Ben Healy powers to 6th place in the Time Trial at the European Championships
Murphy 15th and Patterson 17th in Women's Time Trial
Ireland’s Ben Healy powered though the 24-kilomrtre course in a time of 28:01.56 to finish in 6th place at the European Championships. Still only under 23, Healy’s impressive performance landed him a spot on the hot seat, setting the fastest time when he finished before he eventually was pushed to 6th place finishing 55.60 seconds down on the winner.
The gruelling race against the clock was won by Stefan Bisseggar of Switzerland in a blistering time of 27:05:96, averaging 53.169kph. Stefan KÜNG (Switzerland) claimed silver just half a second behind Bisseggar while Italian rider, Filippo Ganna finished in third place.
Healy commented:
“I set out at a pretty hard pace to try and medal today, and I didn’t quite have the legs for that but held on until the end and still put in a really good performance and a really nice result.”
Healy believed he could achieve a good result going into today’s race.
“I kind of had the idea in my head after my national championships ride, we run the numbers and it was a pretty good performance. I came here with medals in mind potentially and that’s what I was gunning for today but to come away with 6th is still a really respectful performance.”
Speaking about his time on the hot seat, Healy added,
“It was pretty awesome, especially in an elite time trial sitting in the number one seat for as long as I did. You mind of have an idea that the faster guys go at the end and they’re going to knock you off but it’s supper nice being up there.”
Kelly Murphy and Joanna Patterson also competed in the Time Trial earlier today. Murphy completed the tough 24-kilometre Time Trial finishing 15th in a time of 33:25.84. The current time trial national champion averaged a speed of 43.092kph over the course finishing 2:25.94 behind the winner.
Speaking after the event, Murphy said:
“It was a really cleverly designed course; we recce'd it yesterday and it was quite hard to tell how it would go. There’s really massive stonking climb right at the very start which I think was very deliberately designed to blow the legs. It was quite crazy at the start, there was a big screen, and you could watch the girls before you go off and there was a timing chip right at the top so you could see how everyone attacked it and everyone was doing something completely different. It was basically a test of fitness as opposed to raw power, it was you know who’s got the legs to go over and carry on.
“Me and Jo predicted for ourselves that the race today would be between 33 and 34 minutes and the pair of us were right smack in the middle so we performed at that upper limit as we expected to. It’s always a hard day, Europe is a very hard continent to race against, you know some of the best girls in the World are here and some girls are just so strong and nobody enters the time trial unless they think they’ve got what it takes so everyone thinks they are a big dog so to finish 15th I think we were holding our own.”
Teammate, Joanna Patterson finished just 7 seconds down on Kelly’s time to place 17th overall with a time of 33:32.56, averaging 42.985kph.
Joanna said,
“It was really hot out there today but yah I feel good, I got around safely and that was the first thing. It was hard to judge the race, I kind of went off a bit too hard up the first climb when you feel fresh and you kind of pay for it quite soon after that, but I managed to get around and sort of focus on riding technically better and that’s one thing so I’m happy with finishing and my position.”
This was Joanna’s first time representing Ireland in a cycling event.
“It’s something that I didn’t really think of at all and it’s a big honour for me to represent Ireland. I’ve done it before in athletes and stuff and I never thought I would do it again, but it really is a big honour for me and something that I want to build on in the future.”
RESULTS WEDNESDAY, 17TH AUGUST
Time Trial
Ben Healy – 6th
Kelly Murphy – 15th
Joanna Patterson – 17th