A shattered Paddy Clarke after losing the lead in Kerry Group Rás Mumhan in the closing mils of the final stage in Killorglin on Monday (Photo: Pat Doherty)
Runner-up in the Kerry Group Rás Mumhan at the weekend, Paddy Clarke has admitted he was a broken man after he relinquished the yellow jersey to eventual winner Mark Dowling on Monday’s fourth and final stage.
The Liquidworx-Fitscience rider took the race lead on Sunday’s gruelling 142 kilometre stage around Waterville.
He went into Sunday’s decider on the same time as second-placed Dowling, with Clarke leading on count back.
He knew as long as he finished in the same time as the DID Dunboyne man he’d hold the jersey.
But it wasn’t to be for the Ballina rider, who suffered a similarly difficult loss in the Suir Valley Three Day two years ago when he came second to Blarney CC’s Barry Twohig by a mere two seconds.
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“I clawed for victory with every last ounce of energy I had left,” said a shattered Clarke afterwards.
“We gave our best as a team and I couldn’t ask for any more from anyone. The spirit of the team on the road was incredible and we proved we are well capable of competing with the best.
“It’s absolutely gutting to lose by such a small margin though, and no words can describe how depressing it is.
“I woke up today, went into work; but I couldn’t do a thing. I was so down in myself. I’ve been questioning it all day; was there an interval that I didn’t work hard enough in? Was there a day’s training I cut short that may have made a difference?
“We did all we could at the time though,” he added.
Though Clarke was offering no excuses and hailed Dowling for his smart riding and aggressive approach, he did tot up the number of ‘what ifs’ and arrived at the conclusion that his luck was not in when it mattered most.
Paddy Clarke, second from left, leads the breakaway on stage 2 of Rás Mumhan, with eventually stage winner Dylan Foley on the far right (Photo: Brendan Slattery)
“The team are shattered. (Mike) Storan is in complete bits. He punctured twice on the big laps and rode back on his own for 15 miles into a crosswind. He did one turn at the front for me and went straight out the back.
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“That was heroic. He rode through every car in the cavalcade, dodging guys who were streaming out the back. But he barged his way up through the bunch and did one turn. That was incredible.
“Eddie (Barry) was one of the final few men we had left up front before hitting the local laps which was great because he was drilling it over the bridge into the town and kept me up front and out of danger.
“Brian Canty and Gareth McCormack rode until they could not pedal one more metre which was topped off by Gareth puncturing before the local laps.
“Chris Reilly? He rode like warrior. And when the other lads had given their all and were struck by a few bouts of bad luck he stuck in strong and kept the pace up right until the bell lap.
“He was chasing the break so hard on the front he almost put me out the back at one point; what he did for me I’ll never forget. We would have loved to have won Rás Mumhan."
It had all been going to plan for Clarke and his team as on the big laps they set a ferocious pace that saw close to 100 riders ejected out the rear of the bunch, which was aided further when they received help from a number of other teams and individuals.
“More and more men came to help us halfway through the stage,” Clarke said.
“It just goes to show how much support we had. People telling me to keep riding and that I can do it. I was dying, frothing at the mouth and guys roaring at me to get to the front and keep the pace up.
“It was heartbreaking trying to get up to Reilly though, riding as hard as I could. There were hands coming out of nowhere giving me pushes trying to get me up.
“We knew all we had to do was get to at least the second last lap and at that point those who were keen for the stage would pursue it and hopefully bring the break back with Dowling in it.
“But as galling as it is, I have to take the positives. We sat down last year with Derek (Bowyer, manager) and my brother Ciaran and I told them I can win Rás Mumhan and at the time I was kind of half spoofing. But Derek set up a team for me and we almost did it, we almost won Rás Mumhan.
“We have an unbelievable team, you couldn’t buy that loyalty; you can’t buy a team like that and the same goes for the crew who weren’t riding the bike but do everything for us and look after us so well.
“We were very much the underdog team entering the event, but we proved our strength and with smart riding and training from Simon in FitScience we showed what we are made of.
“You can build teams and you can buy individuals but you can’t buy loyalty like I had this weekend, there are no words for it.
“Years have gone by when I didn’t even get off the island in Valentia with the bunch. People would have laughed at us if we said we would be in yellow on the final day but we showed what we can achieve with hard work and loyalty.”
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