Gael Force West – June 2018

In June 2018 I took part in GaelForce West for the 3rd Time. It had been three years since my previous attempt, I was back and ready to restart my athletic career. After a slightly stressful late arrival in Westport on the Friday before the race, I was in an optimistic mood sitting on the bus on Saturday morning on the way to the start line. It being my 3rd time taking part in this race, my familiarity with the race day routine eased any nerves and the clear sky promised a good day.

My brother in law Ger stood beside me at the start line. In our previous outings at this event he had always managed to come out on top, but the gap had been closing and I was hopeful that today would be my day. Running is one of my stronger disciplines and I managed to gain a 10 minute gap on Ger by the time we reached the first transition. I felt Ok completing the first run and by the time I reached the bike I was still ahead of Ger. I felt Ok on the bike but did suffer from some cramp. It was no surprise when Ger caught me nearing the end of the first bike section, but I still felt Ok heading up Croagh Patrick. And then I didn’t feel OK. It is not that I felt in any more pain than one would expect climbing a mountain via a path that was akin to climbing a giant rocky, unstable staircase. The problem was that three years after my previous attempt I hadn’t improved, I was the same, I was OK. Turning at the church on top to start heading back down, I mentally quit the race. I promised myself I would get to the finish today and tomorrow I would start to get better than OK.

On the Monday after GaelForce West 2018 I emailed my local tri club and by Thursday I began training with them. The drive to be better than Ok had started and it wouldn’t be long until I found out if it was working as I had planned to compete in the Quest Achill Adventure Race in September. I would have 8 weeks of Tri Club training before I headed to Achill. It turned out to be eight weeks of struggling to keep up on long cycles, sweating from every pore during intense turbo sessions and 8 weeks of struggling to keep up with the slowest club runners. I loved every minute of it. The tri club provided structure and suffering in equal measure and I quickly adapted to its unequivocal demands. It helped that I wasn’t suffering alone, the club had a diverse group of members from the young to the old and from the trying to get fit to the trying to complete an Ironman in under 10 hours. Every one of them, no matter which bracket they fell into, was friendly and supportive.