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Comeragh Cycling Club News
Gran Canaria 2009 - Hell on Wheels 07/03/2009
Its the begining of February 2008, I am in the form of my life, I (naively) fear no-one on the road and am looking forward to my first full racing season. I have agreed to travel to Gran Canaria with Robin Kelly for a weeks training, I will be unstoppable when I come back. Fast forward a week or two, I am a shattered wreck. I have endured a full week of beatings from one of the strongest riders in the country, I'd given it everything I had but the hills were higher than I thought, the temperature was hotter and I'd seemingly left my immune system on the side of some mountain somewhere. For the next few weeks, I will be unable to shake off niggling injuries and maladies and will have legs made of lead. It benefits me eventually of course, thats the whole point but once the form comes, I cease training and throw it away - thats a whole different story. I promise myself that I will not return to Gran Canaria unless I am in super form. I write an article for the website and close the book on it forever.
February 2009. I cannot believe that 9 comeragh riders are getting on a plane for Gran Canaria and that I am one of them. I thought that my article last year would have put people off, but no... Robin Kelly, Conor McGrath, Declan McGrath, Michael McGrath, Mark Nugent, Martin Cullinane, David Butler and honorary Comeragh rider, David Grace of Carrick Tri Club were all inspired to come along and check it out for themselves. Would they regret it ?
Day 0
The journey was uneventful (brief nosedive into Lanzarote notwithstanding), envlivened only by Conor's spectacular suitcase (which looks like it was re-upholstered with one of Graham Norton's old suits) and of course the by now traditional histrionics from the bus driver when he sees our bikes - despite the bikes being in cases/bags barely larger than a suitcase and the bus being half empty. Roughly 50% of the time these chancers throw a knickerfit and try to shake a few quid out of you for transporting your bike, it's a well rehearsed routine, one which I am bored of. The more they wave their arms around the more cash they want. 6 of us have bikes, he wants 10 euros each. We bargain him down to 20 for the lot, we are hungry and tired and not interested in this guys Fawlty Towers routine, its not worth arguing for a few pennies. We board the bus to head towards the apartments whist Manuel comically over-exaggerates how much it hurts his back to lift ultralight race bicycles a full 12 inches into the air to put them on the bus.
When we get there it's bad news, the "Vista Oasis" (not nearly as grand as it sounds) is at the top of a hill roughly the length and gradient of Seskin. That will be a nasty little kick in the manparts at the end of each days ride. Nonetheless, high on enthusiasm and the worlds most expensive cardboard sandwiches courtesy of Jet2Go Robin, Mark and I assemble the bikes and go out to do a lap of it to be sure. The apartments themselves are smaller than hoped for and the guy at reception looks at us like we just asked him to drop around to film us and his teenage daughters in a bout of naked jello wrestling later on. Honestly you wouldn't think this island relies on tourism at times. We settle in and head to the restaurant across the street, a nice little place that serves the same mysterious brown sauce with every dish, then after a few rounds of tropical beer we bed down for the night.
Day 1
Maspalomas, Soria, Mogan, Puerto Rico, Maspalomas, Fataga Climb1, Maspalomas
First things first. 3 riders had to collect bikes in the superb Freemotion bike shop. I had noted the quality of rental bikes on offer last year but was blown away by the quality of this years fare:
For just 20 euro a day you get a full carbon Cannondale Six13 or Synapse equipped with Shimano Ultegra (Compact or Triple) and Mavic Kysrium wheels. They even throw in a computer, saddle bag and your choice of pedals !
Suitably equipped we headed for the coast road at a brisk pace, turning inland for the first real test of the day which came at Soria, a fearsome climb of two halves the first several Kilometres of 7.7%, the second part much, much steeper ramping to 18% in places. The bunch was instantly shredded, I had come here a stone heavier than last year with a little less than one sixth the amount of training done, I'd be alright though wouldn't I ? Nope within minutes my lungs collapsed and my tyres felt instantly glued to the tarmac. I felt like I was towing a caravan behind me. Along with a couple of others I dragged myself up the mountain occasionally catching a glimpse of Mark, Conor, Martin, Butsy and Robin tearing each other apart in the distance. Mark won the first and second part of the climb, the second part in some style. At the top we all regrouped, I gathered enough breath to warn David Grace that the descent turned dangerous halfway down, I need not have bothered, an elderly gentleman on a purple motorbike came up behind us beeping his horn and shouting forcing the two of us to stop. He didn't speak any english so I assumed he was either warning us of danger ahead, or making very, very lewd sexual suggestions. I am going to guess he was warning us of danger as no sooner had the surface deteriorated than Michael McGrath swept wide on a bend and went down hard. We feared the worst when we saw the blood on the metal roadside barrier, Michael had suffered some nasty facial injuries. Had the bike gone a couple of feet further off the road it could have been ugly, very ugly. See the red arrow on the picture below for the spot where Michael crashed. Notably and maybe luckily this is the only piece of barrier on that part of the mountain.
Still, these McGraths are made of tough stuff and within minutes he was back on the bike rolling down towards the Medical Center in Mogan. At the bottom of the descent we met Hugh Mulhearne and Pat Kenneally of Dan Morrissey and following a brief stop to repair a puncture and drop Michael, the temporary ceasefire was called off to allow hostilies to resume. As soon as we hit the very hilly coast road again the pace shot up and over the next 20kms or so the bunch was torn apart with the Robin, Mark, Martin, Conor and the Dan Morrisseys doing a lot of damage. All encouraged by Michael McGrath who passed us on a hill shouting encouragement out the window of an ambulance which was bringing him to hospital with sirens blaring. It's true, you just can't keep a good man down it seems.
So fragmented was the group that several people got lost, ended up on the GC-1 motorway and in what is becoming a Comeragh tradition ended up being told off by the police for riding on the motorway. They were the lucky ones, they got to go home after 4 hours. Meanwhile your intrepid reporter had the tragic misfortune to catch up to the superstars of Irish domestic cycling just in time to do an extra climb from Maspalomas towards the first lookout point near Fataga. Lucky me. Needless to say it was an unpleasant experience with no quarter given, I instantly opened up a sizeable gap out the back of the bunch whilst Mark Nugent was king of the mountains once again along with Hugh Mulhearne. One rapid descent later and we headed back to the apartments to be treated to the sight of a salmon pink Butsy wandering around wearing a banana hammock (sorry Butsy, "briefs!"). Suitably traumatised I went for a nap, others went for food or a sunlouger by the pool. Later that evening we went back to the same restauraunt to replenish our reserves. This time I got chicken milanese style rather than Viennese style. Although you'd be hard pushed to notice the difference considering it had that same inexplicable brown sauce again.
Later on Michael returned from the hospital, at least we think it was Michael, he was covered in bandages so it was hard to tell. He looked like the Phantom of the opera according to 2 ladies from Cork in a neighbouring apartment. Luckily however he was alright and had been able to visit a specialist. He had cuts needing stitches in his eyebrow, chin, lip, cheek, nose, needed a 10 day course of antibiotics and was required not to cycle and to visit the hospital once a day for the remainder of the week. Worse still, at a glance it looked like any aspirations of a modelling career would have to go on hold. Michaels chance of being the next face of Calvin Klein was now looking remote.
Day 2
Maspalomas, Fataga, St Bartolome, Ayacata, Pico De Las Nieves, Telde, Maspalomas
The big one. Begining with 50k of climbing broken down into almost 5 different ascents with short downhill sections in between leading up to the highest part of the Island, Pico De Las Nieves at nearly 2000m (slightly higher than Alpe D'Huez except you start from sea level, not 800m !). We had arranged to meet with Hugh and Pat again as well as 3 Bray cyclists: John, Ronan and ?. Once fully assembled we made our way towards the mountains in the belting heat (it hit 28 degrees at one point). Mark and Hugh were the 2 form climbers on the day, but Conor McGrath and Robin Kelly were looking stronger than they ever have at this time of year and were climbing very well. Butsy is always strong on the climbs whilst Martin Cullinane was proving to be the surprise package of the trip. Martin had performed well at the end of the last season especially on stage one of the Suir Valley 3 day. But he had surgery on his leg during the winter and missed a lot of time on the bike, you wouldn't know it however... Martin will be a force this season, no mistake.
A quick fuel stop at Ayacata on the way to the top proved worthwhile if only for the old dear who sold us water and then surreally proceeded to come out to us with a bag of sweets and proceed to give us exactley 4 sweets each, one of each color ! Fair play, you take what you can get out there. The drag to the top of Pico De Las Nieves was every bit as unpleasant as I remember it, a steep few kilometres from Ayacata to Roque Nublo followed by a never ending trek through the woods to the military base at the top. I was relived to see the mobile van shop was there again this year as we were all starving at this point. Gracie and Dec ordered a roll whilst I watched in horror as the guy took his scruffy, blackened hands complete with vegetable allotments under the nails (Seriously was the guy digging the garden with his bare hands that morning ?) and proceeded to maul slices of ham and cheese without gloves. The lads were famished, they couldn't have cared less if the guy had pulled the breadrolls out from his underpants. It came to my turn to order. "I'll just have a Coke thanks".
The thing about the mountains is that although you may be cooking in your own juices on the way up, you can freeze as soon as your start to descend, so off we went on the hour long chilly descent towards Ingenio. Unfortunately disaster struck again with Conor McGrath following his brothers lead from the day before and coming off on a bend. Conor suffered cuts to the fingers, arm, shoulder, thighs and legs but was fine. Although he is a McGrath and their fine is different to yours and mine. If you are a McGrath and your leg comes off in a crash, you tie it to the crossbar and practice one-legged drills on your way to the hospital, whilst for the rest of us, standard procedure is to lie down at the side of the road dying of self pity. Although Conor was able to continue his bike wasn't so it was a taxi ride home for Conor.
Meanwhile myself, Gracie and Dec had gotten lost and ended up much further from home in the town of Telde where we encountered a group of riders who said that they were heading for Maspalomas. We decided to hitch a ride. It didn't take long before we noticed that we were heading for Maspalomas quickly, very quickly. Race pace quickly. At that point I began to notice that these guys have the same jersey - no big deal, we all have Comeragh jerseys. Then I noticed that they had matching bikes. And Socks. And Helmets. And Shoes. And hang on a minute, is that car behind us a team car ? Yep, we had accidentally latched ourselves onto a German semi-pro team. The going was tough and several comments were made about myself and Gracies hairy legs, nonetheless we hung on. They had a couple of riders (team sponsors I think rather than race riders) who were struggling a little, so when I found myself going out the back on one of the climbs, I thought no big deal as long as I keep these 2 guys behind me I will be ok. No sooner had I thought that then the 2 lads went past hanging onto the window of the team car. Feck it anyway. I bit down on the handlebars and struggled to hold on. After a while however we started to notice something, we appeared to be heading in the wrong direction, away from the coast and towards a mountain... turns out the lads were going to Maspalomas alright, via a very large mountain, we decided enough was enough and turned for the coast eventually finding our way back to the apartments with some six and a half hours of riding done. A good days work.
That night it was a visit to Playa D'Ingles for food.
Day 3
Maspalomas, Mogan, St Nicholas, Ayacata, Fataga, Maspalomas
This was to be a much more steady day and so it proved initially on the coast road through Puerto Rico and along the two climbs towards San Nicholas where we met the 3 lads from Bray. My legs had started to come around and I was feeling strong. We were to head inland from San Nicholas to Ayacata, none of us had been there before but Don Feighery had told Robin once that it was pretty flat before dragging up gradually to Ayacata. Dons name would be blasphemed many times by the time the day was done. The first sign that something was amiss was when we entered a valley with seemingly no way out. No way except an Alpe D'Huez switchback type thing. We struggled up, the scenery was spectacular, lakes and large dams all round. Things took a turn for the worse very quickly however when we began a very steep section of climb (see image here)
Little did we know that this would be the begining of the steepest climb any of us would ever encounter in our lives. The group fell apart straight away as each rider struggled to deal with the 23% gradient. No thats not a typo, that is in fact a 23.
Day 4 - Rest Day !!!
Maspalomas, Ingenio, Maspalomas
Day 5
Maspalomas, Ingenio, El Goro, Valsequillo, San Matteo, San Antonio, Telde, Maspalomas
Day 6
Maspalomas, Mogan, Soria, Ayacata, Fataga, Maspalomas
Day 7
The trip home.
WORK IN PROGRESS !!!!!!!! KEEP CHECKING BACK !!!!!!!!!!!!
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