Emma Jeffers during the U23-senior road race at the National Road Championships in Cong, where she claimed elite silver and U23 gold (Photo: Toby Watson)
Emma Jeffers (Liv AlUla Jayco Women's Continental Team) may now have been able to live with the finishing kick of Lara Gillespie (UAE Team ADQ) in Co Mayo at the weekend, but she still was very happy with the return on her efforts.
In the U23-senior road race at the National Road Championships in Cong she was 2nd, taking elite silver and retaining the U23 gold she took 12 months ago.
Jeffers said she backed herself in the sprint and was glad she got close to Gillespie, especially as she has not long returned from a nasty injury sustained on Team Ireland duties at the UCI Track World Cup in Hong Kong in April.
"I'm really happy with how it's gone," she said of the past couple of seasons with her trade team, the feeder squad for the 'Liv Jayco AlUla’ World Tour team.
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"This season was going well, but now I've just come back from an injury on my wrist and that kind of slowed my season down a little bit.
"I crashed on the track and fractured my scaphoid. It was a re-fracture so I had to get a screw in it. And that took me out for two months, but it's good to be back now.
"I got back racing the last two weekends and I think I've got my race fitness back. So hopefully I'll get some good racing and then make the step up for next year."
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Jeffers, in purple, said she got into Gillespie's wheel but when the road continued to kick up to the line, she couldn't get around her (Photo: Toby Watson)
During Saturday's national title race, Jeffers said she was "a bit nervous" about the main climb on the large 50km opening loop before the riders moved onto the smaller circuit to finish.
"I knew I had to get over that climb, and I managed to get over in the little group, I was super happy with that, I felt really good
"Then for the next lap, the small lap, everyone was working together and it was a nice little group, it was good to have eight riders all working."
As the race progressed, she said attacks started to go off the front, with those having a go including Lucy Bénézet Minns (Team Féminin Chambéry), Fiona Mangan (Mayenne Monbana My Pie) and Aliyah Rafferty (DAS-Hutchinson).
"Lucy got a bit of a gap for a while, but nothing stayed away. Everybody was riding pretty defensive, which suited me nicely I think," said Jeffers, whose most notable asset to date on the road has been her sprint.
However, coming up against Gillespie and defending champion Mia Griffin (Picnic PostNL), both very fast finishers, how did she think she'd do?
"You've always got to believe in yourself, so I backed myself to do it in the sprint," she said. "I got on (Gillespie's) wheel, but I couldn't get around her in the end. It was maybe a bit too long of an uphill finish for me. But I was happy with how close I was."
