Tour of Meath 2015 - 26th July

Tour of Meath - EPIC Rain, Mixed Bean Salad and Lumpy Tarmac (great Jersey though)! - By Rosemary Gibson

It was great to see the Cuchulainn Ladies well represented at the An Post Meath Heritage Tour of Meath, even more commendable when you consider the forecast was pretty much unrelenting torrential rain all day, all over. It would have been so much easier (and more sensible) to just stay in bed and sleep. Absolutely no need to get up at 6 am and subject oneself to certain torture, definite cold and possible injury. No need at all. But nevertheless we, and over 4,200 other mad yokes did just that and found ourselves registered, tagged and on the start line listening to U2 blaring over the tannoy and the irrepressibly optimistic guy on the microphone egging us all on and just plain encouraging this irresponsible behaviour! No going back now. We've paid our money, fought with Verified By Visa, fought with the darn printer to print the flipping registration pass and we are jolly well going to get our Jersey because let's face it, it's always good and it's a great souvenir no matter what the weather does on the day. Anyway. ..

We arrived early and parked up in the field. Well signposted, well directed and generally well organised thankfully which makes for a much more pleasant day. Having walked over to the sign on tent and picked up our armbands and jerseys, we called in at the nearby Trim Hotel for some shameless scrambled egg and bacon with a pot of tea.

Although we had had breakfast already, we thought it would be better to err on the safe side. Don't want to get hungry half way round. So, well fed and a little warmed up, we trekked back over the river and up the field to the van to get the bikes and gear. Back down the field and we saw some of Pat's and some leisure Cuchulainns loitering around for a spot near the back so as to stay out of trouble. One guy (who shall remain nameless unless he is outed in the comments) had a yellow rain cape of such magnificence that we dubbed it "The Tent". He was easy to see in the thronging mass of cyclists, and helped us to stay with them until our over consumption of tea pre-tour forced a "behind the farmer's gate stop". (Everyone else seemed to be at it so why not?) Only problem was a zealous stinging nettle that got me behind the knee. ..

So I had heard about the famous Hill of Tara but when it came up it was nary but a small blip in the road. Hard to distinguish between it and the famous lumps of Tarmac that the folks in Meath seem to throw with abandon at every dent in the road but neglect to squash flat afterwards leaving a rather interesting tarmacablobstacle course! Cries of Left! Right! Centre! and Sorry! are still ringing in my ears. Strangely though no one had mentioned the sharp wee hill at 30k which justified a couple of jelly babies at the top. Plenty of downhills too though, can't complain. We came through Slane and past the castle and it dawned on me then that maybe the organisers had deliberately routed us past these sites of interesting heritage for our cultural education and edification (the clue is in the name duh!)

The promised food stop at 50k was all that was keeping us going after that desperate climb up from the bridge over the Boyne in Slane. Just then a random guy passed me to complain about the food stop being moved from the 50k to the 75k marker. .. WHAT? ????!!!!!!!! NOOOOOO! !!!! Surely that couldn't be right? !! I refused to accept that piece of bad news and chugged on, pausing momentarily for my companion and I think maybe the low blood sugar was making me hallucinate about the man earlier because only a couple of km after that there were guys with flags and signs saying 50k - FOOD STOP. Well thank God for that. All is right with the world after all. I think some of the would-be 160k folks had downsized to the 100k and eaten all our sandwiches because by the time we got there there were mountains of cold mixed bean salad but a dearth of sarnies. We got a welcome cup of tea and made use of the facilities.

The rain, which I omitted to mention had lightened off a fraction before lunch had resumed with a vengeance and we faffed around a bit to give it time to go away. Fat chance.  I did actually feel grateful and a little guilty though because God love the marshals, they were standing there all day and must have felt miserable but all gave us a cheery word of encouragement, the ones who could still talk, and smiled as they waved us on. Chapeau and Kudos in abundance also to the Garda, the Civil Defence, the ambulance and all the other volunteers who gave up their time for our safety and enjoyment. The second fifty km passed with rolling hills and farmland, lush leafy country lanes and it was indeed a welcome sight to see Trim Castle and the Food Tent come into view. We smiled for the cameras at the finish and went in to enjoy some delicious chilli noodles, sandwiches and bean salad with lemon drizzle cake and tea. A fitting end to an epic day. I even managed to get a wee massage on my poor tired shoulders. Well done and congratulations to veterans Deirdre Armstrong, Sarah Fagan, Siobhan Ladd Greer, and special congratulations to Sandra McKeever on her graduation from the Absolute Beginners to her first 100k and Áine Meehan in the 50km , awesome achievement ladies! I am sure there are some girls there whose names I have missed so please tag in the comments if I have. A challenging and character building day was had by all, it is said whatever doesn't kill you makes you stronger smile emoticon And the jersey was class!