Katie George Dunlevy and Linda Kelly win paracycling gold in world championship time trial

Multiple Paralympic and world champion Katie George Dunlevy raced to yet another gold medal on Thursday, combining with Linda Kelly to win the women’s tandem time trial in Dumfries and Galloway, Scotland.

The duo clocked up Ireland’s first world title of this championships, building upon four bronze medals secured in recent days by other members of the paralympic team.

Dunlevy and Kelly covered the undulating 28.2km course in 37 minutes 18.22 seconds, beating regular rivals Sophie Unwin and Jenny Holl by just over a minute. Anne Sophie Centis and Élise Delzenne of France took bronze.

“I’m over the moon,” said Dunlevy. “It was a really hard race, I think I blew a bit halfway, but I just tried to give it my all. Linda did a fantastic job, it’s her first [world] title, I’m delighted for her – she’s put so much hard work in. To come away with another rainbow jersey is unbelievable. Every medal means so much, it’s just that hard work but also to give back to the team behind us.”

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Visually impaired Dunlevy most often competes with tandem pilot Eve McCrystal, winning two Paralympic golds in 2021 with her, plus several world championships. The duo won last year’s world championship road race and were second in the time trial. Last week, they took a bronze medal in the individual pursuit.

However, in order to try to qualify extra bikes for the 2024 Paralympics, Dunlevy has instead paired with Kelly in several big races since 2022, while McCrystal has partnered with Josephine Healion.

The latter duo were originally set to compete in Thursday’s time trial but had to sit out the event on medical grounds. They are aiming to compete in the paracycling road race on Saturday, as are Dunlevy and Kelly.

“There’s no pressure,” Dunlevy said. “We’ve got that gold there already, we’re just going to go into the road race and make it a hard race. There’s no pressure, we’ll enjoy it and are looking forward to it.”

Kelly partnered with Dunlevy last year to win the European Championships time trial, but this is her first world championship gold medal.

“We knew that the course suited both of us,” she said. “It’s just a course that you would have more momentum on if you select the right gears and take the right lines. I’m absolutely thrilled with my first title.”

Their victory builds on five bronze medals clocked up by paralympic riders in recent days.

Those were taken by Dunlevy and McCrystal in last week’s tandem pursuit, in the C4 individual pursuit and the scratch race by Ronan McLaughlin, plus in the C3 scratch race and the C3 Omnium by Richael Timothy.

Ireland’s non-paralympic riders have gone close to medals, with Lucy Benezet Minns taking a superb fourth in the junior time trial on Thursday and Darren Rafferty netting fifth in the under-23 time trial on Wednesday.

Rafferty was just 5.22 seconds off bronze in the latter event, while Benezet Minns was just seven seconds adrift in her race.

“It was pretty good. I went out pretty hard, I was a bit worried I had overcooked myself,” Benezet Minns said on Thursday. “I think the course suited me with the kicker [steep hill] at the end as well.

“I thought I had gone out too hard but in hindsight I did pretty good job pacing, and I had nothing left. But that’s the way you want to finish.”

Both she and 33rd-placed Áine Doherty were riding their first world championships. They are first year juniors and are therefore eligible to compete in the same age category next year.

Several other Irish riders were in action on Thursday. Ronan Grimes was sixth in the MC4 individual time trial, Timothy was seventh in the women’s C3 event, Damien Vereker and Mitchell McLaughlin were ninth in the men’s tandem race, and Chris Burns and William Clifford were 14th in the MC2 and MC3 categories respectively.

Cormac O’Callaghan made his World Championship debut in the MC1 time trial but unfortunately crashed was a non-finisher. The fall will see him miss Saturday’s road race. Chris Dawson was 32nd in the MTB cross-country short track event.

Racing continues on Friday with Ben Healy and Ryan Mullen competing in the elite men’s time trial, and Liam O’Brien and Adam Raffery going in the junior men’s equivalent.

Allister MacSorley (H4) and Declan Slevin (H3) will compete in the paracycling road races.