Martyn Irvine (far right) was back in the colours of his UnitedHealthcare team today and got his road season off to a good start, helping teammte Jake Keough to victory in Taiwan.
Just over a week after taking a silver medal at the world track championships in Colombia, Martyn Irvine returned to the road today and made an impressive debut for the UnitedHealthcare team, helping teammate Luke Keough to victory on stage one of the Tour of Taiwan.
Irvine returned to Taiwan today, one year after breaking his femur in the same race, and survived a crash marred finale in today’s opening 60km criterium to help place Keough towards the front of the peloton before the final sprint began.
“It was a little crazy at the end with a few crashes that took some of my team-mates down," said 22-year-old stage winner Keough afterwards.
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“But I still had Martyn Irvine and John Murphy staying together to lead me out.”
Keough outsprinted Wouter Wippert of Drapac Porsche and Georgias Bouglas of SP Tableware for the victory and now leads the race by two seconds from Bouglas after time bonuses.
“They did a perfect job,” Keough said of Irvine and Murphy.
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“It’s big for us to come to Taiwan and win here. “We’ve had some good success in Asia recently with Isaac Bolivar third overall at Langkawi and Bradley White winning a stage and have a strong team and big races coming up in Europe with wild cards for Milan-San Remo and Paris-Roubaix.”
Irvine finished the stage in the middle of the peloton, just behind compatriot Stephen Clancy who is riding the race for team Novo Nordisk.
Luke Keough sprints to victory on a rain soaked opening stage of the Tour of Taiwan today.
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