CYCLING Another National Record earns Top 5 placing for Ireland in Team Pursuit

17 Feb 2009


The Irish Team pursuit squad continued their ascent into the top tier of World Track cycling this morning by recording their second National record in 4 weeks to claim 5th spot in a world class field in the final round of the Track World Cup in Copenhagen. The time of 4.11.5 knocked over two seconds off their previous record with Ireland only missing out on a ride in the bronze medal ride-off by 0.7secs. This was another phenomenal performance by the team who left most of the world's leading track nations in their trail. Olympic champions, Great Britain, were fastest qualifiers in a time of 4.04.08 just over seven seconds ahead of the Irish.

The team of Paul Healion, Martyn Irvine, David McCann and David O'Loughlin rode in the eight heat of fourteen, and lead the event until GB took over at the top. It was an agonising wait for the Team as they were pushed out of the final when Spain surpassed their time in the last heat of the qualifying session.

Sam Bennett rode strong in the scratch race qualifiers to make the evenings final to make up for yesterday's disappointment. Sam rode well in the final but was unable to last the distance but the 18 year old done extremely well in his first World cup outing. This has been a good campaign for the Irish squad and another step up in level has been seen here.

Team coach Tommy Evans, was extremely happy with the teams ride, 'we had a game plan and the team stuck to that. We had tried it in training and it went exactly as we had planned. They rode very controlled and got the job done.

Team manager, Brian Nugent, was very satisfied with the team's progression over the weekend, 'We looked at Copenhagen as another opportunity for the team to show the progression that the National Programme has been making. It was very important that we came here and backed up what we did in Beijing last month. We did that convincingly and we have progressed a bit further. We are beating very good and well established teams and this squad is still in the early stages of its development. We are gathering good momentum and our confidence is high.'

 

  1. Great Britain 4 mins 4.08 seconds
  2. Spain 4, mins 8.465 secs
  3. Denmark 4 mins 8.924 secs
  4. Lokomotiv 4 mins 10.708 secs
  5. Ireland 4 mins 11.597 secs
  6. Belgium 4 mins 11.976 secs