'It'll be great to show the Limerick colours abroad' - Fiona Mangan on Tour de France inclusion

LIMERICK cyclist Fiona Mangan has been selected to ride in this year's Tour de France Fémines with French team Winspace Orange Seal. 

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The Pallaskenry native is in her first year at ProContinental level and says she is 'feeling good' ahead of tomorrow's non-stage race, beginning Saturday (July 26), at Vannes, Brittany and ending on August 3 at Châtel in the French Alps.

'I'm feeling good, it's a win just getting to the starting line because it's such a big race. Not every team gets to do this race so even the fact that my team got selected and then for me to get selected within the team, I'm just really, really happy,' she said.

Fiona has had to show some real levels of resilience to get to this point in her career. The 29-year-old suffered separate broken bone injuries at Omloop Nieuwsblad in early March, a road cycling race in Belgium. Fiona broke both her hand and her collarbone. 

'I've had a bit of an up and down season with the crash earlier on in the year so I'm just happy that I'm healthy getting to the starting line now.'

'I had to get double surgery done. A lot of people were quite worried about my hand because the collarbone is actually quite common in cycling to break, I always say it's like breaking a toenail because you are usually back up on the indoor bike after a week or so but with the hand, you use it more than most people would probably think because of braking, steering and the vibrations of the bike,' she said.

Despite her injuries, Fiona competed in the Paris-Roubaix just seven weeks after suffering those injuries.

'I set it as a goal to do Paris-Roubaix and I really wanted to get back for that so what they ended up doing was they put a screw in my hand and that sped the healing process up massively. I was able to compete and thankfully I've had no problems since, I'm very lucky.'

Cycling wasn't a life-long goal of Fiona's. She had played Gaelic football growing up with Mungret St. Pauls but her love of the sport found her after her time at university in Galway, where she studied as a biomedical engineer. 

'I had been playing Gaelic football all my life with Mungret St. Pauls and it's when I went to college I kind of realised that you can't play with your club as often as you'd like because you're away from home. So I went through college without playing any sport and it's when I started working that I started to dabble in triathlons.'

'When Covid hit, I couldn't run because I had a running injury and I couldn't swim because pools were closed and I just said I'd give cycling a go. It's when I moved back home to Limerick that I joined Greenmount, the local cycling club and that's where I caught the bug for it,' Fiona said.

A move abroad to the north of Spain, during the Covid-19 lockdown, is where Fiona's cycling career began to progress. 

'In January of 2021, my boyfriend and I decided to go an do remote work in Spain just for a few weeks, because the lockdown was so bad in Ireland and we were like 'why not?'. We came to Girona which is a massive hub for cycling and from there I progressed bit by bit. I eventually took a step back from work last year and I'm full-time doing it now,' the 29 year-old said.

Fiona says that she is a proud Limerick woman stating that 'it'll be great to show the Limerick colours abroad' whilst also potentially inspiring the next generation of Limerick cyclists. 

'I'm definitely proud to be from Limerick. There was never much cycling where I grew up in Kildimo-Pallaskenry so I hope that this race can carve out a path for other girls and boys from Limerick who may want to go into cycling or anything like that.

'Hopefully I can show them that it can be done because this in an experience like no other. It'll be great to show the Limerick colours abroad,' Fiona concluded.