Club Hillclimb championships, 14th August 2014

The last of the club championships will take place next Thursday night on Kilmashogue. The course will be the same as last year, though there will be some changes in the way the night will run, which will hopefully add to the whole event.

As always with the championships there are both league points and medals to play for. This is likely to be the last chance to effect any change in the league standings, and there are placings for each of the ability groups so lots to compete for there. There will be medals for the three fastest, and if we have five or more women then there will be a set of women's medals as well.

The route is here on Strava. The times on that will give you some idea of what to aim for, but remember that the real fast riders might not put their times on Strava.
You can pre-register here .

As I said above there will be a few changes to the way this race will run.

To start off with I'm inviting all of the non-racers and non-league riders to come and have a go at this, running an open session from 19:00-19:30 for any Orwell member who wants to give it a shot. They won't be eligible for prizes or league points, but will get to race the championship course in the same conditions as the racers, and they will get their time to see how they compare.
Secondly there will be a youth race included in the championships. They will be given early starts, and will be racing as far as the car park (1.1km).
Finally, the championship itself will be run at 30 second intervals, which should make for hugely entertaining viewing for anyone who comes out to watch. Hopefully a gang of the leisure crew will stay out after their own effort to cheer the racers on, because it will be worth watching.

Results of the 2011 national champs:
www.stickybottle.com/races-results/usher...climb-championships/

This started about 10 meters beyond the entrance to st. Columba's college so that was prob 10-15 secs (?) shorter. It was a fast night for it too!

As a bit of advice - try to keep your cadence fairly high on the lower section and the first ramp. It helps to save the legs for the final piece of torture!

Don't get too carried away where it flattens out on the middle either...you don't want to explode before the top.

Provisional start list here now:

Start time	Name	Group	PB
19:00:30	Dave McLoughlin	S-L	11:19
19:01:00
19:02:00
19:03:00
19:04:00
19:05:00
19:06:00
19:07:00
19:08:00
19:09:00
19:10:00	Eugene Dillon	Leisure
19:11:00	Diarmuid Donnelly	Leisure
19:12:00	Helen Horan	Leisure
19:13:00
19:14:00
19:15:00
19:16:00
19:17:00
19:18:00
19:19:00
19:20:00
19:21:00
19:22:00
19:23:00
19:24:00
19:25:00
19:26:00
19:27:00
19:28:00
19:29:00
19:30:00
19:30:30
19:31:00
19:31:30
19:32:00
19:32:30
19:33:00
19:33:30
19:34:00
19:34:30
19:35:00
19:35:30
19:36:00
19:36:30	Bernard Sellars	L
19:37:00	Gavin Moutray	L
19:37:30	Naoise Sheridan	L
19:38:00	Dan Coulcher	L
19:38:30	Greg Farrell	L
19:39:00	Niall Kieran	L
19:39:30	Sean Barry	L
19:40:00	Sean Murnane	L
19:40:30
19:41:00
19:41:30
19:42:00
19:42:30	Monica Marconi	S-L
19:43:00	David Hendron	S-L
19:43:30	Stephen Hayden	S-L
19:44:00	Daniel McElroy	S-L
19:44:30	Jules De Meester	S-L
19:45:00	Frank Moriarty	S-L
19:45:30	Aideen Keenan	S-L
19:46:00	Paul Kane	S-L	13:17
19:46:30	Colum Bradley	S-L	10:36
19:47:00
19:47:30
19:48:00	Garry Blair	S-S
19:48:30	Graham Scanlon	S-S
19:49:00	Fionn Griffin	S-S
19:49:30	Stephen Barry	S-S
19:50:00	Conor Murnane	S-S
19:50:30	Cormac Bracken	S-S
19:51:00	David Tansey	S-S	12:23
19:51:30	Julian Moore	S-S	12:06
19:52:00	Keith Harte	S-S	11:55
19:52:30	David Maher	S-S	11:45
19:53:00	Nick Watson	S-S	10:32
19:53:30
19:54:00
19:54:30
19:55:00
19:55:30	David Swift	S
19:56:00	Valdis Andersons	S
19:56:30	Bryan Geary	S
19:57:00	Dick O'Brien	S
19:57:30	Fionn Sheridan	S	11:08
19:58:00	Gavin Dodd	S	10:48
19:58:30	Patrick O'Brien	S	10:12
19:59:00	Neal Hudson	S	09:58
19:59:30	Brian McArdle	S	09:28
20:00:00	Brian Ahern	S	09:02

Just to give people some targets to chase, here are the various course records:
Senior Men: Brian Ahern, 9:02;
Senior Women: Rachel Glendon, 11:34;
Veteran Men: Ivan O'Brien, 11:23;
Junior Men: Craig Arrigan, 10:43;
Under 16s: Darragh Long, 10:28.

Just out of curiosity, is drafting allowed in this?

Valdis wrote:

Just out of curiosity, is drafting allowed in this?

If you're moving fast enough for drafting to be of any benefit you'll probably win by several minutes. But no.

there is a very real danger of being caught by 6 riders on this climb.

it may be a team time trial as per usual

Bryan wrote:

there is a very real danger of being caught by 6 riders on this climb.

it may be a team time trial as per usual

Since there's only 7 riders chasing you, do you think you should name the one that you're certain you won't be caught by, just to add a little extra motivation? ;-)

For what it's worth I don't think there'll be many catches made in that Scratch group, though there'll be several close calls.

Dave wrote:

For what it's worth I don't think there'll be many catches made in that Scratch group, though there'll be several close calls.

Did you hear that Pat? Dave just said you're not allowed catch me - or draft.

Dave wrote:

Bryan wrote:

there is a very real danger of being caught by 6 riders on this climb.

it may be a team time trial as per usual

Since there's only 7 riders chasing you, do you think you should name the one that you're certain you won't be caught by, just to add a little extra motivation? ;-)

For what it's worth I don't think there'll be many catches made in that Scratch group, though there'll be several close calls.

Ha! Then 7 could be catching me.

Any advice on how to warm up for this? I've never done a TT or any kind of race. Where will be people who aren't bringing a turbo be warming up?

couple of hill repeats should see you ready to go :)

Greg wrote:

Any advice on how to warm up for this? I've never done a TT or any kind of race. Where will be people who aren't bringing a turbo be warming up?

General rule of thumb - the shorter the TT the longer the warmup.

Something like this:
First 20 minutes - spin the legs, very easy gear, loosen up
Find a climb nearby, but not the course itself - this evening I'll be using Cruagh - app.strava.com/segments/693617
Once up that at 3/4 pace, sprint at the end to get fully warmed up
Be finished maybe 10 minutes before your start time, roll back down, spin out the legs, get to the line 2-3 minutes beforehand.

Brief results here for now, full results will be up later tonight. Well done to all who came out and gave it a go.

Gold: Brian McArdle 8'54"
Silver: Brian Ahern 9'06"
Bronze: Pat O'Brien 9'08"

Youth race:
1st: Luke Keating 4'14"
2nd: Uisneach Sheridan 4'45"
3rd: Jamal Ahmed 5'07"
4th: Andrew Ryan 5'34"
5th: Killian O'Brian 5'59"
6th Suleyman Ahmed 6'01"

Limit:
1st: Sean Barry 10'32"
2nd: Dan Coulcher 10'34"
3rd: Sean Murnane 11'15"
4th: Greg Farrell 11'34"
5th: Niall Kieran 12'05"
6th: Bernard Sellars 12'23"

Semi-limit:
1st: Dave McLoughlin 10'26"
2nd: Colum Bradley 10'37"
3rd: Aideen Keenan 10'54"
4th: Jeffrey Hoare 10'58"
5th: Monica Marconi 11'08"
6th: Daniel McElroy 11'08"

Semi-scratch:
1st: Seamus Nolan 9'35"
2nd: David Maher 10'05"
3rd: Conor Murnane 10'13"
4th: Fionn Griffin 10'17"
5th: Ed O'Mahoney 10'19"
6th: Cormac Bracken 10'20"

Scratch:
1st: Brian McArdle 8'54"
2nd: Brian Ahern 9'06"
3rd: Pat O'Brien 9'08"
4th: Neal Hudson 9'16"
5th: Fionn Sheridan 9'38"
6th: David Swift 9'44"

Thank you very much to all of the marshals and organisers, obviously it was a bit ambitious running the youth race and leisure challenge alongside the championship, but despite the almost inevitable hiccups it all worked very well. We had 68 starters across the 3 categories, and everyone seemed to go home happy, so take a bow all who contributed.

Bryan wrote:

Dave wrote:

Bryan wrote:

there is a very real danger of being caught by 6 riders on this climb.

it may be a team time trial as per usual

Since there's only 7 riders chasing you, do you think you should name the one that you're certain you won't be caught by, just to add a little extra motivation? ;-)

For what it's worth I don't think there'll be many catches made in that Scratch group, though there'll be several close calls.

Ha! Then 7 could be catching me.

Caught by no-one, almost caught one.