Archie Ryan’s Tour de l’Avenir campaign had an unwelcome complication close to the finish of Monday’s second stage, with the climber crashing and losing 39 seconds to the main peloton. The stage was won in a 71-man bunch sprint by the Canadian Riley Pickrell, who edged past a prematurely-celebrating Radoslaw Fratczak of Poland at the finish line in Chinon.
Jamie Meehan was the sole Team Ireland rider to finish in the main pack, with Ryan next home. Odhran Doogan and Kevin McCambridge were slightly over one and two minutes back respectively, with Doogan and Patrick O’Loughlin both falling during the stage. Dean Harvey was a non-starter due to illness.
Ryan has a lot of road rash but appears to have avoided more serious injury. “I decked it hard at the front with 10km to go,” he told The Irish Times. “I lost fair bit of skin on left side of body, [but] all seems structurally okay. I will see how it recovers for tomorrow.”
Tuesday’s third stage is a 21km team time trial which Ryan had pinpointed before race as a place where the Irish team will likely concede some ground to his big rivals in the general classification. He and the rest of the team will hope to shrug off the effects of the crashes and limit their losses as best as they can before the hillier second half of the race.
Ryan took the best-ever overall result by an Irish rider last year, netting fourth in the general classification. He was also second on a stage. The Wicklow rider missed most of this season due to a knee injury, finishing fourth in his first race back just over one week ago.
Despite that disrupted preparation he is hoping to fare well in the climbing stages and, if possible, target the general classification.
The 22-year-old was recently confirmed as turning professional with the EF Education-EasyPost squad from next season.
Meanwhile Irish junior time trial champion Adam Rafferty (Team 31 Jolly Cycles U19) had a fine performance on the final day of the two-day Tour Junior Causses-Aigoual-Cévennes in France on Sunday, dominating the 9.1km stage 2 time trial. He beat the second-placed rider Camille Charret (VC Villefranche Beaujolais Juniors) by 33 seconds, then finished fifth in the concluding third stage that afternoon.
That saw him win the general classification, 18 seconds clear of Charret.
Elsewhere in France, Rás Tailteann winner Dillon Corkery (CC Etupes) also won a time trial on Sunday, taking the second stage of the Saint-Brieuc Agglo Tour in Pordic. The 24-year-old ended the 2.12.1 ranked French event 14th overall.
