What was a fantastic day.

We set off from UCD at about 7am in a huge peleton, climbing up towards Stepaside in the morning sunshine. Near Enniskerry the road forked, with the 100Km riders going one way, and the 200Km riders going the other - the lads gave me a bit of a push and I opted for the 200Km route with the option to get back on the 100Km route in Laragh. With some more gentle persuasion in Laragh, I stuck to the 200 route heading towards Glendalough and the climb into the Wicklow gap. The gap was tough, but the cracking downhill after the summit towards Donard made up for the effort. At Donard we took a good break, stocking up on sun cream and drinks.

The next serious climb was Slieve Maan - an epic category 1 climb of 500 metres that seems to go on forever. My legs were burning coming up the last rise, but we all made it up intact. The drinks station at the top was like a sugary, yellow mirage in orange or lemon flavours. We ditched the bikes and took a short rest, then headed down the lethal hill towards Rathdrum. "The Rathdrum Drag" soon took over, a twisting nightmare of little climbs almost perfectly designed to totally screw with your legs after Slieve Maan. My left leg started to do an interesting spasm thing, and the last stop in Rathdrum couldn't have come soon enough. We took a good long break and set off on the last 60Km to Dublin…arriving in UCD in not exactly record breaking time; but happy to have made it through.

The total climb for the day was 2500m, we burned nearly 6000 kcals, but all was soon forgotten with a cheese burger and chips. Well done to the organisers and all who took part.