Having established himself as a top elite road rider in his first season at U23 level in 2022, Dean Harvey has dominated the domestic cyclocross season in recent months and was today crowned national champion in Co Louth on a day when the rain lashed the riders.
From start to finish, Irish U23 road race champion Harvey led the men's race at the National Cyclocoss Championships at the McCrystal Track in Jenkinstown. And while he was threatened initially by Darren Rafferty (Hagens Berman Axeon), Harvey celebrated the start of his tenure with the Trinity Racing UCI Continental team with a national title win just two weeks into the New Year.
The defending champion, Chris Dawson (Dawson Racing), who has been more focused on MTB and eRacing of late, put in a great show again today and came away with silver.
Advertisement
Rafferty, who had been gaining on Harvey in recent weeks, took the bronze medal but after racing around in 2nd position for a long time until he was passed by Dawson on the fourth lap today.
In truth, the battle gold was put to bed on the third lap when 19-year-old Harvey reached for the bazooka and did a lot of damage. From that point, it looked like on major incident would derail Harvey's progress.
Harvey got away from the start like a rocket, with only Seán Nolan (Navan RC) able to live with him for pace. However, Harvey then began to pull ahead of Nolan, with Darnell Moore (Caldwell Cycles) slotting into 2nd while defending champion Chris Dawson (Dawson Racing) running 3rd.
Just behind, Rafferty's start was more modest and was trailing the leading trio on the opening lap, though never in trouble and never in danger of losing contact. Indeed, as the opening lap turned into the second passage of the circuit, Rafferty had caught and passed Dawson and Moore to moved into 2nd place.
Related News
And that was the pattern of the race from that point; Harvey leading, and tapping out a relentless pace, with Rafferty chasing hard. At times Rafferty appeared to close up a little, only for Harvey to pull the gap back out a little. For a long time, fewer than 10 seconds separated them, though given the quality of Rafferty the destination of the gold medal always hung in the balance.
At the end of the second lap Harvey had 10 seconds on Rafferty. Then it was Dawson - who can never be ruled out of any battle - running 3rd, some 29 seconds behind Harvey. And then after that top three came JB Murphy (Kilcullen Cycling Club Murphy Geospacial) and Moore.
On the third lap, Harvey appeared to up his game, the 19-year-old stepping it up and putting another few seconds of daylight between himself and Rafferty; the lone leader looking in great shape and attacking all of the small uphill sections to put a massive deposit down for the gold medal.
And while Rafferty was many people's pick to challenge Harvey for gold, it was Dawson who began to look the stronger of the two; passing Rafferty on the fourth lap and opening a gap of about 10 seconds. On the fifth lap, Harvey had opened a gap of over 50 seconds on Dawson with one lap remaining. Rafferty was another 10 seconds behind Dawson on 3rd place, with Dawson appearing to have the upper hand.
Harvey started the last lap with a gap of about 1½ minutes over Dawson, with Rafferty about another minute back, followed by Moore in 4th and Murphy in 5th, followed by Graham Boyd (McConvey Cycles) and Kevin McCambridge (Trinity Racing)
And on that last passage of the circuit was just as relentless; adding more than 30 seconds to his gap over Dawson, who in turn extended his advantage of Rafferty - the race ending in a really quality podium.
Lots more to come.
