Aiming for an elite world title and world record in the next few years would be pie in the sky for most 19-year-olds. But Ireland's Ryan Mullen looks like an exceptional talent.
By Brian Canty
Newly-recruited An Post Chainreaction rider, Ryan Mullen has set himself a target of becoming World Champion in the 4km individual pursuit and breaking the world record set by Australian Jack Bobridge.
The Irishman is one of the best talents in the world right now, as 7th place in the recent U23 World TT Championships in Florence attests. And last week he put pen to paper on a contract with the Belgian-based team for 2014.
The 19-year-old said he’s looking forward to getting stuck in, is excited about the prospect of stage races and is keen to keep up time-trialing as much as possible.
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Of his move to the team from UK squad IG-Sigma Sport, he explained: “I’d been talking to Kurt (Bogaerts, An Post team manager) for a while and I knew he was interested from the time of the European Track Championships in the summer.”
“I always wanted to be in the team myself; it’s a cool team. They have the programme of races and they have the backing and it seems like a pretty good team to go to.”
“I know most of the guys in the team and raced against them all before. I’ve a pretty good friendships with them.”
He added the fact that so many riders have come out of An Post and gone to bigger teams - citing Sam Bennett, Any Fenn and Matt Brammeier - was also a factor in his decision.
“They’ve all moved on so it’s obviously a team where if you get the right results you will move up. They get to ride all the big races too so you’re exposed to the bigger teams.”
“And if you perform well you will get noticed and that’s my reasoning behind going there. That’s my whole motivation for going there; to try and move on.”
Mullen is a very assured young man and is very clear about what he wants to do in the sport.
He has also set for himself some big career targets, such as beating Australian Jack Bobridge’s record for the 4km individual pursuit; 4mins 10.534secs set in 2011.
“When he got that pursuit record, that was a great moment, so if I could chase that….to just become individual pursuit world champion is my goal. That’s my big goal and that’s what I want to do.”
Right now, he’s taking some well deserved down time after a hectic season of time-trials, the cirterium Tour Series as well as trying to peak for the Nationals, the Europeans and the Worlds. But he’s still hungry and motivated for 2014.
“I really can’t wait,” he said of the year ahead.
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“I know a lot of guys say that before the season but I’m actually genuinely excited to start racing. I want to get stuck in and get some results.”
“I’ve raced a bit in Belgium before, a few of the pro kermesses and been there or thereabouts in them. At the end of this year I started to feature more and was in breakaways. I know how to race them, and the benefits they bring.”
Undoubtedly, Mullen’s really big strength is the time trial and he is already one of the best in the world in the U23 ranks despite having four more years at that level. It would be no surprise to anyone in the sport if he became world champion and went on in very short order to win major pro tests, including stages in Grand Tours.
Many would point to the success of British rider Alex Dowsett in winning a Giro TT stage this year as the kind of performance Mullen could emulate very quickly.
Despite having just signed for a team with a pack road race schedule for most of the year, Mullen wants to continue to work on his testing.
“It’s something I definitely don’t want to let go and it’s one of my strong points so I think it’d be very foolish to give that up. I’m sure Kurt will have some kind of programme that has time trials.”
“I’m really happy with how I’ve done this year. I always progressed every week and if I do the same next year who knows what kind of results I might get.”
“I didn’t actually do a lot of training this year on the track, but I guess you could say I did enough. My first pursuit this year was the International Track GP in Sundrive. It was the first ever 4km pursuit I had ridden.”
The first-year U23 rider beat Martyn Irvine’s stadium record by 10 seconds, with Irvine now the World No 1 ranked pursuiter, having taken a silver medal at the Worlds this year and also captured the scratch race world title.
As regards other memorable performances this year, he says the U23 European Track Championships in Portugal, where he took two bronze medals, stood out.
“The scratch race at the Europeans, the way I rode the race, I was able to deliver at the end when it mattered most,” he said.
“Things weren’t really going my way in the race, everything was getting pulled back and all my moves were getting shut down. The original plan was to go with six laps to go but I tried with nine and I was pulled back straight away. I recovered for a few laps and hit everyone again at the bottom and next thing I know I was half a lap up.”
“It’s insanely hard; the track racing. It’s a very fine line between balancing yourself and going totally fucking mental, but it’s a lot more technique based than the road.”
“The strongest guy on the track rarely wins, generally. It’s always the guy who knows how to ride the track the best and there’s so many ways you can save energy in a scratch race or a points race. And it’s all about knowing when to do certain things and when to save energy and when to turn the heat up. That’s something I have to learn.”
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