Greg Swinand winning the Masters 40 Irish championships in June. He rode the TT title race two weeks ago and has now confirmed he lodged an appeal after the race. But he has insisted he was very grateful to the promoting club and all the officials who organised the racing (Photo: Sean Rowe)
The results of the Masters 40 time trial (TT) at the junior, Masters and A3 road championships last month will stand despite an appeal to the result lodged by former champion Greg Swinand.
The Aquablue rider – who has been Masters road and TT champion in the past – believed he had gone faster in his TT effort than his official result suggested.
At no point did he believe there was any dishonesty on the part of anyone involved. However, he believed a mistake had been made and lodged an appeal so Cycling Ireland would have to examine his issue.
Advertisement
The appeal was lodged just after the championship race two weeks ago and has been considered by Cycling Ireland.
However, the appeal was not upheld and the result on the day stands.
Neil Delahaye (ASEA-Wheelworx) won the Masters 40 title from Ian Cassidy (Fixx Rouleurs), with Swinand (Team Aquablue) completing the podium.
Delahaye clocked a time of 30mins 39secs on the day over the 24km course, taking the gold medal from Cassidy by 23 seconds with Swinand 53 seconds down on the winner.
Swinand went into the contest as favourite and has not only won multiple TT and road Masters titles in recent years but has also won a large number of very hard A1 races in recent years.
However, while Delahaye’s commitments as a Cycling Ireland coach have taken him away from racing, he is a very strong rider, both in road races and against the watch.
Like Cassidy, he would also have gone into the race very much as one of the fancied riders.
The Masters 40 TT was promoted by Cunga CC in Co Mayo and held on the same day as the Masters 50, Masters 60 and Junior TT title races.
The following day the A3 and Junior road races were held, also promoted by Cunga CC.
Related News
In the days that followed the championships, stickybottle reported the fact that a dispute had arisen over the times in the Masters 40 TT.
And Cunga CC confirmed at the time it was aware of some concern being expressed, but insisted the times were correct and would stand.
Swinand has now taken to Facebook to confirm he had lodged an appeal and that it had not been upheld by Cycling Ireland.
However, he said he was very grateful to the promoting club for organising the championships.
He said he was speaking out to confirm he had lodged an appeal mainly because he wanted to be clear that he was very grateful to Cunga CC and its team of volunteers for putting on great racing.
“I would like to take this opportunity now to publicly thank the organisers of the event, Cunga Cycling Club, the officials, the competitors, and all those involved in the event on the day, and in the appeal for their efforts and sincere work,” he wrote.
However, while he now accepted the result from the day would stand he believed his appeal “was not trivial”.
He had held back publicly thanking the promoters while his appeal was active because he did not want any message of thanks to be misinterpreted.
But with the appeal now concluded he wanted to emphasis he had always known Cunga CC and the officials who ran the championships “have a long bank account of organisation in Irish cycling that has never escaped my memory”.
He continued: “They organised a great event last year and this year.”
And he was also thankful to “the competitors involved who showed great sportsmanship and those (in) Cycling Ireland for affording me due process and considerable effort on their part”.
He concluded: “I would also like to thank and congratulate the champions on the night and all those who achieved their goals.
“While the result was not what I had hoped for, I count myself very lucky to have had the opportunity to perform my ride as it was on the night and to be part of such a great sporting community as we have here.”
He now looked forward to the Masters Track Championships and wished everyone “all the best”.
Topics
