Marrey geared for one last Rás
The speeds of the race and constant fear of crashing are two reasons most mortals won’t even consider training, let alone ride it, but Marrey is built of sterner stuff and sees this year as a kind of battle for redemption.
“I’d love to have a go at getting a county rider prize on a stage but, for me now, that’s probably a step too far,” he explains.
“My partner Mary is due our first-born the week of the National Championships at the end of June, so this will probably be my last Rás.
There’s always the chance that you could be humiliated again, but I’m going back to slay the monsters.”
It’s an entirely appropriate choice of words because for many domestic Irish amateurs, the Rás is nothing more than a glorified Tour of Ireland where they suffer like dogs for eight days.
Some of the world’s best talents will line up in Dunboyne tomorrow and they generally look upon the average county rider like Marrey as a nuisance, a man punching far above his weight class.
But the Ballinrobe man, who is one of the highest qualified cycling coaches in the country, is no ordinary athlete. He dedicates anything up to 20 hours a week for six months preparing for the Rás, has ridden 10,000 kilometres since November, holds down a job as a postman, runs foreign training camps, coaches athletes, organises all kinds of endurance events and does an amount of work in the local community.
“I’ve done all the disciplines in cycling,” he said. “I get stuck into them all. I had to stay away from adventure racing last year after I hurt my back doing downhill running a few weeks after the Rás. The injury meant I had to back off a bit, which probably explains why I didn’t go that well on the bike either.
“What I like about adventure racing is, there’s a bit of a strategy to it. You have to thoroughly investigate the course if you want to win those events. It usually starts off with a run, then a bike, a kayak, another run, a mountain run, another cycle and maybe some form of an obstacle course at the end.
“I used to go up a day or two before and check out the course to see what equipment I needed. It probably suited my makeup. I wouldn’t be a really fast runner but I was strong running uphill and had an aptitude to run downhill fast.
“I came down off Croagh Patrick in eight and a half minutes. I just run straight down, no brakes. That’s what gets me on the podium in a lot of those races.”
With plans to ride his first European Mountain Bike Championships in Ballyhoura next month there’s no sign of stopping just yet for a man who has set all kinds of daft Irish records, such as Galway to Limerick on a bike, and Mizen to Malin.
“It’s a huge event for Ireland,” he says of the Euros.
“To be part of that and ride it, it’ll be a thrill to finish it, never mind get a result in it. I was told a while ago that this was my 27th year racing. I had no idea. I don’t believe I’m old. I still think I’m a kid.
“I have to train for something. Then there’s the fear of failure that makes you go that extra step.”
It’s that fear that has spurred him onto training even harder for a 12th and possibly final tilt at the An Post Rás with the Mayo Centra team, alongside fellow Connacht men Paddy Clarke, Derek Joyce, Sean McInerney and Paul Brady.
“You can do all the local races and all the national races you like but none of them compare to the Rás,” he says adamantly.
“The one thing I learned from last year is forget about doing well in races leading up to the Rás but hope they’ll get you ready for it.
“Irish amateurs like Roger Aiken, Bryan McCrystal, all proved you have to train really specifically and that’s the route we’ve gone down this year. Last year we had four teams from the west. This year we will have two.
“The first year I rode it was 1993, the first year the pros rode. But the speeds are even higher now. The big fear now is the amount of crashes.
“Last year on the stage to Listowel, yellow jersey wearer Peter Hawkins and Aaron Buggle came down on a big wide open stretch of road. You’re thinking ‘if they came down there what chance have I on a narrow winding road?’
“I can’t afford to crash and break a collarbone or a leg so to be on the safe side you either hang near the back or else you ride out in the wind. But you need savage strength to do the latter, or you ride at the very front but you need a strong team to do that.
With a couple of top tens in stages under his belt, Marrey’s best day on the Rás came, ironically, when he slid across the line into Sligo in 1999, finishing seventh after crashing in the sprint and ending up wedged under the podium truck.
“A Dutch guy was away and there was a big Belgian going for second with Colm Bracken. He came out from the barriers and caught Colm’s wheel. I remember Colm’s bike hit the barrier on the left, was catapulted across the road and took out Denis Easton, Aidan Crowley and myself.”
That may have been 15 years ago but if Marrey is in with a sniff of a win again, or even a county rider prize, he’ll be risking life and limb once more.
The most important jersey of the race signifies the leader of the General Classification. He is the rider with the lowest accumulated time.
Goes to the rider with the most points tallied at the finish of each stage. Points are awarded to each of the first 15 riders across the line on a sliding scale from 15 to 1 while there are also intermediate sprint points during each of the stages.
Worn by the rider with the most mountain points at the finish of each stage. Points are awarded to leading riders passing each designated summit with extra points on the most severe climbs and fewer on the less severe climbs.
Presented to the best placed rider under the age of 23 at the end of each stage.
Awarded to the best rider overall from an Irish county team, ensuring there is a place for the amateur contestants in the peloton.
Awarded to the winner of each stage.
The times of the best three riders over the line for each team every day are recorded and the team with the lowest accumulated time for those three is declared the winner.
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