New national record for Irish team pursuit squad at European championships

The Irish team pursuit squad raced to a new national record at the European track championships on Thursday, beating the Polish team in the first round.

The quartet of Alice Sharpe, Kelly Murphy, Lara Gillespie and Mia Griffin recorded a time of four minutes 19.705 seconds in the race in Grenchen, Switzerland. This was .033 seconds faster than the 4.19.738 recorded at last April’s Nation’s Cup in Glasgow.

Significantly, the time was over 1.7 seconds faster than their qualifying mark of 4.21.426 recorded on Wednesday.

Thursday’s performance saw the Irish riders finish fifth overall in the contest.

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Griffin was in action again on Thursday evening, riding the women’s elimination race. The race was won by Belgian rider Lotte Kopecky, who got the better of Valentine Fortin (France) plus the rest of the field. With the last rider over the line on each lap excluded, Griffin had a couple of close calls before finally placing 10th.

Earlier, Orla Walsh finished 16th fastest in the qualifying round of the women’s sprint, recording a time of 11.159 for the 200 metres. She progressed to the 1/16th finals but lost out to Ukrainian rider Oleksandra Lohviniuk there by 0.070 seconds.

The European Championships continue on Friday with a number of events featuring Irish riders. Conor Rowley contests the men’s sprint, Lara Gillespie rides the four-round Omnium and JB Murphy lines out in the men’s scratch race.