Mark Dowling takes third Brendan Carroll Memorial victory with late solo attack

Mark Dowling stormed to victory at the Brendan Carroll Memorial in Piltown tonight, to claim his third victory in the race. (Phot0 by Gary Guildea)

By Gerard Cromwell

Mark Dowling of DID Dunboyne took his third victory in the Brendan Carroll Memorial in Piltown, Co Meath, tonight when he slipped clear of an elite escape group in the last three kilometres of racing.

After numerous attacks and streams of groups going clear, Dowling found himself in an escape containing, among others, Paidi O’Brien (Osborne Meats-Edge Sports), Anthony Doyle (Velo Revolution), UCD’s Con Collis, local man Craig Sweetman of promoting club Stamullen M Donnelly and Ciaran Kelly of Bikeworx with two laps to go.

With many of the big hitters marking each other out though, the tail end of the group was caught a lap later just as the race turned left at the National Ecology Centre, Sonairte, with around three kilometres left.

First into the corner, Dowling seized the opportunity, clipped clear and opened a small advantage.

“Everyone was just catching their breath and it was just a very well timed attack,” said second placed Doyle afterwards.

“I saw him going. I could have gone, but in a race like that there’s only one man to watch and that’s Paidi.

"I was just kind of marking him pretty closely and when Mark went, I was thinking ‘Paidi’s waiting for me to go and someone else is waiting for him to go’. It was half a breath and he was gone.”

With the slight hesitation behind, Dowling opened the gap and began his time trial to victory while a crash at the head of the bunch on the final corner split the field again.

“There were good players in the group but we ended up marking each other and I suppose lads were looking at me and I was looking at lads,” admitted third placed O’Brien afterwards.

“I knew I didn’t have super legs but when Mark went he was impressive. He was gone and there was no catching him. Zippy had a good race too and I'm happy with third.”

Dowling soloed across the line with a handful of seconds to spare but didn’t put his hands in the air as the race had been so hectic he wasn’t sure if he had won or not.

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“I didn’t know if there was someone up the road or not,” admitted the Dunboyne rider later.

“Normally the races lately have been really stop-start, really negative. But today it was just flat out the whole way.

"I think every time I came up the back road I used it to attack, trying to be first one into the corner.

"On the second last lap I got away in small group with Paidi and ‘Zippy’. I was just trying to be careful to not do too many attacks and left it late on the last lap.

"I had to just put everything into one attack because I knew if I came to the line with those boys they’d just kill me in the sprint.”

Despite being better known as a climber, it was Dowling’s third victory on the circuit, with not a hill to be seen.

“I don’t know how, it’s pancake flat, but I’ve won the race twice before in the very same way as I did tonight. I attacked in the exact same place. It was just a gamble but it paid off.”