Diversions, debates, debriefs, dehydration and debutants

20 May, 2025 - David Power

Full report with photos on my blog: https://dapower.wordpress.com/2025/05/20/diversions-debates-debriefs-dehydration-and-debutants/
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This 9-time WWR finisher reports out on a hot day out in the Garden County

Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose. For a third year running, East Cork AC emerged victorious after 7 hours of racing down through Wicklow, with TT Racers and Rathfarnham AC filling the podium. These teams have shared the podium uninterrupted for the last 10 years or so. When will a new team knock them off their perch?

The Major Players
Yet while only one teams wins, all 35 teams have a story to tell, usually multiple trials and tribulations along the way. As I sat watching Scottie Scheffler win the US PGA golf the other night, he reminded me of East Cork. Cool, calm under pressure, never makes a mistake. Likeable too, in a mild-mannered way, rather than riling you up like Bryson DeChambeau.

TT Racers are more like LIV Golfers (you’re all nice people :-), just stick with the metaphor). The cream of the crop, from Dublin and beyond. Undoubted quality, you never know who they might sign. Rathfarnham, my club, have been round a while, we’ve been to the top, but struggling to move onto the senior’s tour, like Pádraig Harrington. Bulking our team out with seasoned masters (small M, it’s not Augusta).

Most other teams will score a few birdies, but it’s the double bogeys and ball out of bounds that really ruins the relay scorecard. What makes a good team? Par, par, par, like Scottie. Everybody has a different set of clubs, you make do with what’s in the bag. If I was posting a job advert, here’s what I might look for.

Job application – skills required:
Ability to work well in a high-pressure environment
Flexible work hours – start/finish/overtime
Ability to think outside the box
Learns from mistakes
Weather resistant – works in all seasons
Self-sufficient
Thrives in a competitive environment
Team player
Self-aware – excellent spatial awareness & navigational ability
Full driver’s license (and good at parking in tight spots)
Leadership skills (bonus for team captain role)

This year 280 runners applied and got through the interviews. Some winged it, bluffing their way through on navigational ability (“sure the GPS will tell me”). Others let their CV of past race results speak for themselves – yet looking back, the more experienced the runner, the bigger the faux pas.

The Front Nine
Race day was hot, as we basked in this May heat spell. Clear skies meant the early start at 7am in Kilmashogue would be quick, with conditions firm and dry underfoot throughout. Belpark and DSD were new entrants. Our team had a late change to our leg 1 runner (goodbye Mark, hello Patrick), a bit of welcome youth added to the team. He did really well, despite a spill early on. Captain John followed the team throughout the day, a mighty effort, considering he was also running later.

Car problems can throw a spanner in the works, so between Gráinne getting stuck in M50 traffic and stressing about missing her start (leg 8 at 1.30pm, sure that’s loads of time!), to Louis stopping to refuel and struggling to open the petrol cap, leaving us panicking for 5 minutes.

The Back Nine
The hit rate of getting lost seemed higher this year. Perhaps it was the heat, or maybe just being dazzled by the bright sun, but new or experienced, stories came back from all sorts of diversions, our own team included. Leg 6 maintained it’s reputation as the most likely to cause confusion, with a 3km diversion catching out one team, and even before that, others went awry. Even speedy Enda took the scenic route on leg 7, although Darren beat that with an unplanned tour to Asknagap.

My own reckoning with leg 7 went well. I dreaded the heat knocking me back, but thanks to mid run refuelling from an foireann maoir uisce, Dermot and Alexey, I got a second wind. Maybe it was the joy of finally passing a runner on this leg, rather than having the mighty Tim O’D fly by me. His brother Nicky led the away this year instead, well out of sight by the time I started from Ironbridge.

The 19th Hole
The finish in the pub car park in Shillelagh is always a hodge podge of people arriving, drinking, eating, changing clothes, minding babies (Cork babies) or best of all Nora doing timing with her clipboard and a neatly folded copy of the Irish Times. I doubt she got past the first page, but I suppose she was there for the whole afternoon.

Rathfarnham has a proud record of taking part of 18 consecutive years (20 but for Covid), out of 22 relay events. I was thinking about all the runners that have taken part over the years, it must be nearly 100 from the club. A nice task would be to figure out who, when, where. Coincidentally, Laura Flynn was in the aforementioned car park, having taken part this year. Laura was on the 2005 team, so fair play, she’s the link between now and then. I hope we’re all doing the same in 2045. Hopefully East Cork’s babies take up golf, instead of mountain running.

We were all wrecked, and a little parched by the time we got home, but happy to meet up the Sunday night after to recount all the memories and plot a way back to the top for 2026. If we could only get Rory McIlroy’s phone number, surely, he’d be handy on leg 2 to beat Scottie?

A 40 year old Mystery. Solved.

18 May, 2025 - Diane McConnell

When I was a child my parents regularly brought me and my siblings on family walks through forests and orienteering trails. I remember the large fixture maps in the car park that would show the various trails, with a coloured dot on it. Out of the Dot would be the words, ‘You are here’. My 8 year old mind was full of wonder and curiosity. “But how do they know we are here?” It’s no wonder my parents worried for my future.

This was my first direct experience of WWR. I am fairly new to IMRA so to get picked for Trailrunners I already felt a winner. But I couldn’t stop thinking about that Dot as I slogged on L8 Crossbridge to Shillelagh. The pressure of that Dot was directly over my head, beating down on me harder than the sun. I wondered, will anyone watching know I have just micro walked the last 55 seconds?…I had better keep running.

From 7.10am (yes a lie-in) this morning I was following the Dot watching the progress of my Trailrunner Team mates, Anthony, Robert, Stefanie, Caoimhin, team captain Chris, Brian and Conor…and so many other friends in TT along the route. I had our team marshal Malika continue the tracking while I drove us chasing the handover spots along the way. The excitement was building all day. By the time I took over the GPS belt and tore increasingly slowly up that first mile ascent, I finally realised how they knew where I was. I am the Dot!