Roche-Elliott-Kelly 400, Saturday 13th June, 4am.

scottreynolds wrote: »

I thought I heard blorg and emty saying they are doing it on fixes.

Is it 400 kms or miles?

Kms...if you want 400 miles the National 600 will be on in early July.

niceonetom wrote: »

Any chance of a map?

I believe Ordinance Survey do some nice ones.

I will post the routesheet when it arrives but the one Paul actually attached to his email was for a different route, starting from Phibsboro.

Here's the routesheet, as Excel and Word files.

Well, chaps, that was an epic. I can't say that peeling myself out of bed at 2:40am is my idea of a good time, and I was bit taken aback to discover that my new light is so awesomely powerful that it knocks out the wireless on my bike computer, but apart from that, it was about as perfect a day for a 400 as you could imagine. There were seven of us all told, and to be honest, it was bit intimidating initially lining out with rouleurs like Paul O'Donoghue, Dave McLoughlin and the two Johns who have a stack of Paris-Brest-Paris, London-Edinburgh-London, Boston-Montreal-Boston, 24 hour timetrials etc etc under their belts, but the group stuck more or less together for the whole day. Which was just as well because the routesheet proved to be still a work in development with some very sketchy instructions along the southern stretches in particular and having Paul about to guide you through these sections was a considerable bonus.

The route took us out over Djouce and Shay Elliott before turning south through Macreddin and Aughrim to Bunclody. There was a brief shower on the run into Bunclody which proved to be the only rain we got for the day. We stopped in a hotel there for breakfast - I don't know what the other guests made of the seven guys in cycling rig demolishing the buffet, I would have asked for a discount on the room when I was checking out. From Bunclody we pushed on south through New Ross and Kiltealy over the hills to Mullinavat, Piltown and Carrick-on-Suir for lunch at the cafe next to the big plaque on Sean Kelly Square. 180km in at this point, when you'd usually be finishing up for the day, and we were sitting in the sunshine outside a cafe in Tipperary with 220km left to go.

Leaving Carrick we went north towards Kilkenny - this is where Junior spotted us - a series of long, long drags through Thomastown to Graiguenamanagh. Some of these went on so long that you lost all sense that there was flat road anywhere in the country - 3-4% grade is the new level. Dave calculated that the longest of these was 8km up followed by a 6km descent. After a stop for ice cream it was back through Kiltealy (King Kelly, I now have some sense what the Mount Leinster would be like in the sunshine, which is to say magnificent) to Enniscorthy and Blackwater. This was the worst section of the ride from me - the roads were rough as a badger's arse and after eleven or twelve hours in the saddle my own arse was getting a bit tender.

However the next section was perhaps the best of the day, powering along the rolling Wexford coast road, getting a generous push from the southerly breeze that had been blowing steadily through the day, lifting everyone's spirits. The sun was gradually sinking on the left, while to your right you could see lazily tumbling wind turbines and the deep blue of the Irish Sea. We took a jog inland at Courttown to get onto the backroads to Arklow and Rathdrum. By now it was after nine, lights back on the bike and jackets on as the temperature started dropping rapidly but somehow we kept up a stiff pace through Laragh, Roundwood and over the bog. Descending the Long Hill in the dark you could see the first lights of the city picked out against the hillside and by the time we reached the Poggio, it was shrouded in blackness. It was a weird feeling climbing it in the dark, seeing nothing but the few square metres illuminated by your light, unable to even see what gear you were in and hoping you'd picked the right one. emty and I were back at the Stephen Roche monument a hair past 11:30 for a total time of nineteen and a half hours and I think we were both pretty delirious with exhaustion and pride at that point - certainly I'm going to have trouble fitting my head through doorways for the next few days.

It's hard to convey what a great ride this was - so many new experiences, the camaraderie of a small group out on a mission, the beautiful weather. It was a striking feeling crossing some of the route of the Mount Leinster and remembering that the last time you were in Enniscorthy you had driven down. Actually there were quite a few nostalgic moments as we followed sections of rides from earlier in the season, the Ardattin 200, the Mick Byrne 200. Looking back now, I can't really fathom how we kept riding so strongly for so long but after a couple of hundred kilometres you don't seem to get much more tired. You make the demands on your body and the body keeps giving the answers. Anyway, the REK is a great route and I hope at least a couple of you will think about doing it next year - it's a challenge but believe me, if you can hack the Mick Byrne and you put the miles in during the Spring you can do this one, and you'll be well rewarded for the effort.

I know Caroline is fascinated/appalled by the kind of food I'm willing to shovel into myself in the course of a ride so for the record, here's what I ate yesterday:

One bowl of porridge, two bananas, two Nutrigrain Elevenses bars, second breakfast (two sausages, two rashers, black and white pudding, mushrooms, two hash browns, three mini pains-au-chocolat), lunch (BLT, potato wedges), a Mint Feast (yes, I am the person they brought them back for), a ham sandwich, then tortilla chips and salsa and a pizza when I got home. I drank about eight bottles of water (half with Nuun, half without), a double espresso, two cups of coffee, a cup of tea and a bottle of Club lemon.