Under-Age All-Irelands, 2000
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Kanturk Credit Union Cycling Club again
dominated the All-Ireland Under-Age Cycling Championships. The 2000 event was held in
Charleville and comprised of a time-trial and criterion street-race on Saturday, followed
by a road race on Sunday. The Kanturk club took sixteen All-Ireland medals, won half of
the team-categories and two individual-categories. In the U-11 category, Evan Dennehy, Pat Ahern and James Saunders took gold, silver and bronze, as well as the team prize. Along with these medal winners, the club had a large field on young U-11 riders that included Eoin Leahy, Adrian Jordan, Daniel O'Brien, Sharon Enright and Eleanor O'Brien. In the U-12 category, Gavin Browne and Kieran Enright took silver and bronze, and Noreen Curtin's seventh position also landed the team prize for Kanturk. Ian Jordan rode very well in this category and Mark Ballantyne lost out in the team prize by just one point. Noreen Curtin has been the only female winner of a medal for a number of years. The U-13 team of Maurice O'Brien, Andrew Kenneally and Keith Jordan were fighting for a team medal over the weekend and were in contention going into the road-race on Sunday. However, they failed to make up enough places in the final bunch sprint and were overcome by a stronger Killorglin squad. Danny O'Connor was hoping to hold onto his All-Ireland title going into the event but he came second by only two seconds in Saturday's time-trial. He also just failed to win the steet-race on Saturday evening and he was out of gold medal contention. However, his performance on Sunday's road race was one the outstanding displays of the Championships. He repeatedly attacked the bunch, finally got away, and crossed the line a clear two-minutes ahead of the rest of the field. This performance gained him the silver medal. Mark O'Brien and Colin Cross also gave good performances in this category.
The U-15 team of Eoin Daly, Christopher Higgins and Alan Ballantyne won the U-15 team prize. Eoin Daly gave a great performance by coming second in the road-race and this put him into fifth place overall. He might have climbed one place higher but was unfortunately impeded by traffic on the final section of his time-trial on Saturday. Christopher Higgins rode very bravely for the team and Alan Ballantyne's performance was very impressive considering that he had been training for just a short time. He is expected to improve significantly over the coming months. Paudi O'Brien was the overall winner in the U-16 category. Time-trialling is not his strongest event but just one second separated him from the time-trial winner. Paudi went on to win both Saturday's street-race and Sunday's road-race in decisive fashion and took the gold medal. Stephen Higgins also rode very strongly and consistently over the Championship and was an impressive seventh overall in what was the most competitive category. The performance at the Championships again confirmed Kanturk Credit Union as the strongest Under-Age club in the country. However, club coach, Danny Curtin, said that what gave him most satisfaction was the large number of young riders in the younger categories, their enjoyment and dedication, and the strong involvement of their parents. |
