Road racing suffers another blow as Skerries road races cancelled for 2021

Derek Sheils leads Michael Dunlop during the Open Superbike race at Skerries in July 2016

Irish road racing has suffered another setback with the news that the Skerries 100 road races have been cancelled for the second consecutive year.

The announcement by the Loughshinny Club that the oldest road race event in the Republic of Ireland had been called off means there will be no racing south of the border for two years in a row.

The race was scheduled to take place during the first weekend in July.

The Skerries was to celebrate its 75th anniversary this year.

The event's disappearance from the calendar leaves the Armoy road races and the Cookstown 100 as the only road races to take place in Ireland in 2021.

Armoy is scheduled to take place on 30/31 July, with the Cookstown pushed back from its traditional April dates to 10-11 September.

"With the rollout of the vaccine we had hoped that by the time of the first weekend in July came around, the country would be once more open for business," read a statement from the Loughshinny club.

"Unfortunately, this doesn't look like the case, and with the current level 5 lockdown, or even the prospect of the country dropping to level 4 or below, it is still not enough to give the club the hope that would enable us to proceed.

"The unknown cost of insurance for a one-event road race may well be out of our reach, but to date we haven't been given a quote by our governing body, as they have instructed affiliated clubs that they 'will not be issuing permits at present and we will only do so when we are given the green light from Sport Ireland'.

"Unfortunately, like the other southern clubs who have already cancelled their 2021 road races, the club have taken the regrettable decision to cancel the iconic road race for a second year running."