Wherity on the rise as he claims another victory
STAMULLEN RC rider David Wherity took home top honours at the weekend as he triumphed in Rás an Laois.
This is following on from his two wins earlier in the season in Rás Naomh Finian in Clonard and the Boyne GP in Slane.
These recent successes have earned Wherity double promotion, moving from A3 to A1 in four weeks. The weekend’s race brought the riders across the lumpy roads of County Laois for 112km. Three riders managed to break free and work well together before Wherity sprinted to victory and an A1 upgrade!
While some riders decided to only tackle one day during the Easter bonanza of racing, 6 local riders in a combined Drogheda Wheelers and Stamullen effort faced the three-day, four-stage Tour of the North, which holds position as one of the most prestigious but challenging events on the Irish cycling calendar.
It was here that Cian Delaney showed his talent, taking three consecutive top ten results and mixing it with the very best within the country. Delaney opened his account on stage 1 where he finished 5th, putting himself in a very strong position before the 8km individual time-trial on Easter Sunday morning.
Delaney powered to 9th in the time-trial, a mere 26 seconds slower than the stage winner, which left him slightly over 40 seconds down facing in to the 65 mile circuit race on Easter Sunday afternoon, in which Delaney took another top ten.
These results combined with the efforts of his teammates Barry Hughes, Niall Craven, Sean Landers, Arek Klus and Colin Robinson meant that the team lay in the top quarter of that classification and placing the cycling scene from the North East firmly on top.
As Delaney stormed into the high placings, there was unfortunate luck for his team-mates Arek Klus and Niall Craven as they both punctured during the testing five laps of the ‘Roguery’ circuit, which sent the lads over 2,600 feet of climbing. Craven fought to catch up to the group and finished alongside club mate Barry Hughes.
This was a strong result from the two wheelers men before tackling the dreaded stage on Easter Monday, which brought the competitors over Torr Hill, a route not used since the Milk race almost 30 years ago!
This weekend sees the promotion of the Cycleways Cup by Navan Road Club, after poor weather conditions forced the cancelation of it earlier in the year. This faces the riders with a difficult 37km lap with the main races tackling four of these, a total of 139km.
Before this however, there is an opportunity for the local youth cyclists to open their season in Corkagh Park on Saturday, with the provincial body hosting a series of races for them. This is a welcome sight for many of the local youth riders as they wish to test their ability before the Drogheda Wheelers weekend of racing the following weekend which includes Ireland’s largest youth stage race, Rás na nÓg.