‘I wanted to redeem myself today’ – Darren Rafferty handles the heat to seal national road race title

The 20-year-old Coalisland native, in his first year as a professional with WorldTour team EF Education-Easypost, made the round trip from his base in Girona worthwhile when he soloed clear of the remnants of a nine-man breakaway group that dominated the day’s proceedings to claim his first victory of the season.

“It’s pretty incredible,” Rafferty said afterwards. “After a disappointing time trial on Thursday, I wanted to redeem myself a bit today but I didn’t think I had the legs or the fitness to get a good result so I came into the race with low expectations and just thought I’d see how it panned out.”

As is the norm at the nationals, there were a flurry of early attacks before a nine-man group containing Rafferty, pre-race favourites Eddie Dunbar (Jayco AluLa), Dillon Corkery (Saint Michel), Rory Townsend (Q36.5), Conn McDunphy (Skyline), Dean Harvey (Trinity), Finn Crockett (Volkerwessels) and Leo Doyle (XSpeedabout) went clear around 45km into the 161km race. Also in the group was Rafferty’s younger brother Adam, who won the U-23 time trial championship on Thursday.

“It was nice racing with my brother again,” admitted the elder Rafferty. “He got away in that first attack with Eddie, so I tried to let that group of four get a bit of a gap and let him get ahead.

“A group of five of us jumped across then and it was a good strong group of nine. That was the break for the day.”

Rafferty first showed his hand as the race hit the shorter finishing circuit, with around 25km remaining, but his initial move was reeled in and countered by Crockett and Dunbar.

A combination of these attacks and a tough climb on the circuit whittled the front group down to five before Rafferty went again, this time going clear with only French-based Corkery for company with around 20km to go.

The duo pulled out a 35-second gap on the run-in before Corkery cramped in the last 9km, leaving Rafferty alone out front. He used his strong time trialling skills to stay there to the line, crossing it 16 seconds clear of the Banteer man. Former champion Rory Townsend took the sprint for third just over a minute later, edging out Harvey – who claimed the U-23 title in the process.

The shamrock jersey will now transfer from the shoulders of Rafferty’s team-mate Ben Healy, who skipped nationals this year in preparation for a debut at the Tour de France next weekend.

“It was so nice to do it here with so many people from my home club, Island Wheelers, and to keep it with EF for another year is really nice for the team and for myself.

“Once we got to the local lap, the final climb got a lot harder each time but I just had to dig deep and keep pushing. Hopefully I’ll get some good races in the jersey now, try and do it proud. It should be a good 12 months.”

Saturday’s elite women’s race saw Limerick woman Fiona Mangan do the double, having been crowned time trial champion on Thursday evening.

Mangan, riding for the US based Cynisca team, took her victory with a last-gasp attack that saw her close in on Grace Reynolds (Brother UK – On Form), who had spent most of the 118km race out front alone, in the final few hundred meters before outsprinting her to claim gold.

Defending champion and WorldTour star Lara Gillespie (UAE) took the sprint for bronze ahead of Westmeath’s Caoimhe O’Brien (Das-Hutchinson), who took the U-23 title.

“I’m still a bit overwhelmed,” Mangan said of her perfect weekend. “It’s really special, Limerick, for me. I always get good luck here. I knew I had the legs going into today and I really did study the course. I came out here last week and did a good few runs of it. It just gives you that confidence then during the race.”

Mangan’s hopes of victory looked to be fading when early attacker Reynolds put in a dogged performance to hang on solo out front until the death.

“Grace put in some ride,” said the newly crowned champion. “We got into a group and I was trying to roar at everyone to work together to catch her. Then, when the gap started closing, we started playing cat and mouse again.

“I just thought I’d wait till the hill here because I knew after that you have a descent, so if I went hard as I could on the hill I’d be able to survive for the descent.

“I tried on the first small lap but I couldn’t get away and then, on the last one, I just went as hard as I could up the hill.”

Patrick Casey and Lucy Benezet Minns took the junior men and women’s titles respectively.