Following last week’s appeal in relation to the Irish road race team for the Olympic road race, Cycling Ireland has finalized the three-man selection for the event.
Daniel Martin (Garmin-Barracuda), Nicolas Roche (Ag2r La Mondiale) and David McCann (RTS Racing) will represent the country in the road race, while McCann will also do the time trial.
The trio were originally chosen last week by Cycling Ireland’s three man selection panel, which comprised An Post Rás director Dermot Dignam, international commissaire Paul Watson and Dr. Giles Warrington of Dublin City University’s School of Health and Human Performance.
However Irish road race and time trial champion Matt Brammeier lodged an appeal on Thursday June 7th, and as a result a five-person Cycling Ireland Selection Appeal Panel (CISAP) considered if there were grounds for his petition.
Richard Archibold from the Sport Institute of Northern Ireland, the law practitioner Aideen Collard, Swim Ireland high performance director Shane Keane, Cycling Ireland board member Anto Moran and Anthony Walsh, who has a Masters in Sports Law, weighed things up. Cycling Ireland has not released details of that appeal, but has confirmed to VeloNation that the original selection will stand.
Martin is Ireland’s top points scorer this year, both in terms of world ranking points and under Cycling Ireland’s selection criteria, which awarded points for top ten placings on stages and in one day UCI-ranked events. McCann and Sam Bennett (An Post Grant Thornton Sean Kelly) actually had more CI criteria points than Roche, but selectors also could award up to 100 points as a subjective assessment of each rider’s suitability to the London course and their potential to do well.
Roche’s past results such as second on stages of the Tour de France and Vuelta a España plus his stage win in the Tour of Beijing underline that he has the ability to mix it with the top riders. He is currently fifth overall in the Tour de Suisse.
McCann scored points this year in the An Post Ras and the Tour of Korea, both 22-ranked races. Brammeier has not taken any top ten finishes in UCI races in 2012, making his appeal reliant on that 100 bonus points.
The Olympic road race will be held on July 28th, with the time trial on August 1st.