Nally continues to show impressive form in Cuba

Cycling: Spanish-based professional Dermot Nally is continuing to build form in the Tour of Cuba, finishing sixth on stage eight of the race.

The Paternina-Costa Almeria rider finished towards the fore of a 23-man group in the 157-kilometre stage to Santa Clara, so adding to good placings he achieved earlier in the week.

Nally was 10th on stage three and then finished fourth on day six of the 2.5 ranked event. He is now 12th overall, 17 minutes and 28 seconds off the time of overall leader Pedro Pablo Perez.

Meanwhile across the Atlantic, Ciarán Power will this weekend line out in two French Cup events. The Navigators Insurance Team professional will start the Tour du Haut Var tomorrow and then ride the Classic Haribo 24 hours later.

Power has made a solid start to the season, riding well in the Tour Down Under in January and more recently placing eighth on the third stage of the 2.3 ranked Giro Della Liguria. He was 22nd in the 1.2 Trofeo Laiguelgia race held on Tuesday in Italy.

In France, VC La Pomme amateur Páidí O'Brien showed good early season form when he finished ninth of 175 starters in the GP de Peymeinade last weekend. Seven riders were clear at the end of the 130-kilometre event, with O'Brien sprinting home second of 25 riders in the chasing group.

Stephen Gallagher has managed to secure another professional contract following the demise of the Endurasport set-up he raced with last year.

He has been asked to join the Belgian Flanders-Afin team, and expects to do a good selection of events with them. Although a third division set-up, Gallagher's expectation is that they will get to ride highly-ranked 1.2 and 1.3 races, giving him an opportunity to land valuable UCI points.

In other news, Cycling Ireland's outgoing youth development officer Padraig Marrey has reported that last weekend's national underage camp in Westport proved to be a good success.

Talks were given by Marrey, Jay Daly and Mickey McKenna about performance profiling and training techniques, recovery and stretching techniques.

The Usher IRC interclub league begins this weekend with an event in Clonee. The race starts at 10.30 on Sunday.