Popular Winner: Dylan O'Brien takes the final stage of the Junior Tour by beating a breakaway comprised of every stage winner from a great week of racing; the Munster Sensa man bouncing back in great style after a difficult period when illness sidelined him from some great international events (Photo: Stephen McMahon - Sportsfile)
By Brian Canty
Dylan O’Brien has taken the biggest result of his career and put behind him a miserable month when he won today’s final stage of the International Junior Tour of Ireland in Ennis, Co Clare.
The Munster Sensa rider outsprinted two of his fellow breakaway men, Jack Maddux (Hot Tubes) and Irish national team rider Michael O’Loughlin, at the end of today’s 80-kilometre stage.
It was an especially significant win for the young Cork man as he is still only recovering from a very nasty chest infection he picked up just a week prior to the European Junior Road Race Championships in Switzerland.
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He was subsequently dropped from the Irish team for the event and also missed a key preparatory race in the Trofeo Karlsberg in Germany.
But today’s result shows he’s firmly back on track.
O’Brien, a close friend training partner of O’Leary’s Stone Kanturk club mate Eddie Dunbar, has often worked selflessly for the Junior Tour winner this year and last.
Eddie Dunbar leads today's stage 6 breakaway from Michael O'Loughlin, Jack Maddux, Dylan O'Brien and Matthew Teggart. Between them, they won every stage in the Junior Tour, underlining the quality of O'Brien's win today (Photo: Stephen McMahon - Sportsfile)
But he has delivered a real statement of intent , showing he’s more than capable of notching his own results when the opportunities arise, as he did at the Tour of Connacht back in March when he won the time trial stage and the overall.
Today he escaped in a five-man break that featured all of those mentioned above and Matt Teggart of the Nicolas Roche Performance Team (NRPT).
Interestingly, all five-men who were in the day’s escape were stage winners this week. with O’Loughlin taking stages one and five, Dunbar stage two, Teggart stage three, Maddux stage four and O’Brien the victor on the final leg.
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The race was seven laps of a tough 11-kilometre circuit and the attacks came thick and fast as soon as the flag dropped.
Sean Noon of Edinburgh CC, Caimin Muldoon of NRPT and Graham Ó'Brien of Leinster crossed the finish line with a seven-second gap after the opening lap.
Their time off the front was short-lived however, and the next move saw the decisive attack from Dunbar; with O’Loughlin, O’Brien, Maddux and Teggart all in tow.
Between the five, the three best teams were represented so it was little surprise to see their margin extend to over a minute with three laps completed.
With three laps to go it was over a minute and a half and all chance of the race regrouping was gone, though that didn’t stop a six-man chase group from forming.
That second group worked well but just didn’t have the horsepower of the men up front. And coming into the final couple of kilometres it was a really cagey affair.
Dunbar knew he had the yellow jersey sewn up so he did his best to set up teammate O’Loughlin, who had given him superb help all week.
But it was O’Brien who perhaps surprised everyone with a thrilling late burst of speed to see off renowned sprinters Teggart and Maddux to take a well deserved stage win and put the disappointments of recent weeks behind him.
He has also put himself into the frame for Worlds selection.
Final Stage and Classification Results
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