About Us
Short history of the club
The club was formed back in 1985 by Brian Hammond and Jimmie Stagg who, inspired by the continental exploits of Sean Kelly and Stephen Roche and the growing domestic racing scene in Ireland, saw the opportunity to establish a road racing cycling club in Lucan.
Their hunch was right and the club soon grew with members from Lucan but also as far afield as Ballyfermot, Clondalkin, Leixlip and Celbridige. Within a few short years the young club had established itself amongst the top performing clubs in Irish cycling. Notable victories ranging from 3 day stage races, to national TT championships to road races, criteriums and track national championships were achieved by the likes of Brian Hammond, Rory Keane, Brian O’Connor, Paraic McGlynn, Robbie Higgins, John Herety and John Priest jnr amongst others.
Priest and Herety became the first First category riders in the club in 1989 and after stints racing internationally established themselves again domestically as a feared winning break-away, leadout and sprint double act in the 90s. They were ably supported by great riders across all the categories including Shay Murphy, Alan and Colm Dunne and Brian Burty Reynolds together with a fantastic back-up team.
Although still very much racing-centric the leisure section of the club also began to form around this time with many parents of the racers leading the way including Mary Ryan, Gregg O’Neill (RIP), Sidney Keane (RIP) and John Priest snr. Early club sponsors included Enik cycles and O’Neils pub Lucan, but the core sponsor soon became and remains Stagg Cycles of Lucan village.
Membership continued to grow peaking at about 50 until a big fall off in the late nineties reflecting the general fall off in cycling participation in that period. However, there remained a core small group involved who dipped into MTB for a while and thankfully kept the club alive to be ready for the second coming of Irish cycling. During that leaner time riders like Graham Thomas, Brendan Whelan and Daniel Kirwan kept the wins coming.
By 2011 we were in growth again and had riders getting the arms up, which incidentally was not permitted back in the earlier days. One hand on the bars at all times. Some familiar names from the 80s/ 90s like Eugene Murtagh and Priest popped up again with newer riders also hitting the top step of podiums including Ronan Killeen, Andy Keogh and notably Mark Reilly.
Around about 2014 club coach, racer and emerging Director Sportife Shay ‘Shaser’ Murphy realised none of us were getting any younger and that we needed to grow our youth and junior membership. Backed up by some other club members and amazing sponsors including Velo-Revolution, Green Tiger cars and Stagg Cycles he set about building on the past to secure the future. Instead of just harvesting the best junior riders from other clubs after they became successful the plan was to develop, invest in and organically grow our own talent.
The first batch of junior riders to receive coaching, nutrition advice, tactical training and Pro level race support were Dermot Trulock, Conn McDunphy, Cian Sutclife and Stevie Bryam. You might say the plan was a success as 5 International junior tour team participations were quickly followed by numerous national league and national level classic races wins together with conti pro-contracts (McDunphy and Trulock) and inevitably some bumps on the road. We had another great batch of 4 the following 2 year cycle but sadly the production line slowed after that. Our current Youth officer Austin ‘Ozzy’ O’Hagan is making great strides in getting the youth section going again.
The leisure section really exploded in this period with huge numbers joining and taking on the new form of cycling, the sportife, both nationally and internationally in Italy, Spain and France. Together with beginner groups overseen by Christy Stynes and intermediate groups these cyclists now form the core membership of the club swelling the membership to a peak of 195 settling at around 180 in 2022.
In recent years a number of members have become involved in cyclocross (CX) racing, while others enjoy CX training sessions with club mates. This has become a fast growing section of the club.
So that’s a brief history of the evolution of the club from the brainchild of two pioneers to the racing heights of the late 80s and 90s to the revival in the 2010s leading to the fully formed inclusive club it is today. Why not become part of the history and join up Now!
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