Irish NPS Round 5 - Killarney

August 07

Round 5 of the Irish NPS series took place in Killarney marking the first ever DH NPS in County Kerry. The local crew, headed by Dennis O’Shea of the Big Little Bike Shop have been itching to stage a race but have been frustrated by the fact that much of Kerry is a National Park meaning no mountain biking (take note that there are proposals to make the Mournes a national park) leaving them surrounded by mountains forests and a fantastic landscape but nowhere to race.

Eventually the guys came up with a forest that the forestry said they could use. The task was huge as the forest was steep, wet, covered in dense trees and massive rocky outcrops but come the race the hard work was over and the track was ready.

When I first walked the track I didn’t know what to make of it. It was pretty intimating, like something out of section in a Canadian extreme freeride DVD. It looks scary, steep, dangerous; fun…..it was not like any track I’d raced in Ireland. This was going to be something else!
There was nothing else for it but to get on the bikes and have a blast and after a run or two we were starting to get to grips with the difficult track. Speaking to other riders people where having a blast and were really enjoying the challenge of trying to beat the track.

The weather wasn’t helping things with torrential downpours creating rivers running down the track. Despite this lots of hard work from Mr. O’Shea and lots of buckets of stones were keeping things in order.

Organization was spot on, especially for their first DH NPS with live timing, fast uplift and great trophies. Here is how the racing went on Sunday.

U14

Robert Duggan took first place to give him his first win of the 2007 NPS. Gavin Carroll followed, relegated to second place after winning all previous races this year. Gavin put in a time of 1.40.130. Kyle Rimmer finished in third place with a time of 2.30.050 to take home the trophy.

U16

Banbridge's Davy Graham took first place with a time of 1.37.480 ahead of Epic's Greg Callaghan. Greg put in a second run time of 1.39.200 while Paul McGrady held on to third place with his first run time of 1.43.480.

Vets

Stevie Davidson completed a second run 8 seconds fastest than his first to take first place in the vet category ahead of Banaman Carl Young. Carl was sitting in his place with his first run with a time of 1.54.230 however Stevie pipped him to the post during the second run. Chain Reaction's Michael White took third place with a time of 2.16.900

Ladies
Unfortunately no ladies made the trip to Killarney

Sport

Only nine sport riders turning out for the event, but the usual suspects were in the top half. TC's Thomas Clogher junior finished in first place with a time of 1.45.810 while Enda Munnelly held on to second place with a time of 1.52.620 ahead of Kenneth Murphy's first run time of 1.54.580.

Senior

Local lad Ben Mullen took the win in the senior category with a time of 1.29.320 while Epic's Brian Cooney held on to second place with a first run time of 1.31.780. David Egan took third place with a time of 1.41.410.

Masters
Michael Cowan did enough on his first run to just keep Ian McIntyre in 2nd place. Ian had a big crash on his first run but put in a fast 2nd run to push Sean Herilhy in to third.

Junior
With €200 up for grabs for the fastest time of the day there would be no holding back Jason Murphy. With a fantastic time he took the junior win and the dosh ahead of Cathal Hicky in an impressive time that would have won Elite.

Elite
During practice, Irish team mechanic Dale McMullan looked like he was one of the few riders that was actually riding the course (as opposed the course riding them) and despite a bad first run Dale put in the fastest elite time to take an impressive win ahead of Dan Wolfe on board his 4X machine with Tom Power close behind in Third.

When it was all said and done this was a great race. Very few tracks would have held up so well in the torrential rain and everything ran like clockwork. Well done to the Killarney lads for their massive efforts, we’ll see you there next year!