Ireland’s Premier Mountainbiking Club™
paddyobrien
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Posts by paddyobrien
Tuesday 10th Night Ride
05 years ago
by paddyobrien
in spins
Well folks,
Now that most of us have the weekend mud cleaned off the bikes and ourselves, its time to get back out and destroy ourselves again with some suitably muddy sillyness. We’ll head up to ticknock/3 rock as its close enough, and trash ourselves on fairy castle, daggets, club course, no dabs and the boneshaker.
Meeting at 7:30 at the entrance to ticknock woods, (i’ll pass by the yellow house at 7 for anyone else cycling up). Bring your speedy legs and we’ll try setting a decent pace as its too cold to be hanging out too much at the moment.
Next week i feel a night ride out in slade would be a good option (mainly cos i ain’t been out there in the dark yet). We may even get to meet the people randomly ditching micras/sofas etc. But i hope not …
Paddy (086 6087046)
Bank Holiday Weekend Rides (5th, 6th and 7th)
105 years ago
by paddyobrien
in spins
Hey all,
First off, congratulations to Mel for winning the elite ladies race in killaloe on sunday. Especially since i belive she was doing an adventure race the day before in kerry! (crazy fit people). Also a big well done to Ryan for 3rd place in experts and finally to fergal who’s flying along these days taking 8th place in sports. A very good weekends racing for MAD there.
Well we have a load of stuff going on this weekend. If the weathers nice it’ll be great. If not then it’ll be muddy. Either way its all good!
Saturday – Slade Valley, 10am at the yellow house (for cycling out), or 11 at the entrance to Slade. We’re making a welcome return to Slade for a few laps of the course we used for the race there. Its a great course wiht some lovely tracks and since not everyone got to ride the race this’ll hopefully make up for that.
Directions
Take the Tallaght exist off the M50 and follow the N81 towards Blessington. Continue along the N81 (don’t take the N82 towards Saggart). After climbing The Embankment take the right turn signposted “Slade Valley Golf Club” (If you reach Brittas you’ve gone too far). Then take the next right hand turn also marked for Salde Valley Golf club and the forest entrance is along there on your **left** hand side
**EDIT – The forest entrance is actually on your left hand side! Doh! EDIT***
Sunday – Cloon woods – 9am at the yellow house. We’re goign to take a gentlish off road spin out to cloon woods to watch the Downhill NPS race on there. This race is being run by the EPIC club so we want to get out there and support them even though we’re all too scared to do downhill. This should be brilliant to watch and will feature some of the top downhill riders in Ireland and Europe, doign big crazy jumps and probably falling off occaisionally. Bring some food, water and maybe some warmer clothes so you don;t get cold at all while standing aroudn to watch the race.
Monday – Easy local spin – 12pm at the yellow house. Off up to 3 rock and its surrounds for an easy paced spin on the different trails there. Theres a possible option also of a longer spin on monday. Sean or someone will post details if they want to go ahead with this.
Hope to see ye all there. Any questions just get in touch. Raingear will be a very good idea this weekend judging by the way things are going! (086 6087046, paddyobrien at gmail dot com)
Paddy
MAD Spins this week
105 years ago
by paddyobrien
in spins
Hey all,
Now that we’re getting back to normal after the success of holding our first proper race on sunday, its time we got back to our normal routine, so …
Wednesday Evening (12th), 7pm at the yellow house – Usual evening jaunt up towards 3 rock and its surrounds. Time to go back to our original club course and see what condition its in these days. daggets, boneshaker etc.
***EDIT***
Thursday evening (13th), Club league, Hellfire carpark at 7:30 – Sorry, forgot about this the first time! The next round of the club league will be on thursday evening. Once again everyone should go along to these as they’re great fun and good practice for racing the nationals on sunday!
***EDIT***
Saturday (15th) Beginners spin, 10am at the yellow house – Suitable for everyone from total beginners to experts. This won;t be suitable for the very young riders, we’ll hold an underage suitable spin again at some stage in the next few weeks.
Sunday 16th, National Championships, Kilruddery – We’ll have more info for you on this later in the week, but everyone who has raced already this season should be at this. Its on a private estate so this is the only chance you’ll ever get to ride these tracks (until next years nationals anyway).
See you there,
Paddy (086 6087046)
Club League Round 2
56 years ago
by paddyobrien
in events
What looked like being an awful evening weather wise actually turned nice and sunny for the duration of the race. Again we had another good turnout from MAD though a combination of punctures and broken gear cables saw the end of ryan and morgans hopes of a good showing.
The results were as follows:
1 – Brian (IMBRC)
2 – Luke (IMBRC)
3 – Oisin (UCD)
4 – Nigel (MAD)
5 – Steve (MAD)
6 – Paddy (MAD)
7 – Ryan (MAD)
8 – Mick (MAD)
9 – Morgan (MAD)
10 – Fergal (MAD)
11 – Mark (IMBRC)
We’ll post a league table soon to show how people are doing overall
Bank Holiday Weekend Spins
06 years ago
by paddyobrien
in spins
Theres a number of spins this weekend wiht something to suit most people.
Saturday 29th, Yellow House at 10am, advanced beginners (ish) – This’ll be a fairly steady paced spin up over 3 rock and down the wocas to the road. From there we’ll take the road back and cut into Cruagh woods before heading up back over tibradden and finally back over the top of fairy castle and 3 rock and down the club course/boneshaker. If the hills kill you this probably won’t be suitable. (Contact me, 086 6087046).
Monday 1st, Yellow House at 10am, Seans Second Savage Sycle – Something similar to the last one of these spins. Non stop, race speed down towards Prince Willies. Exact route to be confirmed but the return will be the same as the way out so anyone dropped on the way out will be picked up on the way home. Bring food and water as this will be tough. We won’t be stopping and waiting for people on this spin … and that includes me 
so no giving out steve (Contact Sean, woohoo.downey(at)gmail.com)
If people are interested in goign out on sunday let me know, though i may be sleeping that day.
Kindlestown, Wednesday 19th, 6:30
26 years ago
by paddyobrien
in spins
Myself and Geoff and heading down to Kindlestown for a spin on wednesday evening. We’re aiming to be there/starting cycling at 6:30 so anyone else who wants to come along is more than welcome.
That should be plenty of time to allow for a good few laps before darkness sets in.
Paddy
Wednesday Night Ride
96 years ago
by paddyobrien
in spins
Hey All,
Night riding this wednesday 8th, meeting at the yellow house at 7pm. Destination etc still to be decided.
Paddy (086 6087046)
Thursday 19th and Saturday 21st
26 years ago
by paddyobrien
in spins
Thursday 19th Night race – Ticknock arials at 7:30.
Meeting at the ariels at the top of ticknock forest for 7:30 for an interclub XC night race. If you’re unsure of hte way then just follow the fireroad in ticknock all the way to the top. The race should take about 45 mins to 1 hour at most. CAn go for a more gentle spin after if you want.
Email Paddy or call on 086 6087046 for details.
Saturday 21st Beginners spin – Yellow House at 10am.
Sean will take a beginners spin on saturday morning. Probably 3 rock or somewhere thereabouts. Everyone and anybody will be welcome along.
Email Sean for more details.
Details of anything happening on sunday will follow when someone decides whats happening.
And finally … don’t forget folks, you really really really need a helmet and other basic safety features like brakes when going mountainbiking. For a full list see here
Paddy
Night Riding on Thursday (and Night Race details)
66 years ago
by paddyobrien
in spins
Hi All,
First of all there’ll be a night ride this Thursday 12th. Meeting at The yellow house at 7pm or ticknock carpark at 7:30pm.
Secondly, MAD will the running the first of a short series of Interclub (i.e. everyone welcome) night races on Thursday the 19th of January.
Meeting at the Ariels on 3 rock at 7:30pm for a quick practice lap. The race should take no more than about 45mins to 1 hour in total and will most likely be run on our old club course, including the newly reclaimed lower section.
(This is all assuming that Coillte haven’t logged it by then so fingers crossed. If they have then we’ll look for an alternate venue).
Paddy (086 6087046)
MAD Weekend Report (7th and 8th)
26 years ago
by paddyobrien
in spins
Saturday saw myself, Steve, Judith, Roddy, Louis and Shane heading out for the spin over Tibradden. Steve was the first casualty as he was feeling very ill on the climb up Kilmashogue and so decided to head for home. Roddy was next after damaging his frame at the seat tube. With a little persuasion (i.e. hitting it with rocks!) we got him back up and running, though he decided to head for home then rather than risk trying to mountian bike wihtout a saddle which, we can only imagine, could be a little painful. So the remaining 4 of us headed off down the Wocas until the turn off for tibradden where we headed upwards again all getting a good soaking of the feet in the big huge puddles/lakes on the track. The rocky descent off tibradden claimed two more victims, both of them, unfortunately, being me Luckily though after going over the bars i had the incredible presence of mind (sometimes known as luck) to land between the rocks, rather than on them, and so managed to cause only cosmetic damage to my hand, elbow and knee. That’ll teach me for trying to keep up with Louis!
(and sundays report from Nigel)
Sunday saw Paddy, Maciek, Louis, Andrew, Juan and myself head for a spin. I met them up in ticknock car park and then off we went to Fairy Castle, and then down towards Wocca Wocca’s. Then we set off for Prince Willie’s but Paddy had to leave us at this stage due to an injury from a crash on Saturday. Followed the Wicklow Way looking for the descent through prince willies, but we couldn’t find it so we headed for the descent through Cloon. Juan decided to leave us at this stage and headed back along the WW. Some felling has taken place at the top but we managed to get through. The descent through cloon is as good as ever so maybe it was a good thing that we missed the prince willies descent! Andrew and Louis left us here and headed towards Enniskerry for some well deserved food! Maciek and myself then set off for Crone via WW and that nice descent just before the steps with all the sheep. We made our way up to the car park and then decided that it would be best to head home. We both wanted to finish the day with a descent so we decided on heading back along Military Road and then down through Massies which was lovely and muddy!
I’ll post up picures and also a video of Louis jumping on the Wocas tomorrow assuming i remember to bring my camera in to work with me.
Paddy
