Secret of champions’ success as simple as riding a bike
Situated on the north Antrim coast, Torr Head provides a cyclist with breathtaking scenery and a breathtaking five-mile climb. It combines rugged beauty with ritual torture.
The assault on Torr was the brainchild of my friend, Philip. Precisely 14 weeks earlier, Philip had bought a new bike. A cyclist in his teenage days, he quit at 16. That was 22 years ago. He hadn’t worn Lycra since.
Soon after he bought his bike, I invited Philip to Belfast and we went for a spin. I took him to the hills to the south of city. After one steep but short climb, he was gasping for air. He would have called me names, but he couldn’t breathe.
A few months later, a group of us accepted Philip’s invitation to take on Torr Head.
Dan Nancy’s Brae, which comes shortly after the Cushendun hurling pitch, claimed the first casualty to a broken chain. After about two miles, I was in utter agony. My lungs and legs were screaming for mercy. Rather than face the dishonour of dismounting, I battled on, desperately hoping that the coastline would flatten out. But when I turned a hairpin bend, all I could see was sheep, Scotland, the blue sea, and a road that stretched onwards and upwards into the sky. Beaten and broken, I got off the bike.
As for Philip. He darted past me on Dan Nancy’s Brae. On a couple of occasions, I saw him in the distance. But after I surrendered, he disappeared. When I met him at the summit, he was laughing and relaxed. The man who inched his way over a foothill outside Belfast had charged over Torr Head. It was an extraordinary transformation. The change from caterpillar to butterfly was no fluke.
Suffice to say, Philip could be described as being slightly obsessive. Between his trip to Belfast and our day in the Glens of Antrim, he trained six times a week. He also sought expert advice, so he trained smart. His weekly regime consisted of two weight-training sessions, two turbo-training sessions and two long rides on Saturdays and Sundays. To avoid fatigue and to allow his body to recover, his workload was reduced every fourth week.
As an endurance-based sport, proficiency in cycling is largely dependent on the hours dedicated to training. Eddy Merckx, the greatest cyclist of all time, had a simple formula for those seeking success on two wheels. Merckx went by the mantra: “Ride your bike, ride your bike, ride your bike.”
There are those who would argue that the same elementary principles can’t apply to skill-based sports such as Gaelic football, but recent evidence would suggest otherwise.
If talent and technique were the sole determinants of success, then Kerry would be the All-Ireland champions. No other team in the country has four forwards like the two O’Sullivans, Colm Cooper, and Kieran Donaghy.
Yet it is Dublin, a team that was annihilated by Kerry and Tyrone in recent years, that are the reigning champs. If the other leading counties examine Dublin’s success then they should be able to deduce that there is nothing to stop them from lifting the Sam Maguire Cup in 2012.
Dublin have proved that the ultimate prize can be secured without the presence of four marquee forwards. Two class acts (the Brogans) and a super-sub (Kevin McManamon) can do the job.
The basic recipe is two artists and 13 foot soldiers. Subservience to the greater good is all that is required from the men in the trenches. There are at least half a dozen teams that could provide that ratio of talent to industry.
Yet the bookies have already decided that this year’s championship is a three-horse race between Kerry (5/2), Dublin (3/1) and Cork (7/2). The next teams on the betting are Kildare (12/1), Mayo (14/1), Donegal (16/1) and Tyrone (18/1). Armagh, a Division One team, are 50/1. Down, the beaten finalists of 2010, are 30/1. Derry, last year’s beaten Ulster finalists, are 40/1.
Is a Dublin team that is hugely dependent on a 12-man defensive system really that much better than the other leading contenders? Admittedly, Dublin have Bernard and Alan Brogan, and having two quality forwards is a prerequisite. Yet, barring injury and mishaps, Tyrone will have Stephen O’Neill and Sean Cavanagh. There is a chance that Armagh will have Steven McDonnell, Jamie Clarke and Ronan Clarke. Donegal have Michael Murphy and Colm McFadden while Patrick McBrearty is only going to get better. Bear in mind that Donegal could have beaten the eventual All-Ireland champions by playing only one forward in attack. Indeed, teams like Donegal and Kildare underline the massive gains that can be obtained from the Merckx school of thought.
A year after getting slaughtered by Armagh in the qualifiers, the same group of Donegal players won the Ulster title for the first time in 19 years. While Jim McGuinness installed a new defensive system, his players also trained like dogs. At the weekends they trained twice a day.
Kildare’s major failing is that they have a severe shortage of artists, hence the courting of Seanie Johnston. Forced to play John Doyle further out the field, the Lilywhites don’t have that killer touch in attack. Yet despite this massive handicap Dublin still only managed to beat them by a controversial free in their Leinster semi-final.
By the time you read this column the Dublin players will have completed their second 6.30am training session of the year. Having witnessed the repeated failures and disasters of this Dublin side, we know they aren’t an extraordinarily gifted bunch. They are, however, an extraordinarily dedicated one.
There is no great secret to Dublin’s success. The bigger mystery is why so many other teams are neither willing nor able to copy their extremely simple formula. Then they’ll wonder when their season is over why they ended up beaten and broken only halfway up the hill.
* p.heaney@irishnews.com
