One of Ireland’s rapidly emerging riders over the last 12 months, Megan Armitage has taken her first win in the pro peloton in Belgium.
The former UCD Cycling Club rider, now competing for UCI
Continental team Rupelcleaning-Champion, was best at the end of Emptinne GP
Roland Warnon in Wallonie yesterday.
Armitage (25) only rode her first UCI race – the Irish
national championships – last season and already this year has made her debut
on the national team.
She rode Kreiz Breizh Elites Dames last month, placing 23rd
with an attacking ride though it was her debut at that level.
And now she has beaten Belgian international and five-time national TT champion, Ann-Sophie Duyck, in a two-up sprint for her first win.
Yesterday’s race
was 85km, over 15 laps of an undulating course, with Armitage joining several
attacks in the first half of the race, though the 70-rider peloton neutralised
those moves.
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However, just after the halfway point the Irishwoman went again, and this time broke clear on her own. Though she was about 40km from the finish, she put her head down and set about gaining a gap.
Duyck (Multum Accountants Ladies Cycling Team), who has finished top five in the TT at the Worlds, then attacked the peloton and got across to Armitage.
They shared the workload out front and the Belgian rider’s team, which had been active in closing down moves, knocked off the pressure back in the peloton.
That aided the leading duo to build what
proved to be a racing-winning advantage and going out onto the last lap the
battle up front intensified.
Armitage tried to distance her rival with
an attack, though Duyck closed her down and then tried to shake off the
Irishwoman with a counter move.
Those efforts came to nothing and the duo
approached the finish together for what was a cagey sprint; the speed dropping
right down just before the final kick for the chequered flag.
Armitage stuck
the experienced Belgian on the front and pulled the trigger first, going passed
Duyck and holding her off to take victory. Duyck’s 24-year-old Dutch team mate,
Céline Van Houtum, was best of the rest in 3rd place.
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