2009 Kilmashogue Hill Climb

For many years there has been an off-road hill climb race up Kilmashogue as part of early and late season training. At the start of the year it's a trial to see where you are at, and at the end, see if you have improved. This year, like the last few years, Team Worc had it as part of their club race.

This year the course has changed a little from when I set the unofficial record (I guess to make it official it has to be in a race) up the climb in 2007. It is pretty much the same with the same start and end points but a slightly more direct run in the middle of the fireroad section meaning that it is about 70 meters shorter. Personally, I preferred the old route – but you gotta work with what you got.




It had been a while since I had used the Schwalbe Furious Fred tires and as the climb is not technical, they were the perfect choice to get a bit of extra speed up the hill. At an astonishing 300 grams each they dropped the weight of my S-Works Epic down to 9kg. The Epic really did feel like my road bike with the setup.


My warmup to the race was not exactly conducive to giving me a fast time. The Shay Elliot Memorial road race on Sunday, a 3.5 hour endurance/tempo MTB ride on Monday and some tired legs when I rolled up to the start line on Tuesday. I didn't feel too bad warming up and the evening was nice (no strong winds) so I thought a fast time was still possible.

The climb profile

Despite being a mass start climb, my strategy was no different than it would have been if it was an individual TT – start easier than you think you should, push hard on the flatter sections (because it is so easy to ease off the power when you are not climbing), and pin it for the last few minutes.

As we started off, I went to the front and for the first minute or two heard a few bikes behind me. As I turned off the tarred road onto the fireroad a few minutes in, I only had Robin Seymour for company. We stayed together for the next minute or two until I increased my tempo on the flatter section – from there on out I just pushed hard to the finish line rolling over in lots of oxygen dept.



At 11:47, I set a pretty good time up the climb that will be pretty tough to beat. When the new section up the climb beds in a little more it should get a little faster and at the end of the season I might just turn up fresh :)

Thanks Team Worc for inviting me along and running the race.

Results are below and there was a report about the race on the Team Worc website.

1 Ryan 11:47
2 Robin 12:37
3 Evan 13:34
4 Joe 14:15
5 Dave 14:34
6 Robert 14:42
7 Ian 14:58
8 Paddy 15:10
9 Andy 15:12
10 Stu 15:20
11 Paddy M 15:37
12 Gordon 15:40
13 Vinnie 16:24
14 Mark 16:39
15 Ray 17:37
16 Rachel 17:55
16 John 17:55
18 Paul H 19:24
19 Owen 19:45

A Weekend of Hill Climbs - Kippure and Kilmashogue

This weekend turned out to be a weekend of timed climbing races. First off was the Team Worc Extreme Hill Climb. It was a handicapped, (small) group start road climb. The course wasn't a constant climb (see the profile) but was almost 20km long and had 748 meters of climb. Robin, James and I were the last to start so we had many 'rabbits' in front of us to catch. We worked well together for the first 'rolling' 30 minutes of the race and we started to catch some of the earlier starters from about 25 minutes in. The conditions were very windy up around the Military road so our time wasn't going to be setting any records. Into the wind for the final few kilometres before the turn off to the final ascent of Kippure I somehow ended up on the front – unwilling to put much work into the wind I cruised along at a recovery pace as we all tried to recover a little before the final steep (17% in places) ascent of Kippure. As we made the turn and accelerated towards the masts, it was James and I in contention. We ended up playing cat and mouse the whole way up... Unfortunately, I miss timed my final sprint (I thought the penultimate bend was the last) and James pipped me to the post for the fastest time of the day – with the handicaps in place, we were still a little off the overall win. The Irish National Hill Climb Championships are on in a few weeks so I might give them a go – hopefully I'll have my light wheels serviced by then as I had to ride my 'heavy' training wheels for this race.

A graph of the climb from my Garmin

After a false start on the morning spin (more about that in a later post) I ended up heading out on the Epic for an afternoon spin. This week has been mostly (race aside) about recovery so I was only going to be out for a couple of hours but I still wanted to do one hard short effort. Every time I feel like this it's good to give the Kilmashogue hill climb a go. I physced myself up for a fast time and rode half way up it for a warmup dumping my bottles and saddle bag in the ditch, rode back down and made a go for it. I went hard from the start but was careful not to over do it on the steep sections so that I would have enough in my legs to really hammer on the less steep sections. I was about 2:54 in when I turned off the road for the first time (I remember last year doing this when I was really happy if I was under 4 minutes at this point!), negotiated the closed barriers (another few seconds could be saved here) and hammered on up the hill. I tried to remain relaxed and not over cook myself but I noticed that I was riding fast – Big and 8/9 for the 2% 'flat' section. By the time I got to the quary I looked down at my watch and I was still under 10 minutes – I remembered reading a report by Robin from a few years ago when he said he was at 10:something at this point and yet he still posted the second fastest (recorded – as far as I can find) time up the climb (he did a 12:13 in 2001 - the record of 12:12 was set by Craig Brady in 1997). I put my head down and hammered the last second hopping to stay in the low 12 minute mark. I crossed the crest of the climb and hit the split button – I looked down to find 11:56 a new (if unofficial) Kilmashogue Hill Climb record. I let out a few cheers and then realized that I need to get my breath back before I fall over. My heart rate average was actually a little low for the climb (173 – my LT is usually around 178 – last year I averaged 190 up a 17min climb in the states) so I might be able to squeeze a little more time out there. The weather conditions were pretty much perfect though – dry with little wind but some fresh gravel and the closed barriers would have slowed me a bit. A great end to a recovery week :)

My HR versus the climb... The coloured bands are my heart rate zones