STEPHEN ROCHE has accepted an invitation to be one of the three delegates from the Federation of Irish Cyclists to the Olympic Council of Ireland.

Billy Kennedy, who was ousted as president of the FIC at the annual general meeting in November, remains a member of the OCI. The new FIC president, Pat McQuaid, joins the secretary, Jack Watson, as a delegate and, when invited by McQuaid, Roche agreed to accompany them when required to attend meetings.

Roche is now based in Dublin because of some business interests and this could be the start of him getting involved in Irish cycling in an official capacity.

He was only 20 when he contested the Olympic road race in Moscow in 1980 before he turned professional and capped his great career with victories in the three major events, the world championship, Tour de France and Tour of Italy in 1987.

Irish cycling has slipped to a low level since the heady days of the Roche Sean Kelly era and to have such a high profile personality willing to play a part can only be beneficial.

The national team director, Alasdair MacLennan, has drawn up a squad for the under 23 category events but changes will, of course, be made if necessary as the new season unfolds.

There are 13 listed, headed by the road race champion, Michael Fitzgerald. Aidan Duff, Mark Hutton and Ciaran Power will, like Fitzgerald, be racing with French teams again, and the others are Mick O'Donnell, Michael McNena, Michael Smyth, Stephen O'Sullivan, Pat Moriarty, Conor Lally, Shane Baker, Michael O'Reilly and Michael Woods.

As MacLennan will be concentrating on the Olympic hopefuls in the track and mountain bike events he will not be able to go with Irish teams to all the top road races, particularly the FBD Milk Ras from May 18th to 26th, and he is appealing for applications for managers for that and other important assignments.

At the first meeting of the new FIC board last Saturday all of the committees were not ready for ratification. The chairman of the under age committee, John Joe Daly, was absent and McQuaid expects to have that position clarified by the time of the next meeting on February 10th.

Daly's Kerry region has led the way in the drive to try and boost interest and increase membership. The Kerry County Board have a new venture, a community employment scheme being promoted by FAS and it is hoped this will be extended to other areas.

A group of 15 are involved in Kerry and the initial impact was very successful. After they visited schools and explained the benefit of cycling to pupils a total of 196 accepted invitations to go on spins at Killarney, Killorglin, Listowel, Kenmare and Cahirciveen.

The scheme is to continue until October by which time every school in Kerry will have been visited and it is hoped to discover some talent to help keep the county to the fore in Irish cycling.

The FIC board members are concerned over the upheaval in the British CF as talks were being arranged to try and resolve the crux that has arisen over the Northern Ireland CF affiliation.

Tony Doyle was elected the new president in Britain in December but there was a mixed reaction to him as head of the federation and a vote of no confidence in him was passed in Manchester on Saturday.

He refused to stand down and an extraordinary general meeting has been called but that will not be until March when the new season will be under way.