The Sound of Cycling

Gently pedalling down along the blueway I watched a small branch floating along with the current of the river. It moved at pretty much the same speed as I did and it felt as though I too was floating along the river in harmony with the current and nature itself. A commotion to my left revived me from my daydream. A swan was having a wash in a tributary stream. I stopped to watch for a moment, but not so long as to disturb the animal in its morning ritual.

Early mornings can be incredibly noisy but remarkably peaceful at the same time. Having an aversion to heavily trafficked roadways I often find myself seeking out the laneways and forest tracks that are least inhabited by anything with an engine. This mornings spin lasted 8km on the riverside towpath before I crossed the bridge in Kilsheelan and headed into the depths of gurteen wood. Having a gravel bike offers up so many different options and today I availed of most of them.

Shortly after entering the wood I took in my surroundings and listened closely trying to identify each individual sound. There was the crunch of small twigs being broken beneath my 42mm tyres. There was a gentle whirr of my Sram chain on the 12 speed Force AXS cassette. Birds from all directions and angles were chirping, tweeting, cooing and cawing. Rain was falling gently upon deep green leaves. As each drop passed from one leaf to another small sounds combining a splash, a plop and a drip were being gently created. The air was damp, but very fresh and clear. I always find the air quality to be at its very best after being washed and filtered in the processing of a rain shower within a wood. A deer stirred as bushes rustled close by and then another. A very brief glimpse and they were gone. At this time of morning it is a common occurrence to happen upon them as they make their way back upwards onto the mountains having seen the night resting down close to the river side.

Surrounding me were at least forty different shades of green combined with translucent pinks, summer sun yellows and patagonian purples. Furz bushes, heather, rhododendrons and foxglove honeysuckles abounded. It would take a skilled artist many hours to get them all in and no photograph would do them justice but I tried anyway.

I was now approaching the habitat of the blind sheepdog. It would be too early for him to be out and about but you never know. I was out with a group a while back showing them around the wood and approaching this area mentioned that they should keep an eye out for the blind dog. Chuckles of incredulity were forthcoming until just minutes later we actually came upon the dog and its owner, deep within the wood. The owner warned to watch out for the dog as he was blind. All proferences from then on were taken at face value.

Passing a stack of fresh cut trees the smell transports me back to a day during my childhood. A warm summer day when the rain fell so no silage or corn could be cut. Rather than waste the day my father decided that its would be a good opportunity to cut a tree to provide fuel for the winter. I was given the task of loading each block into the trailer. As a child on a wet humid day it was tough back breaking work. I was very stiff and sore that evening but learned a valuable lesson about the satisfaction that comes from a hard days work. The feeling of tiredness and exhaustion was also a feeling of accomplishment. A better nights sleep I never had.

Meandering through the wood my thoughts drift to my father who will have passed 13 years on Friday. I am also reminded of my father in law who passed recently. A very straight decent man. His priorities were his family, his faith, his friends and his sport. No material possession could impress him but an honest days work would. A lifelong GAA man he once played in a county final with is younger brother. He was a tall and strong full back, the brother mid-field. The younger brother was being bullied and beaten, punched and kicked both on and off the ball by a much bigger opposition player. Billy saw injustice being committed and would not stand by to let it happen, especially to his younger brother. He went out to Donal and told him to go in full back for a few minutes. Five minutes later he came back in from mid field to Donal and told him ‘Go on away back out there again now. You won’t be getting anymore trouble from that clown so play the game you are capable of.’ Donal had a great game after that and they won the County final.

Next I pass a piece of roadway where stones have been laid in some form of orderly manner. One day on a mountain bike spin a member of the group remarked that they were like something he had seen on his holidays in Rome. A week later some riders were missing and different riders were there passing the same spot when a guy who was on both spins remarked that the stones were there since Roman times. Tales about chariots and the like being used abounded and history was created as fact.

Nearby stands the ruin of a house, or a civil war barracks depending upon which historian is on the bike on any particular day. One prominent mountain bike historian enthralled the group one day with the assertion that he remembered seeing someone living in the house back in the late fifties. This was in 2019 and the historian was 42 years of age. I’ll let you do the maths on that one.

Parts of this wood I first experienced in the winter of 1987 on a yellow Dawes mountain bike. I had worked hard on a farm all summer to save up the money for the bike. Sean Kelly was the Worlds number one cyclist at that time and he grew up on a farm not far from here. Local folklore was heavy with tales of how tough Kelly was as a child and a young man growing up and how hard he could work. This led to my own teenage days being given a different perspective. I would cycle 10km to work, hail rain or shine. Milk cows before breakfast. Stack hay bales as fast as any grown man all day long. Pull fields of ragweed by hand and do any form of physical labour at every opportunity, as I believed that this would make me stronger like Kelly. It would make me tougher like Kelly. It would make me a better cyclist like Kelly. I even remember once going to the dentist and considering asking him not to give me the anaesthetic before pulling out a tooth as I had seen Kelly being stitched up after a crash in the Nissan Classic without an anaesthetic. Did any of this make me any stronger or tougher? Probably not, but it didn’t do any harm to my work ethic either.

My time within the wood is now coming to an end as two gates are climbed and I now find myself at Harneys cross. I go straight on for Powers the Pot. The morning is damp and humid. Rain is now falling steadily and low cloud is restricting visibility to about 50 meters. The conditions remind me of another day 5 years ago when friends, family and the local cycling community came along to help me ride up this climb 22 times. That day I was trying to raise money for local hospice care. I had been humbled to see the care they give those who are terminally ill when my father was in his final days and wanted to do something for them and to remember him by. I suffered a lot that day but will always remember so many people who came out to help and provide support and encouragement on the day.

A white line finally appears stretching across the road. I remember the night it was put there by Eddie Keogh over 14 years ago now. It was the finish line for a league race that I was helping Eddie to organise each week. I am amazed that the line has survived for so long. I wish my house was painted in paint that good. Some of the riders who raced in those races have also survived, and thrived. One young fella from Carrick was a real danger when he was only 15 or 16. You could leave him off with the scratch group. A group made up of some of the best senior riders in the country and he could beat them all. He was an animal devouring all round him during the race with the power in his legs and his appetite and hunger for victory and success. Its’ easy to remember that side of Sam Bennett but what I remember just as much is how he would thank myself and Eddie each night as he set off for home for organising the races. A well reared credit to his parents back then just as much as he is a son to be proud of today. I am fortunate to be able to say that I know both Tour green jersey winners from Carrick on Suir pretty well and can also say with some confidence that if they had never sat on a bicycle they would still be men worth looking up to who would had achieved much in whatever their chosen field might have been and both would still have been honourable and sincere sons that their parents could be very proud of.

You hear all kinds of sounds whilst out on the bike. Some come from your surroundings and some from inside your own head. They are all worth listening to.

Hello Gravel bike my old friend,

I’ve come to cycle you again.

Because a thorn softly creeping,

left a puncture while I was sleeping

And the vision of a spin that was planted in my brain

Still remains

Within the sound of cycling. 

Barry