Just back in London after a rather busy weekend to take in this
fantastic ride
First of all thanks to Seamas for bringing the ride to my attention in the first place as otherwise I might never have heard of it.
Firstly I flew to Belfast on Friday with the bike packed in its new box, reassembled it on Saturday morning at my parents' house, and went to Portadown to get the train to Dublin that afternoon. At least 50% of the passengers on the Dublin train were en route to hen or stag nights and dressed accordingly...
I had booked accommodation at the start of the ride (UCD at Belfield in the south of the city), so rode across the Liffey, checked out a few of my old haunts from over 20 years ago, and had a pleasant spin of a few km out to the campus. I was student at UCD once upon a time in the 80s - the changes in Dublin and in the campus itself are tremendous. Even within the campus it took me a while to find any of the original buildings.
Located my room (no problem bringing the bike inside, thankfully), got a few rations in, checked the bike over, and had an early night. The car parks were filling rapidly with cars and vans loaded with lots of carbon bling
Up at 5.30, and at the start for 6.30 - with 1700 entries I wanted to avoid getting caught up in the queues. A quick swipe of the control card and I was off just before 7.
Here is the route as per my HCx:
Wicklow 200 on Bikely.Very quickly the route took us out of Dublin through Enniskerry and into the beginnings of the Wicklow hills - there were a few early glimpses of the climbs to come later. The views and sights en route were absolutely fantastic, gorgeous countryside. Gradually we climbed up on to open hills. The climbs were mostly lonmg drags - suited me well as I found I could get into a rhythm quite well while remaining seated. It was a matter of avoiding the temptation of trying to keep up with those passing me and staying within my own limits. The climbs were all rewarded with good downhills with lots of open corners and good visibility where you could really let the bike go.
I saw a couple of tandems out, one of which was a Burley, but most unusual was someone on a 46 lb Royal Mail post bike complete with plastic crate on the front, who zoomed past me fairly early on. He was in training for the Transalp mountain bike run. Well done to him! I didn't see any fixies and only one or two steel bikes, one of which was a Roberts. There were quite a few commuter type bikes, and I saw one person complete the 200 on a full suss MTB.
The route was signed by way of stencils painted onto the road at junctions, coupled with warning signs at danger points. Worked really well, far better than a route sheet. However, around Djouce and coming into town there were definitely still stencils there from last year's route which was briefly confusing once or twice. I suspect a small group of us took an old W200 route back into town, I don't think there is meant to be a split there. I think this caught Seamas out too. Roads were in general really quite apart from a short stretch on the N?81. Drivers were unfailingly patient and courteous. Controls were fairly well spaced out but did not take long to negotiate despite the numbers. Food provision was adequate; my only gripe was a the lack of water at the top of Slieve Maan so that you were forced to use the provided Powerade for a while - it was vile and I got rid of it as soon as I reached Rathdrum.
At some point my replacement Sigma computer started playing up again
which threw me a little as I like to have an idea of how far on I am. It would also have given info as to the total distance, as I had forgotten to zero my Garmin odometer at the start of the ride. I get 198.1 km according to Bikely but figures vary, :I heard quite a few people saying it was closer to 185 km. My Bikely profile gives me 2393 m of climb which seems a little low... I see someone else's profile on Garmin connect gives over 4000 m of climb (page is slow to load):
http://connect.garmin.com/activity/168079 (I've just read that the above route data is incomplete due to battery failure. Also it is definitely not 4000m of climing
, more like 2600 m).
No matter, the route swept us along utterly beguiling small roads up and through the hills. Maximum speed for me was 48.5 mph
before my computer gave up the ghost entirely. I suspect I may have been fractionally faster later.
Despite the large number of entries the road never seemed too crowded, although I did leave pretty early. One thing that struck me was how friendly everyone was (this applies to Dublin in general over the weekend), very engaging and relaxed. Great crack all the way round
There was a
lot of swearing, the Irish must be the most prolific cursers of all.
It was great to see quite a few locals out here and there clapping us along; everyone had a smile for us.
I force fed myself all the way round with energy bars and gels (and unlike a good few of the participants I took my rubbish back with me
) and kept up the fluid intake and generally found the ride very manageable - much less pain involved than in my few previous 200s. I usually find the pace of Audax groups too fast for me but in this event there was always someone going at the right speed... I even got a couple of unnecessary apologies along the way from people hanging on to
my wheel
. Most unusual.
Many thanks to to Irish Veteran Cyclist Association for organising this ride - an superb job by all. There was plenty of support all the way round.
A truly gorgeous part of the world and I for one will be heading back next year. My only regret is that my camera is off being repaired so I have no photos to share with you.
198 km in around 10 hrs 15 mins for me.
I had been texting Seamas throughout the day, and I finally bumped into him at the finish - great to meet you, Seamas! and I look forward to Lap the Lough.
