Michael Dunlop picks out "the boy to beat" in Irish road racing

Isle of Man TT legend Michael Dunlop has sent praise the way of Michael Sweeney after the pair battled over victory at Tandragee.

Dunlop was in a newcomers vest on the opening day of the Tandragee 100 road racing event having not raced there in over a decade, but was victorious in both Superbike-class races on Saturday and set new lap records in both the Superbike and Supersport classes.

Dunlop’s Superbike wins came after battles with Michael Sweeney, who impressed the 32-time TT winner with his speed at Tandragee.

“Michael [Sweeney] rides national road racing fantastically well, there’s no doubt about that,” Dunlop said, speaking to the Belfast Newsletter.

“He’s the boy to beat every weekend, he’s at it all the time and he’s a good, steady rider – that’s great – and he does a great job.

“My main thing [in the final race] was to do a lap, do another lap.

“Then ‘Micko’ was on the pace, so I said ‘Right, time to up it again’, and that’s when I took a couple of seconds out of him on that lap.”

Dunlop added that he felt it necessary to be avoidant of any mistakes in the final laps.

“But me and Michael kept upping the pace and, at the end of the day, I’ve got the Southern coming up and you have to make sure [to avoid any mistakes].

“So I just kept upping the pace to see where ‘Micko’ was able to come and once I got that gap I calmed down again.”

Dunlop added, in summary of his performance on Saturday at Tandragee: “Good job, won both and broke the 600 lap record, broke the Superbike lap record, so I can’t complain.

“It’s nice [to be back at Tandragee] and it’s nice that when they said I was coming, a lot of people came out to watch it.

“It’s good – it’s nice to be back somewhere where you feel welcome.”