It looks increasingly likely that Ireland will have a three-man team in the elite men's race at the World Road Race Championships in Florence, Italy, in September. The names of Nicolas Roche (left) and Dan Martin (right) will be first on the team sheet. (Photo: Toby Watson at World Championships 2012)
By Graham Healy
Following on from the finish of the Tour de France yesterday evening, the UCI has released the latest World Tour rankings which takes into account the points gained during the Tour.
Dan Martin (Garmin-Sharp) now sits in 8th place, with Chris Froome (Sky Procycling) leading comfortably from Peter Sagan (Cannondale).
As stickybottle reported a couple of months back, Ireland is in a position to qualify three riders to line up in the World Championships through Martin’s position in the top 100 of the World Tour. The cut off date for qualifying teams and riders for the Worlds in August 15th and even if Martin did not race again between now and then he could not lose his place in the top 100.
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It means Ireland will have at least three riders in the elite men's race at the World Championships in Florence in September.
If Ireland was in the top 10 nations by August 15th, we would qualify a six-man team. The bigger representation would be very important in providing five team mates, rather than just two, to support Dan Martin's effort to win the race.
Ireland now sits in 14th place overall in the rankings with 287 points whilst Belgium is in 10th position with 412 points.
Dan Martin scored points for his stage win in the Tour, and was looking good to score points through his GC position until he was struck down with illness in the last week.
At this stage, it is an impossible ask to get into the top 10 because the only remaining races in the World Tour before the deadline are the Tour of Poland and the Clasica San Sebastian.
Obviously after their exertions in the Tour, neither Roche nor Martin will take part in the Polish tour which starts later in the week, whilst just Roche will line up in San Sebastian next weekend as Martin tries to recover from his illness.
The other option for Ireland to qualify a larger team is through the Europe Tour rankings.
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Ireland has moved up one position to 20th since the last report, with the first six nations in the rankings (excluding the nations qualifying via the UCI World Tour) entitled to start six riders in the elite men's race at the Worlds.
There are currently eight European countries in the top 10 in the World Tour, so Ireland would have to be in at least the top 14 in the European rankings to qualify six riders. We currently have 358 points in the Europe Tour rankings, whilst Sweden in 14th position has 575 points.
Connor McConvey (Synergy Baku Cycling Project) is the highest ranked Irish rider in the Europe Tour in 194th place with 43 points, followed by Matt Brammeier (Champion System) in 211th place with 40 points and then Philip Lavery next with 30 points in 293rd place.
McConvey has also scored 15 points in the UCI Asia Tour.
There may be opportunities in the next few weeks to gain more points for the Europe Tour rankings as a number of Irish riders will be taking part in the UCI 2.2 Kreiz Breizh Elites in Brittany which starts on Saturday.
Philip Lavery is expected to make his stagiare debut for Cofidis in the UCI 2.HC Vuelta a Burgos which starts on August 7th, although his race plans for the rest of the season are not clear.
However, the best chance to score a substantial number of points may come from Philip Deignan (United Healthcare).
Deignan has been in great form this season, with a win in the Tour of the Gila and numerous other good results, including 9th place in the Tour of California. He currently sits in 7th place in the UCI America Tour ranking with 89 points.
He is expected to line up at the UCI 2.1 Tour of Utah which with its hilly parcours will be suited to the Donegal man. He rode well there two years ago, when he helped his then team mate, Levi Leipheimer to the overall win.
However, he can expect some stiff competition there as a number of World Tour teams are taking part including Garmin-Sharp, Cannondale and Orica-Green Edge. The race starts on August 6th.
With a number of Irish riders posting some really impressive results this season, it will make for an interesting few weeks to see if they gain enough places to get six riders to the Worlds, though that does seem like an uphill challenge with the cut off date for points being counted now just over three weeks away.
