The Irish U23 team experienced a difficult day on stage 2 of Tour de l'Avenir, losing one rider with three others in the line-up crashing. The loss of Dean Harvey, and the crashes of the others, is a blow to the team, especially ahead of today's stage 3 team time trial.
However, while team general classification leader Archie Ryan also lost some time on the 189km stage from Nozay to Chinon, the Irish are still in the game.
The crash victims for Ireland included Odhran Doogan, Ryan and Patrick O'Loughlin. Doogan was the first to fall, in a multi-rider pile-up with about 30km to go, before Ryan and O'Loughlin also feel victim to spills closer to the finish as the speed ramped up in the chaotic bunch.
That was a testing day for the Irish, especially after stage 1 breakaway man Harvey did not start today due to illness. However, Ryan limited his losses to 39 seconds, which is not insurmountable. Jamie Meehan was the only Irish rider to finish in the 71-rider bunch that sprinted it out for victory.
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On the line, Radoslaw Fratczak (Poland) thought he had done enough to win, only to celebrate too early with Riley Pickrell (Canada) pipping him on the line to take the victory. Meehan finished in 44th with Ryan in the second half of the bunch, at 39 seconds, in 89th place.
Doogan was 100th at 1:10 while Kevin McCambridge was 111th at 2:12 and O'Loughlin was 143rd at 8:34. The race lead changed hands as stage 1 winner, and yellow jersey, Anders Foldager (Denmark), lost nearly eight minutes; Michał Pomorski (Poland) now in yellow.
Meehan, the Irish U23 road race champion, is best-placed of the Irish, in 40th place and equal on time with a large group of riders all six seconds behind Pomorski. Ryan is now 67th, at 45 seconds, and today the Irish team must hope to limit their losses in the 21km TTT in order to keep his general classification aspirations on the road.
