The first round of the club league will be held on Sunday the 21st of this month (yes, that's just over a week away!) and not the 28th as previously advertised.

The race will be run over the same course as last year, starting in Dunboyne, out the Summerhill road to the Mullagh, right through Culmullin and then twice over Dorey's forge, with the finish at the Hatchet Bar on the run back towards Dunboyne. Probably.

The exact start and finish details will depend on what other races are running in the area on the same day. We'll have confirmation plus a sign-on/start time in the next day or two.

If anyone doesn't feel ready to race yet they can take the chance to get their marshalling stint out of the way. As always, we need about 10 marshalls. Anyone who does their turn now gets out of marshalling a Thursday night during the season.

The step-up spin next Sunday (the 14th) will run from the Pope's cross and take in the route of the race. For all the first timers it will be an excellent chance to get acquainted with the course. It won't make your first race hurt any less, but it'll significantly reduce your chances of getting lost after you've been dropped. ;-)

I have four marshalls so far for this one- John M., Dave T., Barry R. and Ivan.

If anyone else wants to throw their name into the hat and get their turn out of the way it would be greatly appreciated.

Dave, I'd be happy to Marshall if you are still looking.

Thanks Pat, I'll count you in.

Change of plan- the race will begin at the "old petrol station" in Batterstown at 12.00, sign on will be from 11.15am.

The route will still be two laps of Dorey's forge to give a distance of roughly 55k.

Dave,ill do a Marshalling stint if you need another hand

Thanks Ray.

That's 6 marshalls now, I'd imagine we'll get a few from the other clubs so we should be alright at that. Still, if anyone else wants to marshall, we'll take literally every help we can get.

The route for tomorrows race can be seen here. The sign-on point is the old garage, at the Trim end of Batterstown village, from 11:15. A 12:00 start should mean that any frost or ice will be long gone.

The race will cover two laps of the Dorey's forge circuit. In memory of Joe Daly we will be awarding a Prime to the first rider up Dorey's forge on the first lap.
Note that the finish is a new one- the race will finish on the drag just before the descent to Culmullin. The chequered flag will be out at the finish line on the first passage so everyone can see exactly where they'll be sprinting for.

I look forward to seeing you all there.

Things don't look too promising right now with widespread snowfalls. Obviously if the roads are dangerous the race will be cancelled, so check here before heading out in the morning.

Well, that was a pretty good day out. Shame we couldn't run it as an actual race, but it was a good workout all the same. 40km/h average for me in a group that included Dec Quigley and Martin Caddow. It felt an awful lot faster.

Fair play to everyone who came out and took part, especially the first-time racers, it wasn't exactly the most pleasant day to be hanging on to wheels.

Who was driving the pace in the Limit/Semi-limit group? Anyone looking for an early promotion?

Is it definitely going to be rescheduled for Saturday?

Its a pity that the race did not go ahead, but it was a fun bash down the road. I was in the Limit / Semi-Limit group and we averaged 38 kph. The pace was literally being 'driven' by a nice silver car, which provided a superb slip-stream.

Dick O Brien wrote:
That's up to Jimmy Stagg at this point. I'll let you know as soon as I do.

Patrick O'Brien wrote:
It was a shame alright, conditions were perfect on the main road. However, the league works on consensus, so if one party is unhappy there's not much you can do.

Dave Mc wrote:


Thanks Dave!

Patrick O'Brien wrote:

No wonder I couldn't keep up - My legs don't do 38kph yet. Not for more than 2 minutes anyway.

Dave Mc wrote:

Conditions weren't good on the road across from Mullagh through Culmullin. In addition to snow and ice down the middle of the road there was a section covered in farmyard muck. That part of the course was definitely too dangerous to race.

Barry wrote:

It never occurred to me at the time but we could have had a perfectly safe race over the route we eventually went training on. 36kms would have been okay. Mind you, the training spin was plenty fast enough! The question is, if Jimmy wants to run a race on Saturday what's the story on points allocation?

Niall Diamond wrote:


Well you did have over 200 hilly kilometres in them from the previous day!

Barry wrote:
The plan was to race out the Trim road to the roundabout, turn, and come back. The Mullagh wasn't on the agenda.