Philip Lavery’s rampage continues in France; win in Coupe de France his third in eight days

Dubliner Philip Lavery takes a great win in the rain at the Coupe de France yesterday, Monday. (Photo: Marine Grolier - www.be-celt.com)

By Graham Healy

The winning streak of Philip Lavery (AC Bisontine) continued yesterday, Monday, when he took victory in the Prix des Vallons in Schweighouse-sur-Moder in France. The race was the third of six rounds of the DN2 Coupe de France, and consisted of seven laps of 19.3 kilometres and three laps of 10.6 kilometres.

Lavery finished two seconds ahead of Polish rider, Tomasz Olejnik (USA Pavilly Barentin) and a further five seconds in front of Fabien Fraissignes (Occitane Cyclisme Formation) after 170 kilometres.

His victory follows on from wins in the first stage of the Tour de Franche Comté, the Souvenir Jean Lacroix and the Tour du Charolais.

That latter win came in the earlier part of the season, but his victory in the Souvenir Jean Lacroix came just last Sunday week. And he followed that up just four days later, last Thursday, when he won the opening stage of the Tour de Franche Comté in eastern France. He was quickest in the sprint to the line from a breakaway group of seven men.

That win brought him the yellow jersey and was his best victory since moving to France earlier this year. The four-day, five-stage, event is a major fixture that attracts many of the top teams in the country.

After winning the opening stage he was then fourth on stage 2 on Sunday, which was settled in a sprint from what was left of the peloton. The following day the 22-year-old Dubliner faced a split stage; with a road race in both the morning and afternoon.

On the morning stage he decided to defend his lead by attacking on a number of climbs and got clear in a breakaway. However, he then suffered a puncture as the race was fracturing and faced a major chase back on as he battled very hard to defend yellow, though he did regain contact with the leaders.

Because he had well over a minute on GC on the riders he was with after being in the winning escape on the opening stage, he retained his overall lead despite a small group going clear to fight for the win at the end of Saturday morning’s stage.

The afternoon stage was a more difficult affair, and when a number of the bigger teams attacked, Lavery missed some key moves and found himself trapped in the bunch, which effectively sat up and lost 12 minutes.

With his hopes of the overall win gone, Lavery rode home in warm-down mode from the last climb, bringing his losses on the day to 16 minutes.

He later agreed with his team to ride part of Sunday’s final stage and then abandon in order to keep himself as fresh as possible for yesterday’s Coupe de France. It was a calculation that has clearly reaped rewards in the shape of another win.