What. A. Race. Not because of results (although the lads were riding well), but because of the event. Pi Cycles with Paul Birchall at the helm put on one hell of a show. The lap was one of the best we had ever ridden, and despite being the end of October, due to the unseasonal weather it was super fast. The lads rode around the warm up laps smiling at the brilliance of the lap and despite it being challenging, it was just plain fun to ride.
Ger, Robbie, and Kevin were first off in the B race and they both rode very well. Kevin was making his debut in CX and finished well up in the top 20. Robbie got off to a flyer of a start and was leading, then second for the first half of the race. Ger had a slow start, but had moved up to 3rd on his own. Then disaster struck when Robbie became a cropper at the barriers and broke his helmet. He managed to get a new one from Richie at the pit but was now just out of the top 10. Ger was on a stormer of a ride and lap by lap was putting time into 3rd place and was holding the gap to the leader. That was how he would finish, and his was the stand out result of the day. Robbie just snuck into the top ten, and was definitely on for the podium had he not crashed heavily. Stevie had made the step up to A racing and joined Richie and Russell on the start line. This was the strongest field so far in the league with the current National m40 champion and World m40 champion Robin Seymour in the field, along with many of the strong Leinster riders who made the trip down. Richie was on the front row of the grid and got off to a good start. Despite a couple of small falls in the 1st 2 laps he was on for battling for a top 5 until his chain got jammed between the chainring and the frame on the 4th lap, 6th lap and again on the 8th lap, putting him out of contention. However he still managed 9th. However due to the misfortune of others on the day, he moved up one place to 3rd in the Senior A league, and is 4th overall- 11 points off top spot with 3 races to go. However in the grand scheme of things Richie got off lightly with a jammed chain compared to the misfortune that befell Russell. While jumping the barriers on the 3rd lap, he hit the 2nd barrier and fell. Normally this wouldn't be an issue and Russell jumped back up ready to continue. However the bike wasn't so lucky. His frame had broken in half. This is every cyclist's worst nightmare. This was apparent when after the race half the riders came up to offer their condolences for his loss. It's a testament to his mentality and competitiveness that after the race, Russell was more concerned about the points he had lost in the league rather than the bike he had destroyed. Expect to see him primed and ready in 2 weeks time to put in a serious performance in Aghada. Stevie had a solid race for his first A race and finished well up in the m40 ranking. No bad luck befell him and he rode hard without incident which makes his story of the race a fairly boring one. (Get your act together and have a good story for us next time Stevie!). Big thanks today to Pi Cycles, Revolution Cycling Club, and Focus Munster CX team who were the promoters of this round. Visit them at www.picycles.ie. Thanks again to John Dempsey for his continued support of the league through Verge. Next up is DeRonde CX in Aghada on the 12th of November. Entries can be found here:
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St.Finbarrs Cycling ClubEst. 1938 Archives
October 2017
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