Trailblazer Lydia Boylan: "I didn't look back. I couldn't believe it"
A picture Lydia Boylan will cherish for a very long time to come. The two-time Irish national champion winning the final stage of the 2.2-ranked Setmana Ciclista Valenciana in Spain (Photo: Bart Hazen)
By Brian Canty
Lydia Boylan is reflecting on the greatest win of her career at the weekend when she won a professional road race for the very first time.
The two-time Irish road race champion attacked a small break a couple of kilometres from the finish of the final stage of yesterday’s Setmana Ciclista Valenciana and held on for grim death to the line.
She was a spent force by the time she made it over the whitewash and now reckons the win can be a launch pad for the rest of her season.
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“How to put that into words I just don't know,” she said of what is the biggest win ever by an Irish woman on the road.
“It’s just one of those things that happens so quickly you don't realise it is happening. And then it does happen and you still can't believe it actually did happen.”
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At 10km to go there was a Drops rider off the front solo and Boylan found herself on the front of the peloton as a few had attacked and she was just following.
“I thought it was inevitable it would come down to a bunch sprint and we had Katie Archibald who's pretty fast. So I knew we were set up well for the sprint.
“We got a gap and I worked the little breakaway thinking ‘this might actually stick’.”
With the bunch closing in behind and about to make the catch before the red flag Boylan kicked hard and got a gap.
Couldn't believe it...
“I never looked back. I went around the last left-hander and I still had a gap. I couldn't believe it.
“It’s me best moment in cycling I think. It's hard to process it all really. I knew I had good form but I never really knew I could pull off a win like that.
“My nationals wins are special but they are different. I go into those races knowing I can win.... so there's always more pressure on myself to perform.”
Having admitted she wasn’t worried about being good enough to race at this level, it’s quite a different thing to go and actually prove it.
“I've been training hard recently and the form is there and that's pretty evident now.”
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