Damien Shaw may have been hit by injury this year, but he was still 4th overall in the Rás Tailteann.
Damien Shaw is set to return to the home road racing scene next year. He will ride with the Strata 3-VeloRevolution team run by Aidan Crowley.
Shaw has decided not to seek a team to race full-time abroad next year after three seasons racing for Continental-level teams.
A former national road race champion, Shaw came to the sport late but that has not stopped him enjoying significant success.
He rode for the An Post-Chainreaction team in 2016 and again in 2017. However, the team folded after that 2017 campaign.
It was hoped the squad, run by Sean Kelly and Kurt Bogaerts, would find a title sponsor to replace An Post and return to the peloton next season.
Advertisement
However, a sponsor has yet to be found and the team will not come back for 2019 as had been hoped.
Related News
Attacking a very young Eddie Dunbar in the closing stages of the elite men's road race at the national championships back in 2015 (Photo: Sean Rowe)
When An Post-Chainreaction came to an end, Damien Shaw was among a number of Irishmen to sign for Holdsworth Pro Racing.
However, it is unclear if that team – a UK-based Continental outfit – will continue next season. Either way, Shaw has now decided to focus on the home scene.
And he will do that through next season with Strata 3-VeloRevolution; a team he can still win many of the big races with.
Shaw was a tandem pilot on the Irish paracycling squad before going on to concentrate on road racing.
Now aged 34 years, he still has many good years ahead of him in domestic racing if he so chooses. He began racing properly in his late 20s, in 2011.
In 2013 he took a bronze medal in the elite men’s road race at the National Road Championships. And he took 4th on a stage of the Rás the following year.
In 2015 he enjoyed one of his finest moments, beating Eddie Dunbar to the national road title. He was also 2nd twice and 3rd once on stages of the Rás that year.
In both 2016 and 2017 he finished 5th overall in the Rás. Also in 2017, he took the opening stage of the Tour du Loir et Cher (2.2) in France and held yellow for several days.
And while hampered badly with a hip injury this year, he placed 4th overall in the Rás riding for Holdsworth.
We’ll catch up with Damien Shaw in the next day or two.
Topics
