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Some of the lads in the club decided to race during the summer. Morgan Slattery and David Tracey raced at U-14 level in two races. The first race was the Navan CC race. The race was well attended, with about 20 competitors in the U-14 race. The following are some pictures taken before and during the start of the race. Click on the pictures to make them bigger.

The race was a 3 lap race (each lap being about 4 miles). Morgan and David, given that it was their first race, decided to keep to the back of the main group, so that they could see what was happening, and get a feel for what they might have to do. Unfortunately not long after the start of the race there was a crash in the middle of the group. The front of the group saw this as their opportunity to put some distance between themselves and some of their competitors. They made a break and got away. About 6 riders went down in the crash including David. 4 got into the ambulance, but David and one other got back on their bikes and continued on.
Morgan, while he just managed to miss the crash, also missed the break at the front of the group and ended up cycling the rest of the race with another boy and a girl. Morgan's companions seemed to be quite tactically aware. and let Morgan blast away at the front. Despite Morgan's best efforts, the two, in particular the girl made a determined effort to stay with him.See the pictures below (click on the pictures to make them bigger).

The group at the head of the U-14's competition continued the race at a fierce pace. There was little hope of anyone not in the group catching them. Nicholas Roche (son of Stephen Roche) was at the head of the group, and was the one of the principle contributors to the high speed at which they were travelling.

The finish of the race came soon, and turned out to be a very exciting one (as the following photo sequence shows), with Nichols Roche being awarded first place in the sprint finish.

Meanwhile, Morgan's two companions succeeded in staying with him all the way to the finish. The fact that Morgan towed them all the way to the end gave them a great advantage when it came to the sprint finish. As you can see from the photo sequence below, the girl made the most of her advantage, and much to Morgan's later annoyance, just piped him to the line.

However Morgan vowed to have his revenge in the next race that they met in, and took solace from the fact that he beat the other boy in the sprint.

David's one and only companion (who like David had crashed) soon dropped out, leaving David to cycle much of the race on his own. The U-16 group who were doing a 4 lap race, managed to catch David, but to his credit David stayed with them right up to their sprint finish. The U-16's less restricted gearing allowed them to pull away from David right at the finish. You can see him, just in the background of the 3rd picture, as the U-16 sprint to the line.See pictures below (click on the pictures to make them bigger).

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Last modified: April 13, 1999