Irish team named for UEC Track European Championships

Cycling Ireland have named a five-strong team for the UEC Track European Championships in January.

The competition will take place in Apeldoorn, Netherlands from 10-14 January and will be a staging point for qualification towards the 2024 Olympics in Paris.

Mia Griffin, Alice Sharpe, Kelly Murphy, Lara Gillespie and Erin Creighton will participate in the women's endurance events.

Ireland are currently ninth in qualifying for the women's team pursuit with the top 10 set to progress to Paris 2024, along with placings in the the omnium and madison events.

"At this point in the Olympic qualifying process it's a small team focused on dialling in their main qualifying route for Paris via the team pursuit," said Cycling Ireland's high performance director Iain Dyer.

"Naturally as Olympic events the omnium and madison will take precedence in the bunch racing events, but we won’t pass up the opportunities that a championship presents in the other bunch events with an eye on attaining eligibility for Copenhagen World Championships later next year."