By Shane Stokes
Darren Rafferty completed a very rare double on Saturday, becoming only the fourth male in more than 30 years to win both the junior time trial and road race national championships.
The Villeneuve Cycliste/Team31 JollyCycles rider launched a solo move inside the final hour of racing and reached the line a clear one minute 53 seconds ahead of closest rival Dean Harvey (VC Glendale) and two minutes and five seconds ahead of a second VC Glendale rider, Jamie Meehan.
The showing followed his equally dominant result in Thursday’s time trial, where he beat Ronan O’Connor (Orwell Wheelers) by almost three minutes.
In doing so, he joined Mark Hutton (1992), Ryan Mullen (2011) and Michael O’Loughlin (2015) as the only riders in more than three decades to take both titles in the same calendar year.
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“It was a major goal,” Rafferty confirmed to Sticky Bottle. “I knew that it was going to be tough, because I really messed up the road race last year, and didn’t want to repeat that. I just had a shocker of a day then, an awful day. I just couldn’t get the legs working, so I didn’t want to be in that position again.”
Rafferty had won the time trial in 2020 but was back in 17th in the road race. This time around, his dominant form this season put him in a better position.
“I just came into it as best prepared as I could. I knew the legs were there. All I could do was see how the race panned out, and it went as I thought it would. It was fairly controllable.”
The 18-year-old Dungannon rider has had a stunning season despite a very bad crash in the Hilltown GP in mid-May. He fractured three ribs and a wrist and had bruising to his left lung.
But he bounced back to provisionally break the junior 10 mile time trial record on July 1st. His time of 18 minutes 48 seconds is subject to ratification, but was a full 33 seconds better than the 19 minutes 21 seconds set by Ben Walsh in 2017.
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He then moved to France after that and clocked up a stunning run of results in amateur events while racing with the Villeneuve Cycliste/Team31 JollyCycles squad.
He won three stage races in three weekends, taking the overall classification of the two day Tour du Carmausin-Ségala on July 11th, winning the Ronde sud Bourgogne seven days later (having won the stage three time trial and taking a solo victory in the concluding stage four road race), and then taking the overall Tour de la Vallée de la Trambouze on July 25th.
He also took two stage wins plus second overall in the Tour Junior Causses-Aigoual-Cévennes on August 8th, as well as a solo victory in the junior race at the prestigious GP de Plouay on August 28th.
Since then, he was fourth in the European junior time trial championships on September 8th, 35th in the European road race two days later, 11th in the world junior championships time trial on September 21st and 24th in the road race on September 24th.
Those results plus his national time trial win meant he
was the clear favourite for Saturday’s event. And despite close marking by his
rivals, he broke the elastic and then added to his lead all the way to the
finish line.
“It’s great,” he said shortly before the podium ceremony. “I won the TT on Thursday and was looking forward to trying to make an effort on the double. I like the course, so I came into it with a bit of confidence. I was expecting a much worse day weather-wise, prepared for the worst, and then it actually turned out a nice enough day at the end.”
Rafferty explained the steps he took to secure his victory. “On the first two short labs, nothing really happened. One rider went up the road, Somhairle (Owens Fisher of Caldwell Cycles). He was on his own in the break, and the group just sort of rolled around for the first 25k.
“When we hit the first climb on the longer lap, I attacked on the long drag and the group split. There was seven of us in the front group. And then on the second steeper climb I attacked again, with Dean [Harvey] and myself getting away.
"They brought us back again on the main road, then I did the same again on the next lap. I got away solo on the steeper climb with about 40k to go, and was able to hold it until the finish. It went well.”
Rafferty’s breakdown of the race sounds simultaneously
impressive and methodical. That’s down to his hard work in recent months, with
a large volume of overseas racing putting him in a different class to his
rivals. He’ll head into the winter months motivated by that and try to progress
further in 2022.
