English
Stage Two
The following morning, after a perfect night’s sleep, the team took the morning trip down the breakfast area to eat as much as possible hopefully giving themselves plenty of energy for the 110 miles which lay ahead of them today. Soon after breakfast, the van got packed and the bikes put on the team car, but instead of the bikes and riders being taken to the start, which was back in Wexford, we decided that they should ride the 2 miles to help loosen up their legs and help relieve the aches and pains from the racing the day before.
Today’s race started at 11.00am in Wexford and with the predicted strong winds and rain, today’s stage was going to be hard. Also with 2 category 3 climbs and 1 category 2 climb on the route, this would also play a deciding factor in the stage today.
Because the race route covers roads which the team vans would also use, it was the case of leaving the HQ ½ hour before the actual start giving me plenty of time to arrive at the hotel and drive back to the finish. The first hour of my drive was fine, with only one stop which was shopping at Lidl to collect some chocolate, bread rolls and 4 packs of coke and after 10 minutes spent in the shop the Surrey League team van was back on the open road making its way to Cobh, the finishing town. The next hour soon passed by without too many problems, apart from slow moving traffic holding me up.
Now, when I left Wexford the weather was fine with just a few dark clouds lurking around, but thankfully it did not rain. As I was approaching Dungarven things were just about to change though. Dungarven sits in a valley and coming down the long hill the rain decided to make an appearance by unleashing some torrential down pours causing some flooding to quickly appear on the sides of the roads. As I was around 1 hour in front of the race it made sense to relay this info back to the team car therefore letting the riders know of impending rain before they actually rode into it themselves. Armed with this latest weather update, Keith informed our riders by team radio of the expected weather conditions and one by one the riders fell back to the team car to collect some gilets etc.
From Wexford the race route, and my driving route, used the main N25 road linking Wexford to the city of Cork. This road is a main road and in plenty of places very wide indeed, but only when the road passes through the small towns or villages did the road actually narrow down. Today’s stage finish is situated in a small town known as Cobh (pronounced Cove) and is located southeast of Cork via the R624. Cobh is a lovely town to visit and is situated on the coast of an Island known as The Great Island. It has plenty of small narrow and steep streets with plenty of small shops selling all sorts of goodies to the locals and holiday makers. Within Cobh there is plenty of historic building to visit including a huge cathedral which dominates the skyline as it lives on the hill overlooking the town and is also the backdrop of today’s stage finish.
As my trip down was pretty easy, I arrived in Cobh in good time. I quickly located our hotel and booked the luggage in and signed for the rooms. The hotel was also very close to the finish, which was perfect as this meant I could leave the van in the hotel car park and walk to the finish allowing me to miss all the traffic jams due to the closed roads. Once unpacked and luggage dropped off, I then decided to take a walk around Cobh before finishing up at the finish line. Today I had around 2 hours spare which was partly thanks to the strong headwind the riders had and also the easy of the route down to Cobh so took advantage of this by going site seeing.
As I roughly knew what time the race was planning to arrive thanks to me having contact with the team car, I decided to head back up the hill and wait for the riders to come in. By this time the locals had gathered behind the barriers and also waited for the race to arrive. On the stand I heard the mayor mention that the race had visited Cobh 3 years ago and was looking forward to today’s finish. All the local dignitaries were out as well as the main man from FBD Insurance who has sponsored this race for about 26 years.
At approx. 3.45pm the lead cars and police bikes started to arrive so everyone knew the race was not that far away. As more and more cars came through and with the race radio letting us all know the exact position of the leaders (2 riders) it was not long before we saw the last lead car before the first rider. Over the radio we did hear that 2 riders had broke clear of a 15 man break and these two were now fighting it out for the victory. We at the finish had no idea if both riders were together at the foot of the climb and separated, but we soon knew. The climb up to the finish has several bends and the final bend is about 200m from the finish. In view came the Halfords rider and 15 seconds behind him was the Ralph Condor rider and around 3 mins after these two came the remnants of the 15 man break.
The climb is a steep climb and by the time the riders came across the line these guys were crawling and almost coming to a stop. Everyone waiting for their own riders help to push the riders back up the remaining hill out of the way of the finish line as other groups where now at the foot of the climb. With the public applauding the riders and the children waving their flags, seeing this finish on a sunny afternoon (at long last) and with a glorious back drop with the bay in the distance I was extremely pleased to be here today.
I soon spotted the team coming up the climb and waved to them so they knew where I was placed as I had the food that required and the directions to the hotel, which was just around the corner. Out of my Liquigas musette, given to me by Mr Bolwell, came the cans of Cokes and Mars Bars which I bought previously during the day and once all the team was together we then walked to the hotel to relax. A strange thing did occur though as when I was walking back with Richard Hoult his chain decided to snap and wrap itself around the rear cassette. Glad it happened then and not during the race.
With all the riders home safe and sound, it was time to get back to the hotel so we could all relax and unwind. Chris had taken a tumble earlier in the race as well as suffering a puncture so had some sore parts of his body which needed attention. The rest just had dirty bikes which needed to be cleaned up for tomorrow’s stage. Tomorrow’s stage is the longest stage covering 189 km’s taking in some lovely scenery around the Ring of Kerry and goes over some very tough climbs. Should be another tough day in the saddle for all the riders and again with the predicted heavy winds and possible rain should make for an interesting race.
Will Halfords win again or will Rapha claim their first victory?
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