before another ill-timed bout of cramp put paid to his hopes of stage victory with 5km to go.
He then finished eighth on stage four and third in the final stage criterium.
The cramping however is something he says he will have to get sorted as the same thing happened to him on the opening stage of Langkawi, causing him to lose out on a possible stage win and have to settle for second place.
Related News
“One thing I would like is to find the solution to these cramps. So far I've lost two results and potential wins. Hopefully it won’t happen any more.
“To be honest the Mzansi Tour was never a big focus for me. I had a big chunk of time away from racing after Langkawi as we lost a couple of races at the last minute.
"We were racing at over 2,000m altitude so it was always going to be difficult and after my lead up to the race went so bad, I took some pressure off myself.
"Of course I wanted to do something though, so I tried on the first day but I got cramp again like in Langkawi and it ended my chances that day.”
Having ridden for former WorldTour teams HTC and Omega Pharma Quickstep, Brammeier is settling in nicely at Synergy Baku, alongside Irish riders Connor McConvey, Philip Lavery and Irish team bosses David McCann and David McCann.
“The team is good. It’s a fair bit different to what I've been used to in the past and it's taking a little bit of getting used too.
"It's great having the Irish lads about. Connor McConvey is a good friend and I trained with him a lot during the winter. We got to learn a lot about each other and how we ride, so that always helps.”
A ride at the An Post Ras is more than likely next month but a return to form is the next key focus for Brammeier, who still has one eye on taking a fifth national title in Mullingar in June.
“Of course I’ll come back for the national championships again. Like every year, I'll come and give it my best shot.
"Nothing really stands out that will be my main goal or focus this season, I just want to try to be competitive at every race and keep riding positively and aggressively.”
Brammeier finished 18th at the Rund Um Koln in Germany on Monday, won by NetApp Endura pro Sam Bennett. He is the only Irish rider in the team's line-up for the Tour de Bretagne.
Topics
