Stunning Austrian conquers Seskin as Mark Dowling & Eoin Morton fly Rás Irish flag

Mark Dowling has put in an excellent ride on the summit finish of Seskin Hill, blasting up the famed Carrick ascent for a top 10 on the day and the county rider prize on Rás stage 6 (Photo: Pat Doherty)

Having come into this race with last year’s runner up Connor McConvey as their big hope for the general classification, the Synergy Baku team was forced to rethink when the Belfast man lost time. And this evening in Carrick they are celebrating their second stage win of the week.

Markus Eibegger spent most of the day out front in the breakaway before attacking it when the cooperation in the escape began to fall apart.

He then spent an hour or more in a two-man move off the front as the breakaway he was with was reabsorbed by the peloton, led by the An Post-Chainreaction team and the Austria Tirol Cycling Team of overnight leader Clemens Fankhauser.

However, with Remi Pelletier-Roy (Canada National Team) for company, Eibegger was never caught by the much depleted chasing pack.

And when a chase group – containing the very impressive UCD CC duo of Con Collis and Eoin Morton - got across to the leading pair during the pointy end of the stage, the 29-year-old Austrian simply waited for the 1.5km Seskin Hill near Carrick.

Once it began, he blasted away from those he was with to take a massively impressive victory after a final hour of racing that saw riders soaked and hit by cold temperatures.

An Post-Chainreaction’s Owain Doull was second, with double stage winner and former yellow jersey Patrick Bevin (New Zealand) in third and David Chopin (France Bretagne Velotec) in 4th place.

Mark Dowling of the DID Dunboyne team was best Irish man in 7th, with the flying UCD rider Eoin Morton in 8th on the day.

Today's stage 6 from Clonakilty to Carrick, a 168km trek, started fast and aggressively with plenty of moves going clear but being pegged back.

Present in that early action were a number of Irish riders including Morton, McConvey and Simon Ryan (Tipperary South).

And while those moves came to nothing, when the key breakaway eventually pulled clear after around 20km of racing, the aforementioned Simon Ryan was impressively in it; clearly going very well after six long and hard stages.

Also in the nine-man escape were Damien Shaw (Aquablue), Ronan McLaughlin (Donegal Inishowen Gateway Mccafe) and Ian Richardson (Dublin Central UCD Arrow). They were with Remi Pelletier-Roy (Canada National Team), Markus Eibegger (Azerbaijan Synergy Baku Cycling), Micha Glowatzki (Germany Team Kuota), Davide Ballerini (Italy Team Idea 2010 ASD) and Lars Horring (Netherlands Parkhotel Valkenburg).

No Fear: Eoin Morton is having the week of his life on the Rás, with the legs and the bravery to go toe to toe with the pros and make the breakaways during some very tough racing (Photo: George Doyle)

Less than 30km later, and with a really good effort being put in by all up front, that gap had grown to 1:55.

The nine very nearly became 10 while the gap was still a little smaller, with Shane Archbold of An Post-Chainreaction getting right up to the back of the escape before sitting up and waiting.

He apparently stalled on team orders, to assist the chase back in the bunch for Sean Downey, who was 8th overall this morning and the team’s best bet for a big GC result.

With around 70km covered, the gap between breakaway and bunch had reached almost 3:30. But disharmony set in, with some of the foreign riders arguing and bringing each other out the back before jumping each other.

Eventually, Remi Pelletier-Roy (Canada National Team) and Markus Eibegger (Azerbaijan Synergy Baku) attacked the leaders and pushed on alone, still with around 90km to race.

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And incredibly that long range two-man move would lay the basis for the stage win.

They pulled out a minute immediately, and that pushed on to 1:30, with the gap between the leading pair and the bunch now four minutes.

An hour later that gap to the bunch was 5:45, with the remains of the original breakaway in the middle as the main field disintegrated behind, down to no more than 30 or 40 riders.

The remains of the original breakaway were then caught by the depleted yellow jersey bunch, but not before Shaw and Ryan attacked the group and were last to be caught by the ‘peloton’.

With the race leader’s team and the An Posts taking turns in the chase, the gap to the two leaders tumbled and with 35km remaining it was down to 1:40. Some 10km later it was just one minute.

George Tansley (Australia Team Subaru Albion) was then first to get across to the two leaders from the yellow jersey group as the stage finale started earnest.

They were then joined by Robert Partridge (Britain Velosure Giordana), Con Collis (Dublin Central UCD) and Eoin Morton (Dublin Central UCD).

Owain Douill (An Post Chainreaction), David Chopin (France Bretagne Velotec) and Matteo Collodel (Italy Team IDEA 2010) then also jumped across.

Then Morton moved clear of the expanded breakaway with Partridge and Eibegger, before being caught by some of the riders they had just left and some men who had jumped across from the yellow jersey group, now just 35 seconds back.

And when that lead group arrived at the finishing climb still out front, it was Eibegger who proved strongest.

Morton lasted really well, taking 8th on the stage but just being pipped for the county prize by the best Irish man on the day Mark Dowling (DID Dunboyne) in 7th place, only 27 seconds off the winner.

Leader Fankhauser was unsure of his chances of keeping yellow before today’s stage, but the modest Austrian not only did enough up the finishing climb to retain his jersey with just two stages remaining, he actually extended his lead.

He now has 25 seconds on second placed Alex Peters (Madison Genesis), as against just 11 starting this morning.

Peters continues to lead the under 23 classification, Bevin holds points, Pettit keeps the mountains jersey and Sean Lacey leads the county rider classification.