Robin Seymour may be now aged 41 years, but he is showing no signs of slowing down and is seen here romping away to another win in River Vally, Swords, north Dublin, yesterday (Photo: Sean Rowe)
By Gerard Cromwell
Multiple national cyclocross champion, Robin Seymour confirmed his favourite tag for the upcoming national championships when he dominated the final round of the High5 North Dublin Cyclo-Cross League yesterday, Sunday.
He beat Glen Kinning of East Antrim and Sean O’Tuathail of Bray Wheelers in River Valley, Swords, north Dublin, to the top of the podium on a technical course.
Seymour’s sheer grit and determination meant he rode up the steep uphill section that saw all but himself and Dundalk’s Ray O’Shaughnessy carry their bikes up. This combined with excellent technical skills saw him pull away from the rest of the field early on and win the race comfortably.
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“If you can ride up the hill it helps,” said Seymour afterwards.
“You carry the speed over the top of the hill and can keep accelerating then. But in really heavy conditions like this, it makes it hard.
“The bike’s heavy to pick up, heavy to run with and it makes it tough. It was a good, tough course and it’s great to race on something that’s this hard. It breaks the race up.”
Now aged 41 years, Seymour shows no signs of slowing down and is still head and shoulders above all but current national champion and recently crowned Ulster champ Roger Aiken on the domestic scene. So what’s the secret of his success?
“I think being able to do things like that... having the determination to cycle up that hill is part of it,” he said.
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“I think the attitude of doing that, whether it be cornering quickly, riding through the mud, dismounting and mounting better; it’s all the little things that add up. On parts of the courses I’m not necessarily the strongest rider but, overall, I think it probably adds up and keeps me in front.”
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Seymour knows too that his dominance can’t last forever and there is a good group of young riders chomping at the bit behind him.
“It’s great how competitive it was today,” he noted.
“If you look just behind me there’s a group of four or five riders going around together halfway through the race and I think they will leap forward soon.
“It’s good too because they’re mixing and changing. One falls back and the other guys come up and it’s good the way it’s chopping and changing as it’s made it really competitive.
“Every weekend it’s different people up there. Obviously Roger is the big one for me to beat at the moment and it’s very difficult to judge, even on today’s performance, how well I’m actually riding.
“You’re only talking about a minute between my best day and my worst day, maybe a bit more on a course like this. But where does that put you in relation to Roger? If you’re a minute behind him or in front of him, you can’t tell.
“You do what you have to do to win these races but you’re never pushed to your absolute maximum and I’m sure it’s the same for him.”
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