Ryan Mullen will get to wear the Irish TT champion's kit again next year - when he is set to move to Bora-hansgrohe - after his victory in the elite men's TT at the National Road Championships today.
The 27-year-old, who is nearing the end of his four-year tenure with Trek-Segafredo, took gold today ahead of Nicolas Roche (Team DSM) and Marcus Christie (Performance SBR).
Mullen was best over the 33.79km course from Brittas in
Co Wickow out the old road to Arklow and back again, recording a time of 40:30.
He was 16 seconds up on Roche and 1:11 up on Christie.
“I’ve not had the best of seasons; it’s not been too
great for me but I’m really happy to turn that around,” Mullen said after his
gold medal-winning ride.
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“Today I came here, I put a bit of pressure on myself, more for my self confidence and going into next year with Bora; I really wanted to bring a national champs jersey of some form, whether it’s this or the road race."
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Mullen continued: “I’m really happy today, in terms of performance, in terms of power I’m up there with one of my best rides,” he said.
The new TT champion added that Roche had pushed him so close he felt the Team DSM rider would be a big threat in Sunday’s road race.
“Nico is clearly in great shape because he wasn’t far off me and, yeah, I’ve done a good ride by my standards. It should be an exciting (race on) Sunday," he said, before setting out some of the numbers he achieved today in the TT.
“I had about 440 (watts) average at the turn, and I think
I finished the ride with 435, 436 (watts). Normalised (power) is going to be
close to 440 with the roundabouts. That’s definitely up there with one of my
better rides.”
“I’ve had a bit of a change of coach in the last three weeks and it’s definitely paying off. He’ll be more than happy when I text him now.”
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