Irish team on the attack at Tour de l'Avenir ahead of big mountain stages | Video

Jamie Meehan, the Irish U23 road race champion, takes on fuel during his breakaway ride, with his group gaining almost three minutes at one point

The Irish U23 team stepped up to animate the racing at Tour de l'Avenir in France today, with U23 national road race champion Jamie Meehan especially active and forging clear in a breakaway for a long time.

His Team Ireland team mate, Adam Rafferty, also managed to get clear in a promising move with Meehan on a day when the Irish team looked spritely ahead of two absolutely brutal days to come in the mountains.

Meehan was fortunate to avoid a crash at one point when he initially went on the attack, joined by Stef Koning (Netherlands). As they raced clear of the peloton, in pursuit of a small group ahead, Koning hit the deck as he worked with Meehan and, such was the severity of his injuries, he was unable to continue in the race.

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At the end of the 110km stage from Montagnat to Val-Suran, with just one cat 4 climb and two laps of a 17km finishing circuit, the many attacks had been closed down by the stronger nations.

The battle for stage victory came down to a bunch sprint, with Seth Dunwoody Ireland's best finisher, placing 7th. The stage was won by Mathieu Kockelmann (Luxembourg) from Cesar Macias (Mexico) and Anže Ravbar (Slovenia).

Jamie Meehan in the special Team Ireland jersey, denoting the fact he is Irish champion, on the podium at Tour de l'Avenir (Photo: Quentin Joly)

As well as Dunwoody 7th, other Irish riders finishing in the bunch included Adam Rafferty (38th), Liam O'Brien (40th) and Jamie Meehan (77th). Ronan O'Connor was a little further back, placing 119th at 3:17 after riding for the team today.

After a number of early attacks - including by race leader Maxime Decomble (France) - it was Hugo Aznar (Spain) and Isak Magnusson (Sweden) who combined in a two-man move to pull out a proper advantage.

About 20km into the stage their lead was between 40 and 50 seconds when Ireland's Meehan went after them with a solo move. Though Meehan was then joined by Koning, the Dutch rider then crashed out.

Meehan gradually closed up to the two leaders with about 85km to go to the finish, by which point the gap back to the peloton was over two minutes. When the gap reached 2:40, and with American Ezra Caudell trying to get across to the three leaders, Great Britain took it up on the front of the peloton.

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Though the gap remained above two minutes for about 20km, by the time the leaders reached the top of the only climb of the day - the cat 4  Col de l'Aubépin with 61km to go - their advantage was down to 35 seconds.

However, a three-man group - including Ireland's Rafferty - then attacked from the peloton and got across to the three leaders, making for a six-man breaking, including the two Irish.

The bunch was then lined out behind the six leaders and with 50km to go they were caught. However, Meehan again got clear just after the race passed the 20km to go marker, once again in a three-man group.

Behind them, attacks were being fired off the front of the bunch as riders began getting across to Meehan's group, which soon numbered eight riders and then 15, including the race leader. However, they too were caught, paving the way for the bunch sprint.

Tomorrow involves a summit finish to Tignes 2100 – a stage with 3,900m of climbing, where Irish climbers Meehan and O’Brien will look to make a big impression.

On Friday there is a 41.6km road race stage in the morning, comprised almost exclusively of climbing. That is followed in the afternoon by stage 6b, a 10.3km mountain TT to La Rosière. It averages 6.6 per cent, though the opening 5.5km is between 9 and 10 per cent.

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