Michael O’Loughlin is maturing as a rider every time he goes out. He’s the most feared junior in the country this year and is doing very much the same as what Eddie Dunbar was doing last year; winning the biggest races on his own (Photo: John Coleman)
By Brian Canty
The winner of Sunday’s A3-Junior race at the Des Hanlon Memorial in Carlow, Michael O’Loughlin, explained how he targeted the hardest part of the course as the place he’d make his race-winning attack.
The Magnet.ie-NRPT man was runner-up to Eddie Dunbar last year and said he was determined to go one better this time around.
But with a huge bunch tracking his every move he knew it wouldn’t be easy.
“I attacked there last year with Stephen Shanahan and Dylan O'Brien and did a bit of damage so I looked at it as a hard part and a good point to go,” he said.
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“Going out the road it was all together,” explained the first year Waterford Institute of Technology student of the earlier exchanges.
“It was a big bunch, kind of dodgy because it was very fast with stalls and then a big acceleration again.
“We turned left up Castlecomer, I attacked and Adam Stenson went over the top of me and got away with Dermot White (Lucan CRC) and Mark O’Callaghan (Limerick CC).
O'Loughlin piles on the pressure up the road with Jake Gray just behind on Sunday in Carlow (Photo: Sean Rowe)
“Then it was cat and mouse for a while on the draggy roads and about 2 or 3 kilometres before the descent up to the last climb I got away with my teammate Jake Gray, Matteo Cigala (Navan RC) and Cathal Clarke (Newry Wheelers) but when we got to the hill it was just me and Jake left.
“It took us until Castlecomer on the next lap to catch the three boys up ahead and once we got there Stenson attacked and I went across to him so it was just me and him and we worked up and over.”
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The pair had it all to do even at that point as there was still 40 kilometres to race but they got down to work straight away.
“We’d about 30 seconds first and then we had around a minute on two behind us and then four minutes to the bunch at one stage. But we kept going up and over; it was hard.
“Coming to the last climb I jumped away at the top and had the tailwind into the finish then so I just held the power to the line.”
O'Loughlin comes home solo on Sunday for his fourth victory of the season to date (Photo: Sean Rowe)
O’Loughlin will head to the Gorey Three Day in a couple of weeks as the most marked man in the race.
But he knows that’s just the way life is when you’re winning so prolifically.
“I’m watched a bit more than I was last year but that’s expected,” he said.
“A hard course like that today suits me. I like it, there’s no easy sections; especially with the wind. It felt like a headwind all day.
“It was a perfect day for the team and we’ll go to Gorey in two weeks full of confidence.
“We’ve a strong team and there’s a time-trial. I haven’t been on my time trial bile too much now yet but I’ve worked on my position a little more so hopefully that’ll help me.”
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