Rás Tailteann stage 3 - Evan Keane

Evan Keane:

The 71st Rás Tailteann was a race I came into with a lot of confidence. I was coming off the back of a win at the Sliabh Luachra Classic, a stage win at Rás Mayo, and the team also taking Stage 1A of Rás Mumhan, so morale in the camp was high heading into the week.

Going into the race, I knew the general classification probably didn’t suit me perfectly as a bigger sprinter/puncheur rider, so I had targeted Stages 1, 3 and 5 as my main opportunities.

As Luke mentioned in his diary entry, Stage 1 didn’t really go to plan for any of us in Orwell. We got caught behind the crash, which effectively ended both my chances for the stage and any hopes of a GC ride.

On Stage 2, I spent around 100km in the breakaway before eventually being caught with about 50km to go. It wasn’t a stage I had specifically marked down as one for a result, but I felt the best way to give myself a chance was to get up the road early. We had a strong group in the move and I was happy with how it worked, but as Sean mentioned, we never really got much more than two minutes, which made things difficult from the start.

By the final 30km of Stage 2, I had already started thinking ahead to Stage 3 and trying to save what I could for it. Unfortunately, when Stage 3 rolled around, the legs still weren’t feeling amazing. They were definitely a bit tired, but I still wanted to give it a proper go.

The racing was aggressive early on, but I decided to wait for a later move rather than following everything. Small groups kept going clear and being reeled back in, and once we got closer to the Category 3 climb, which was the main climb of the day, I moved up into position and slipped away in a larger move.

From there, one of the Wheelbase-Castelli riders attacked solo. I bridged across to him and we were eventually joined by four more riders. The six of us worked well together for roughly 30km and managed to build a gap of around a minute to a minute and a half at our maximum advantage.

I spent a lot of energy in that move, but at the time I genuinely thought it had the potential to stay away. The composition of the break was strong and everybody was committed. Eventually though, the time checks coming back from the convoy made it clear we weren’t going to make it to the finish, so I sat up and was absorbed by a chasing group of around a dozen riders.

That larger group eventually contested the finish, but after spending most of the day up the road, I just didn’t quite have the legs for the uphill sprint. I gave it everything I had, but 16th was the best I could manage on the day.

After finishing Stage 3, I was absolutely exhausted. I rolled back down to the team tent, which was set up in a car park below the finish, and lay on the ground for about 20 minutes. I couldn’t eat or drink anything. My stomach was completely sick from forcing gels and carb mix in during the stage, and I genuinely couldn’t stomach anything for nearly two hours after the finish. Thankfully, I eventually came around and managed to get some food and carbs in ahead of Stage 4, although the plan for that stage was always to take things a bit easier and try to recover as much as possible for Stage 5.

Overall, I had hoped for a little bit more from the week. Last year my best stage result was 20th, so improving to 16th is still a step forward, but naturally I was aiming higher. More than anything though, it’s left me motivated and has definitely put a bit more fire in the belly for next year’s Rás Tailteann