CYCLING NEWS:FOLLOWING A month-long break from competition due to injury, national road race champion Nicolas Roche will return to racing this Sunday when he competes in the Tour du Canton d'Argovie in Switzerland.
The 25-year-old has now fully recovered from the torn hamstring he suffered in the Tour de Romandie, and has been able to notch up progressively more training in recent days.
On Monday he began a training camp with his Ag2r La Mondiale squad at the ski village of La Touissure. “The leg is feeling good,” he said this week. “I don’t have any problems with it.”
While he is a bit short on stamina due to his time off the bike, he has time on his side. “I have a month to get ready for the Tour [de France],” he said. “Hopefully it will be fine. It is two weeks since I started back riding my bike, and I already feel that I am progressing every day.”
Sunday’s race will test his legs in advance of his start in the Tour of Switzerland next weekend. If things go well there, he feels relatively confident that his Ag2r La Mondiale team will select him for July’s big race.
“If I get to a certain level, I will have a chance to go again to the Tour,” he said. “I think the team trusts me now when I say that I feel I am going well, that I am going to be going okay.”
After the Tour of Switzerland, Roche is due to return to Ireland to try to defend the national title he won last year. He will also do the Stephen Roche Grand Prix four days beforehand in Meadowmount. They may be his only opportunities to race in the country this year, following the cancellation of the 2010 Tour of Ireland.
Meanwhile, other Irish riders are in action this weekend. Philip Deignan is due to line out in the Dauphiné Libéré. A good showing there by the Vuelta a España stage winner could well see him get the green light to ride his first Tour.
Across the Atlantic, Philip Lavery, Seán Bennett, Connor McConvey, Simon Williams and Marcus Christie lined out late yesterday in the Ville Saguenay Coupe des Nations event. Lavery’s bike was lost in transit to Canada but fortunately turned up on Wednesday.
FIXTURES
Today-Sunday:Rás Dhún na nGall, Killybegs. Sign on at 5pm.
Saturday-Monday:Cycling Pursuits 3-day. Stage 1 starts Newcastlewest at 4pm.
Sunday-Monday:IVCA Usher 2-day, Batterstown. Stage 1 starts at 9.15am. XC NPS round 5, Crag Wood, Killaloe; Youth racing, Waterstown Park, Palmerstown. Starts 11am.
