You Beauty: Ryan Mullen has plenty of time to take the applause of the packed crowd as he wins the National Road Race Championships in Westmeath today (Photo: Kevin Monaghan)
Having blasted to the fastest time on the night at the National Time Trial Championships in Co Westmeath on Thursday, Ryan Mullen has today taken victory in the U23 and senior combined road race contest.
The 19-year-old rider with An Post –Chainreaction made it into the breakaway that went clear after an intense early period of attacking, never to be seen again.
And nearing the end of the second last lap of nine 19km loops, Mullen attacked and broke clear alone. He went out onto the final lap solo with around 25 seconds of a gap and 10km later that had grown to over one minute.
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He remained incident-free in the run-in and took a great solo win, with team mate Sean Downey taking the sprint for second from Paidi O’Brien (The Edge-Osbourne Meats)
How it happened
In a very exciting contest, almost all of the big favourites from the pro ranks who had travelled home to Ireland to fight out the title race missed the main breakaway of the day.
That move took flight after the traditional intense period of attacking on the opening lap. And despite efforts to get on terms, the most significant chase coming from Dan Martin (Garmin-Sharp) and Damien Shaw (Aquablue); the breakaway was never caught.
In that move were: Dominic Jelfs (Madison Genesis), Paidi O’Brien (The Edge-Osbourne Meats), Sean Downey, Ryan Mullen and Jack Wilson (all An Post-Chainreaction), Bryan McCrystal and Neil Delahaye (Aquablue), Ali Macauley (Phoenix CC), Stephen Clancy (Novo Nordisk) and Roger Aiken (Banbridge CC).
When they went clear initially a number of chase groups went after them, with the gap to the first of those chasing bunches staying under one minute for a period.
Dan Martin and Damien Shaw try to get across to the breakaway but with so much power up front they never got close (Photo: Kevin Monaghan)
But with so much firepower up front, and especially with Aquablue having two big men in Delahaye and McCrystal in the escape and An Post-Chainreaction having three men there; the riders knuckled down and the gap grew.
There was then a general regrouping of the chase groups behind and in the early stages it was the Synergy Baku team of defending champion Matt Brammeier, Connor McConvey and Philip Lavery who were among the chasers, with Dan Martin and others.
However the gap remained stubbornly close to two minutes.
It was just after the halfway point that Shaw and Martin made their two-man move. And for a while it looked like those two big guns might close up to the leaders.
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However, going out onto the third last lap of the nine 19km circuits, the gap was at 1:40 and next time round it was more or less the same.
At the point, around 40 seconds behind the two chasers was a three man move containing Ryan Sherlock (Unattached), Mark Dowling (DID Dunboyne) and Conor Dunne (An Post-Chainreaction).
And just behind them was a large group led out onto the penultimate lap by Fraser Duncan of Northern CC-Dave Kane.
Phoenix CC's Ali Macauley leads the breakaway before the attacking started on the penultimate lap (Photo: Kevin Monaghan)
Up front, it was Sean Downey and Paidi O’Brien who took the initiative, attacking in a two man move from the breakaway as the second last lap had just begun; Downey driving it up the climb.
However, that was short-lived and as the attacking continued from the lead group on the penultimate lap it was Downey’s An Post-Chainreaction team mate Mullen who made the key move.
He broke clear in the second half of the penultimate lap and gained around 25 seconds on the breakaway as the riders headed out onto the last lap.
O’Brien was among those attacking behind to try to get across to Mullen, but the attacks were covered by the lone leader’s team mates Jack Wilson and Downey.
And as the time checks to Mullen came through, his lead had rocketed to 1:05 with 10km remaining and barring disaster the title was his.
He duly took the win well clear if the breakaway he had left, with Downey winning the sprint for second from O'Brien.
We'll have plenty more later.
- Mullen was awarded both the ‘senior’ and U23 titles, unlike Thursday’s time trial when he was fastest but only got the U23 gold. In the time trial there are two races; elite and U23. So anyone in the U23 race can only win that event. But today’s road race was for the ‘senior’ title, not the elite title. The senior race has an U23 component within it and so Mullen is now ‘senior’ champion and U23 champion. It is not possible to be elite and U23 champion at the same time. (Hat tip on this point to Paul Watson)
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