Mark Downey said he was in tears at times last year, when he couldn't seem to finish the job and take a big win. But his medal at the elite World Championships yesterday was his biggest ever result and his eighth major medal despite being aged just 22-years (All photos by Guy Swarbrick)
Having previously won medals at junior and U23 European Championships and at UCI World Cups, including multiple golds, Mark Downey has faced stern tests of late.
He and Felix English are two of Ireland’s brightest hopes for Olympic qualification, in the madison event.
But with that race added to the Olympic programme since Rio 2016, the standard has been edging higher the closer Tokyo 2020 gets.
Downey has spoken of it being so much harder that he and English are suddenly riding bigger gears in races; having to completely up their game in an event they’d previously taken World Cup victory in.
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But with Downey there has always been a pattern; throwing himself headfirst into a challenge before adjusting to the intensity of a higher and harder level.
And then the moment he steadies himself he’s firing off the front; getting on top and winning his medals. It’s the Mark Downey way.
And while the madison has bumped him around a little over the last 18 months or so; Downey has once more pulled himself up onto a podium.
This time it’s at an elite Worlds and in the points race, rather than his Olympic qualification madison event.
But he’s back in the winner’s enclosure having scooped a big prize for himself and Ireland in the shape of a points race bronze medal in Poland yesterday.
#Pruszkow2019 ? A very proud moment for this County Down man: Put your hands together for @MarkDowney03! WORLD CHAMPIONSHIPS BRONZE ? MEDALLIST #TEAMIRELAND pic.twitter.com/wOIgUm2xRX
— Cycling Ireland (@IreCyclingFed) March 1, 2019
It was his eighth medal at a championships or World Cup since 2014. He won points race silver at the junior Europeans in 2014 followed by U23 silver at the Euros in 2016.
Shortly after he went rampaging through the UCI World Cups; three golds and one silver scored in madison and points races between November, 2016, and February, 2017.
Later that year, in July of 2017, he won points race bronze in the U23 European Championships.
Three months later he claimed 9th in the U23 road race at the Worlds. And then came a series of very strong performances, but ones marked by frustration at what might have been.
There were no medals on the track at the Commonwealth Games in Australia last April. Furthermore, the road race on the Gold Coast ended in possibly the most frustrating result of all, 4th place.
And at the Tour de l’Avenir in August he was passed at the death and denied a stage win, having to settle for 2nd instead.
On the attack off the front on his way to gaining a lap. All smiles on the podium after the hard work was done.
Many of the results he’s taken over the past two years would bring satisfaction to most riders.
His bronze medal in the National Road Race Championships last July, for example, would have been a major milestone for others.
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But for a prolific Mark Downey it was two places short of what he’d gone to Sligo for.
And having medaled so regularly since his junior days at major international track meetings, 15 months without silverware on the boards was a long time.
With a lot of close run things in major road races also coming during that period, the relief at taking a medal yesterday in Poland was palpable.
Significantly, it was his first medal at an elite championships. And while the madison is his ticket to the Olympics, this Worlds medal puts him on an upward trajectory once more.
And that’s something that madison partner Felix English can hopefully also take a lift from.
In the pack and getting ready to pounce in Poland. With Cycling Ireland coach and former world champion Martyn Irvine.
Mark Downey made his move yesterday with about 40 laps remaining; taking a lap and sprint points. Another lap was later gained and with nine laps remaining he was joint 3rd in the standings.
In the final sprint to the line he did enough to gain more points and secure his place on the Worlds points race podium in the Pruszkow Arena.
“That was crazy out there now,” said the Co Down 22-year-old after his race. He then quickly put it in the context of recent events.
“I’ve had so many ups and downs the last year and a half of my career,£ he said, adding a bad crash on the track was only part of it.
“I finished 3rd in the National Championships Road Race and I was bawling my eyes out after it.
"I was always there or thereabouts in races. But, I never really picked up that win. I was beaten by inches in the summer at the Tour de l’Avenir.
“So I’ve had that feeling of being fourth so many times in my career,” he said of rallying mentally close to the end of yesterday’s race.
“I just got that urge with eight laps to go, I said: ‘I can’t feel like this again, this literally can’t happen to me again. If this happens to me again, I’ll get the nickname, ‘the nearly man’’.”
TRACK | ? 'I literally couldn't go through finishing fourth again'
Mark Downey, @UCI_Track Bronze ? Medallist, reflects on an historic performance at the Pruszkow Arena. #Pruszkow2019 ?
FULL STORY ? https://t.co/KNfMMOXEsZ pic.twitter.com/eQ0THgJLFy
— Cycling Ireland (@IreCyclingFed) March 1, 2019
Downey added: “That result is just for all the staff at Cycling Ireland and all the people behind me; my family, all the support staff, everyone that’s just got me up every morning, just kept me on the straight and narrow.”
His medal yesterday is Ireland’s first at the Worlds since Martyn Irvine won scratch race silver in 2014.
That came one year after Irvine, who was among the Cycling Ireland coaching staff yesterday, won the world title in that event and silver in the individual pursuit.
But while Downey enjoyed his moment in the sun yesterday, he was immediately looking ahead.
There’s a madison to contest at these Worlds tomorrow and he and English must busy themselves in the battle for points.
They must knuckle down now; muster their confidence and book their tickets to Tokyo, where anything could happen.
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