North Cork riders perform strongly at the National Road Cycling Championships

Danny Curtin, founder of Kanturk O’Leary Stone, spoke The Corkman about the performances of North Cork riders at the race, which was organized by Newcastlewest Cycling Club from the village of Athea and consisted of time trial and road race events in the junior, U23s and senior men’s and women’s categories.

As he often does, Banteer’s Eddie Dunbar stole the show by winning the men’s Senior Time Trial event on a 36.3km test course that started and finished in Athea last Thursday evening (June 20). The Team Jayco-AlUlA rider defeated fellow top professional Ryan Mullen of Bora-Hansgrohe by a margin of 15 seconds after a time of 45:09 on the track.

Danny said his former cycling student’s performance was “exceptional” as he had not raced since crashing out of the Giro d’Italia at the beginning of May and had never been a pure time trialist.

“For a guy who is not a time trialist, his first medal was for U16 time trial. He never had a medal until then,” Danny explained.

“The Youth Championships were held in Limerick that year. Myself and Vincent O’Connor took him out to do the time trial course about three mornings a week for about four weeks.

“The following year he won the juniors in the north. I think he won the U23 two years after that.”

Dunbar’s latest win means he has now retained the national TT champion jersey across all age categories.

“He’s an individual rider by and large, he’s a guy who can go out and ride all day long,” Danny said.

Dunbar’s time trial success did not carry over to Sunday’s Senior Men’s Road Race in which he finished eighth, perhaps due to his lack of “racing legs”. But another Banteer man who also cycled with Kanturk in his youth achieved a great performance.

Dillon Corkery, the winner of the 2023 Rás Tailteann, won a silver medal in the 161km race, which started and finished in Athea. Although he would fall just short of the eventual winner, Tyrone’s Darren Rafferty (EF Education-EasyPost), Corkery (St Michel) put in a strong performance and led the race with Rafferty towards the end until he eventually lost his wheel and finished by 16 seconds . behind.

Danny said Corkery’s result was “very good” and if there had been another lap he might have overtaken the winner.

Perhaps the support of North Cork cycling fans played a role in encouraging Corkery and Dunbar to top ten placings as many came up the hill from Athea to cheer on the riders.

“You’d feel sorry for the other boys if our boys started bawling!” Danny joked.

The seniors race also included U23 riders who have current or past links with the O’Leary Stone club. Ronan Tuomey was the strongest performer, finishing in 19th place, while Sean Tarrant and Arnaud Dumoulin also competed.

Dumoulin’s brother, Olivier, competed in the junior road race but suffered an unfortunate mechanical failure after taking to the road early in the event, ruling him out of proceedings. However, his Kanturk teammate Rory Condon, who won the U16 championships last year, finished a strong fifth.

“He was the only non-continental rider in the top seven, the rest are in France and places in Europe,” said Danny.

One of the biggest success stories in North Cork was the Junior Women’s Time Trial, in which Kate Murphy of Sliabh Luachra won a bronze medal.

Murphy, from Knocknagree, also did well in the Junior Road Race where she came close to a bronze medal but was beaten close to the finish to finish fifth.

Danny said Murphy is a “strong” cyclist who has been selected for an Irish underage team that will race in Belgium next month before heading to the Netherlands as part of a Munster squad.