Stephen Halpin was one of four Irish riders who competed this year with Polygon Sweet Nice, which has now just collapsed (Photo: Toby Watson)
By Gerard Cromwell
The Asian-backed, Irish-registered Polygon Sweet Nice Continental team has folded, leaving its Irish riders scrambling for last minute places on teams for next year.
After troubles with its own federation, the team had registered in Ireland this year and included Irish riders Stephen Halpin, Charles Prendergast, Mark Dowling and Ryan Sherlock at the start of the season.
While Sherlock left the team after a falling out with management mid season, both Halpin and Dowling expected to be riding in the Polygon Sweet Nice jersey for 2014, until a few days ago.
“Myself and Mark had our contracts sent out and we both signed them for next year,” said Halpin.
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“About two days later we found out that the team had folded. They were trying to register in Ireland again but there were complications there so they left us hanging, which was pretty devastating given the time of year it is.”
“This year, more than ever, there are tons of riders looking for teams and going looking for a team in December is just unrealistic.”
While Cycling Ireland recently hiked the cost of registering a professional team here from €1,000 to €10,000 the squad did themselves no favours by leaving everything until just before the deadline to try and register as a continental team with the UCI.
“On the contract it said registration, which closed a few days later, had gone through. It was kind of typical of the team to leave it until the last minute, which they did and it backfired. I don’t know if it was down to money or whatever.”
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The rise in the Cycling Ireland’s registration fee this year, which had previously been among the lowest in the world, is believed to have come about in an effort to deter Continental based teams with past or possible future links to doping from registering here.
In the past, numerous Italian teams had registered here in an effort to save money. But Halpin sees it another way.
“They say that, but to register as a Continental team in Ireland you need to have the majority of riders from Ireland. That means more jobs for riders from Ireland, so the more teams that register with us the better. I think to charge €10,000 is a bit insane and makes no sense at all in my mind.”
While Halpin won a hat full of races on the domestic scene this year including the Seamus Kennedy, Paddy Flanagan and Tommy Sheehan memorials, he hadn’t expected to be racing at home quite so much this year.
“After the Rás, myself and Mark won almost every race we did together so domestically we did well, but it wasn’t what we’d hoped for,” he admits.
“We expected a lot more from the team. I think a lot of it was down to both the management of the team and the current financial situation in cycling. There were a lot of races cancelled in Asia that we were meant to do.”
“One of the races was cancelled due to a war and another couple due to financial trouble. The race in Kazakhstan we had problems with visas. A race in France fell through.”
“We got to ride the Tour of Azerbaijan and a few pro kermesses in Belgium but it wasn’t what we signed up for.”
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