In a year when Irish cycling began to return to normal after the pandemic, the domestic road racing scene threw up some brilliant performances. Very young riders, and late bloomers relatively unknown before this year, came through to take big wins.
In other events, more established names put in spectacular performances that will likely come to define their racing careers. In this piece stickybottle's selects its best domestic road race performances of 2022 and ranks them for quality, starting with the very best.
1. Daire Feeley | Rás Tailteann
One of the star performers on the home scene in recent years, since returning to Ireland to race, Feeley’s win in Rás Tailteann was by some margin the best domestic performance of the season. He made the winning breakaway on stage 2 into Castleisland. And though he came undone in the finale, he still gained time on all but five of the men in the field. The following day, on the 172km stage into Lisdoonvarna, the 25-year-old from Roscommon was again up the road. This time he forged clear late with Adam Ward. They combined to win the day; Ward (Team Ireland) victorious on the stage and Feeley (All human-VeloRevolution) taking yellow. He then rode a defensive race – with the aid of a team that really stepped up – to hold onto the race leader’s jersey on the final two stages. In doing so he became the first Irishman since Stephen Gallagher in 2008 to be crowned Rás winner. In the race’s comeback year, a home win by a such a popular rider was the perfect relaunch for an iconic event many feared was lost. (Photo by Lorraine O'Sullivan)
Advertisement
2. Lara Gillespie | Rás na mBan
Having returned this season from a year-long period of illness and injury, Gillespie was on the Irish team for Rás na mBan and got off the mark immediately with stage 1 victory into Callan. It was the first Irish stage victory on the race since Olivia Dillon last did the damage back in 2014. While she lost the race lead the following day, Gillespie (Team Ireland) took a second stage victory two days later into Piltown. She triumphed once more in a bunch sprint, this time head of compatriot Ellen McDermott (Team BoomPods). As the most prolific medal-winner for Ireland on the velodrome at junior and U23 level, Gillespie’s roaring back into form was confirmation one of our brightest stars had put a difficult period behind her. (Photo by Lorraine O'Sullivan)
3. Rory Townsend | National Championships
This was a performance of great quality by Townsend, but one matched by the sheer emotion of his triumph in Kanturk in June. The 27-year-old got up the road early, driving the initial four-man breakaway forward. And when the man he perhaps feared most, Eddie Dunbar of Ineos Grenadiers, got across, Townsend was not deterred. He made sure to keep the pressure on and one by one the four riders he was with were distanced, including Dunbar. Finally it came down to Townsend (WiV SunGod) and Cormac Mcgeough (Wildlife Generation Pro Cycling), with Townsend powering clear of his rival late in the race for a huge solo win. He was overcome with emotion at becoming Irish elite men's champion even before he crossed the line; winning the title less than a year after he considered stepping back from cycling due to lack of opportunities at professional level. (Photo by Sean Rowe)
4. Matt Teggart | Rás Tailteann stage 1
A number of Teggart’s performances on home roads in 2022 could have made this list, including any one of his victories in the first three rounds of the Cycling Ireland National Road Series. However, it’s hard to beat a Rás stage win and when such a victory comes with a yellow jersey, you know it’s been a good day. Teggart (WiV SunGod) had already won a stage and taken the race lead on the Rás – into Bundoran as a 21-year-old rider back in 2017. He also scored a crucial win for the home nation on the first stage of this year's race. In the Rás's comeback year; his winning sprint into Horse and Jockey was as important for the race, as it was for him. (Photo by Lorraine O'Sullivan)
5. Kevin McCambridge | Rás Tailteann stage 5
The manner McCambridge claimed his Rás stage win was the stuff of childhood dreams; breaking clear solo on the final stage and holding off the bunch for victory in front of the biggest crowd of the week. Now aged 21 years, McCambridge’s progress in recent seasons has been slowed by illness and injury. However, his performance on the Rás – with a 10km solo ride to victory to hold off the charging bunch by just three seconds – underlined his abilities when in full flight. He has tried a similar move on the penultimate stage of the Rás and though he was caught that did not dull his determination, or his legs, for the following day. His win, one of real quality, will hopefully prove to be the start of bigger things. (Photo by Sean Rowe)
6. Adam Ward | Rás Tailteann stage 3
Like McCambridge, Ward is a rider who really knows how to celebrate a big win and the photographs of him and McCambridge in celebratory mode on the Rás were among the best images of the week. Ward, a former Irish junior road race champion, went clear in the main breakaway on the 172km stage 3 from Newcastle West, Co Limerick, to Lisdoonvarna, Co Clare. He attacked from that nine-man group with Daire Feeley with about 30km to; the duo racing over the climbs of The Burren and Corkscrew Hill. Ward, as streetwise as he is strong, took the sprint for stage victory after an epic day of racing that dictated the shape of the final general classification; Ward’s stage win helping take him to 3rd overall in the race when it finished two days later. (Photo by Sean Rowe)
7. Alice Sharpe | National Championships
Related News
In wet conditions, and over a leg-sapping course in Kanturk, Co Cork, Alice Sharpe was best when the top women in the country were put to the test against each other at the National Road Championships. She sprinted in at the front of what remained of the peloton to take her second Irish elite road race crown, ahead of IBCT team mates Mia Griffin and Fiona Mangan. It was her second title, some five years after first being crowned champion in Derry in 2019, on a day when the field disintegrated. In the three years since her first title win, Sharpe has become one of the best riders Ireland has ever had and her victory in Kanturk only served to underline that status. (Photo by Bryan Keane-Inpho)
8. Dean Harvey | National Championships
While Harvey has won repeatedly on road and in cyclocross, this year and as a junior un 2021, his ride at the National Road Race Championships, where he crossed the line in 4th, was arguably the best of his career to date. Having won the Shay Elliott Memorial in May and then gone on to claim the climbers’ jersey in the Rás, Harvey went into the nationals in Kanturk as a fancied rider. However, even by those standards he rode out of his skin; just missing a medal in the elite race but winning U23 gold. He went in the early move with eventual winner Rory Townsend (WiV SunGod), silver medal man Cormac Mcgeough (Wildlife Generation) and John Buller (AC Bisontine). And as Eddie Dunbar (Ineos Grenadiers) was caught and then distanced, and others tried to catch the breakaway but couldn’t, Harvey remained a constant at the front deep into the race. He was eventually distanced by Townsend and Mcgeough and had bronze stolen away by Ben Healy (EF Education-Easy Post), with a late charge. But when Harvey was collected by a chasing group he still had the legs to win the sprint for U23 gold, against Darren Rafferty (Axeon Hagens Berman), with Archie Ryan (Jumbo Visma) 3rd. (Photo by Sean Rowe)
9. Tom Regan | Brian O’Loughlin Memorial
One of the great stories of a year – and one of the most popular winners of the season – Tom Regan struck a big blow for the slightly older racing cyclist when won the Brian O’Loughlin Memorial in May, which was part of the Cycling Ireland National Road Season. The 39-year-old made the large early breakaway and when it split late in the contest he was at the pointy end. At the finish he seized his chance; sprinting home for a huge win. He came to cycling aged 32 years, after a successful career in top flight hurling. He said while it took him two or three years to build up the stamina required for racing, once he started he became hooked on the sport very quickly and made his Rás debut this year.
10. Lindsay Watson | Kerry Group Rás Mumhan
A class rider and one of the real racers of the home scene, always willing to have a go, Watson’s aggression paid off during the Easter Bank Holiday Weekend in Co Kerry. He got clear with Darragh McCarter (Spellman Dublin Port) on the first stage and beat him to the victory, and first yellow jersey of the race. The 33-year-old was a late addition to the All human-VeloRevolution team, after the Tour of the North was cancelled at the last minute. And when he got the race lead he rode in an assured manner, with the help his team, to hold it all the way and claim his biggest career win. (Photo by Brendan Slattery)
11. Gabrielle Glodenyte | Brian O’Loughlin Memorial
When she got clear in the Brian O’Loughlin Memorial with Eve McCrystal and Caoimhe May, Glodenyte had already done well to match riders of their standing on the domestic scene. But not content with simply taking a ‘good result’ in that round of the Cycling Ireland National Road Series, Glodenyte went and beat her breakaway companions to win. In doing so, she put in one of the best breakthrough performances of the year. Having only begun cycling seriously about two years ago, Glodenyte went from strength to strength after her win in Co Mayo, claiming overall victory in the road series and also winning the Newry Three Day with a clinical strike in the finale of the last stage to win the day and the overall.
12. Niall McLoughlin | Rás Mumhan
Part of an Irish junior team that secured permission to ride Kerry Group Rás Mumhan, 17-year-old Niall McLoughlin came away from the race having really made his mark; winning stage 3 in a big bunch sprint to the line. It was an excellent performance by the Westport Covey Wheelers rider, against Ireland’s best A1 elite riders, some of them with serious international experience. McLoughlin bookended that win with 2nd on stage 2 and on stage 4, suggesting he is a rider to keep a very close eye on in the years ahead. If he goes on to become the rider many predict, his performance in Kerry this year will always be pointed to as the start proper of his cycling journey. (Photo by Brendan Slattery)
13. Aaron Wade | National Road Series Final Round
Wade spent some of his season competing in France for Team U Cube 17 and while his plans were undermined by some crashes he came good late in the season. A big win at GP Christian Fenioux-Souvenir Gilles-Malard, an elite national event in France in mid August, was followed by victory in the final round of the Cycling Ireland National Road Series a week later in Dromore. When the race split to pieces and the cream rose to the top, just Wade and Matt Teggart were left leading at the front approaching the finish. And though Teggart had won the opening three rounds of the series, and a stage in the Rás, Wade beat him to victory. The fact it was Teggart he outgunned at the end of such a hard race, and decisiveness of his finishing effort, made it one of the performances of the season. (Photo by Inpho)
14. Lara Gillespie | National Road Series Final Round
A winner of medals at the World Championships and European Championships on the track as a junior and U23, Lara Gillespie’s victory in a domestic race – even a big one – will not be seen as one of the stand-out results in her palmares. However, Gillespie had been beset with injury and health issues for a year and was just coming back into good condition when she pulled the trigger to win in August, in what was the final round of the Cycling Ireland National Road Series. Those problems she had endured, coupled with her track and college commitments, meant in Dromore that day she was riding her first road race since winning the National Road Race Championships two years ago in Knockaderry, Co Limerick. She pulled clear with Eve McCrystal in the finale in Dromore and went on to put in a huge finish to secure a clear win; turning it on on the road with apparent ease despite such a long absence. (Photo by Inpho)
15. Seth Dunwoody | Peter Bidwell Memorial
That an U16 rider can make the list of the top road race performances in Ireland this year perhaps tells you all you need to know about Seth Dunwoody. One of the dominant riders in the youth ranks over the last two seasons, he placed 5th in the TT at the European Olympic Festival in Slovakia this year. He has also secured a place on the Cannibal Bahrain Victorious junior team for next season, which is now part of the Bahrain Victorious World Tour operation. Dunwoody, and others on the U16 national team, were granted permission this summer to race against the elites at home as they prepared for the European Youth Olympics. The 16-year-old Shelbourne-Orchard CC rider took to the start line of the Peter Bidwell Memorial in Donore, Co Meath, in July, and attacked the A3 group shortly after the start of the handicapped event. He rode the remainder of the race on his own out front, holding off the main field for a brilliant solo win. (Photo by Toby Watson)
