 on around the northwest. Now the cyclist running the Glowland who's from Muff but who lives in Derry is a former on-post Sean Kelly rider. In fact he was with them for six seasons, represented Ireland on the road many times including in the elite men's race at the World Road Championships in Valkenburg back in 2012 and he was one of three Irish finishers that day alongside Dan Martin and Nicholas Roach and he also holds a record for the fastest time cycling between Derry and Dublin and broke the Everesting record a number of times during lockdown. This is for cycling the equivalent of the height of Everest. In fact he's the current holder of that world record but not content with that. He wanted to break the mizzen to Malin record going the the length of Ireland and give it a go on Sunday headed off on Sunday morning and wanted to do it to well number one supposed to break the record but also to raise awareness for a charity that's close to his heart and we'll get to that in a moment but I'm delighted now that Ronan joins us on the line well hopefully anyhow because we're on zoom as well Ronan can you hear me yes I can thank you very good and I can hear you and see you so so that's great so anyhow Sunday morning you wanted to head off to try to break the record for a mizzen to Malin and what what what's what's what was on Sunday morning what was a record this the record when I set out in Sunday morning was 17 hours and 21 minutes and that was set in September 2021 so it was almost two years old the existing record okay and you did it in what time I did it in 15 hours and 30 minutes and I'm full of seconds I can't remember the exact second count but it was 15 hours 30 minutes so excuse maths you knocked how much off the record an hour and 50 minutes an hour and 50 yeah yeah so the obviously the start and finish points are fixed did you have to start in either mizzen head and Malin head and you have to finish in the opposite one so you have to ride the length of the island but you can you can select your own route between the two locations and more or less my route was almost identical to the existing record and we came up through a long time in County Cork and then Limerick at Sloan through the Midlands up Dennis Gill and Straban Derry and then through through Moff Cuggies Point Cairndona and up to up the Malin head so five hundred and sixty eight kilometres altogether in 15 hours 30 minutes altogether and actual moving time if you remove that if you exclude the stops the moving time was 15 hours and seven minutes and that's a it's an average speed of just under 38 kilometres per hour just under 38 kilometres per hour and that includes all the hills that's your average yeah there's about four and a half thousand meters of elevation gain throughout the route when you include all the hills and Cork especially was it was pretty pretty mountainous getting out of Cork that was the one deviation I had made to the existing records routes and that I thought I'd well I did find a sort of a quicker way out of Cork but it did include a little bit more climbing but we figured that that would that would be worth it in the end up and so yeah a lot of climbing a lot of kilometres a lot of hours in the saddle but yeah a lot of hours in the saddle so very little time out of it to to rest or to eat or do whatever but if you're gonna break the record those things have to be done well the clock doesn't stop yeah so if you stop the clock keeps ticking and your time keeps etching upwards there so like my goal sort of unrealistically but my goal was setting out in something not to stop and now the sort of famous Irish weather didn't really play ball on Sunday and it was well I think it was the hottest day of the year so far and it was like 26 degrees coming through the Midlands and actually it was mostly because of the heat that was that was the biggest challenge on Sunday was just dealing with those high temperatures and because of that I had to take a few additional stops that 22 minutes I think of stops in total and I think about 20 of those were just down to needing to get myself some shade and get cool down a bit out of the direct sunlight for a bit so it was hot hot hot for a lot of time okay but you know the thing is about the Irish weather it's never gonna be just right because if it's not hot it'll be wet if it's not you know wet it'll be windy well this is that you know it's a there's actually quite a lot of rules and regulations around trying to break the the records and they're governed by a cycling Ireland which is the governing body for cycling on the island and one of the rules states that you have to actually nominate the day that you're going to attempt the record and the exact time you're going to attempt it three weeks in advance so you have no idea what the weather is going to do three weeks in advance and I sort of find a little bit of a loophole in that and that if I just took the time and effort to nominate every Saturday and Sunday for the entire year and every time between 5 a.m. and 6 a.m. and 7 a.m. I could I could yes I could I could wait somewhat wait then for a good day and Sunday you know in and over a year of waiting Sunday we thought was gonna be the best day possible it was forecast I think that you know with the there might be a bit of a cam before storm Oscar came our way I don't think some Oscar must have got lost somewhere along the way because there was no there was no storm in a way but what we did get was a you know mostly a tail wind for the first half and then the the winds sort of died away the temperatures and increased and yeah that when you're gonna be on the bike for 15 16 17 hours over you know your traversing the whole island also you're gonna get mixed weather conditions you you know it's impossible to wait for for perfect conditions and I think we did a good job of you know managing the heat that was there you know my parents were there helping hands they I think they emptied pretty much every shop between the Midlands and Mount Head of any bags of ice that they had and then Chris and Mitchell who were sort of the crew for me supported me the whole way they you know they did a great job of sort of dumping bottles of cold water and ice down the back as much as we could just to try and control that temperature as much as we could to keep your body heat down that you know there's that that's actually one of the things that sports scientists have identified in recent years is just the importance of either with the core temperature and you know we all know I think it's a 37 and a half or something about the normal and quite often in these events you know we've got core bodies temperature sensors now they can measure your your temperature and throughout these events you'd be touching 40 41 degrees at times and the higher your core temperature gets the the less power you've got so the slower you go so keeping it under control is very difficult but also very important it's it's down to monitoring things like that and and and you know I'm preparing in advance and being being well organized and allowing for all eventualities that I suppose are the sort of things that you have to do when you're out to break a record because remember chatting to you about the Everesting record and and how you took the bike down to I think it was two cogs just to lighten lighten the weight and it's small things like that that can make a big difference when you're when you're you know you're at extremes yeah like I'm a reporter for cycling websites escape collective calm and I spent all morning just writing up all the sort of granular detail that we've been to to try and optimize the bike and the equipment and the clothing and the helmet and you know there was very very little left a chance and because it you know all that tech offers a second here a second there over a short distance but when you're doing 560 kilometers it could you know could add up to minutes of gains or losses depending what way you go so and yes the the bike is incredibly important as well again is very lucky to have the bike that I have there and then just you know fueling on top of that like all the food and hydration and I think the we have a parameter on the bike and I can tell you how many calories you burned I burned 11 and a half thousand calories on during during the ride so if you don't it's just like a car if you don't put the fuel in it's gonna stop somewhere along the road so you kind of have to keep that tapped up throughout as well and sort of that that actually gets becomes quite a challenge also because the longer you ride that the less you actually just want to or the less you can even stomach and so just getting the fuel in is a bit of a challenge also so what was the hardest part was it physical or psychological and and where was it I think in terms of physical effort you know it's not like a sprint finish or something like that where you're going as hard as you can it's a you know it's a much steadier pace so it physically it's not that tough but then the heat on somebody made for a big big challenge that that was probably the hardest point and then that directly sort of links into you know the more you're overheating and it was it was actually like the tarmac was radiating the heat back up a major you just you could just feel that it was it was it was very very tough and that then becomes a psychological challenge off the back of it so you know when I was coming through on a scale and was still 200 kilometers to go or whatever it was and I didn't know if I was going to make the other side of on a scale and that was that was tough but at the same time I was fairly adamant that I never wanted to have to do this again so you kind of buckle your head down and get on with it and when you're going through towns do you do you have to allow for things like traffic lights and traffic at roundabouts and just you know work with them or yes all the rules the roads fully apply like and we know at a support car behind me but with no lead support so there was no road closures or so yeah full rules of the road still still apply well when you've knocked just under two hours off the existing record there's a good chance that it'll stand for a while well yeah however long it stands it's nice to have had it at some point so I personally would like to see you know maybe maybe the rules relaxed a little bit because at the moment they're very very like given how good a day I got when I broke the Derrida Dublin record last year it makes it almost impossible now for someone to attempt that record because I had such a lucky day in terms of weather forecast so I would like to see the rules relaxed a little bit and maybe in line with the way all their organizations work and that might just inspire more people to maybe attempt these records and rather than hold something forever I would rather see more sort of more riders attempt the records and you know make better well that's just I would find that fascinating as well just watch all the riders attempt the records also so maybe allow them to specify a number of days rather than one day that that would be one time that's one of the things I had identified yeah like if rather than rather than setting an exact day and time that you have to start out and if it even was just you know you had a three-day window and you could start at any time within that one do you know you you're at the other the other element of it for me is that you know had had there been a storm Oscar whatever that was or wasn't on Sunday morning you know if I'd gone the whole way to Cork and couldn't wait an hour for it to pass then perhaps there's a safely issue there and you know taking the risk to start in conditions that maybe aren't just safe just because you know you have to get referees on site and timekeepers on site and your crew has come the whole way down to Cork and there's a there's a lot of organizing and a lot of other people's time involved in in these things that you know isn't isn't always easy to or you know it's it's it's much appreciated I'm going to put that word. Just for the record by the way what is the record from Derry to Dublin? So I actually did it sorry Dublin to Derry direction you can you can attempt these records in either direction and it's five hours and 14 minutes wow yeah it was I think that was a 60 year old record that one so I had a little bit of technological advancements on on my side over the last 60 years but also the road network is sort of the the route is actually a lot longer now because you can't take you know the same the same route that used to exist so I'm at least telling myself that balances out in the long run. Well I think on occasion in heavy traffic it's taken me that long to drive it so well done so both both those records from Dublin to Derry and also from Missington Ballin and I want to I want to touch on something that you're you're keen to highlight because you did raise awareness and indeed some funds for a charity that's close well in a way it's to a foundation and a charity that's close to your heart and it's to do with your daughter tell us yeah my daughter has a severe nut and raw egg allergy and and we've unfortunately had a few scares where she's taken very serious reactions to to those allergens and so I just wanted to I've heard about nut allergies but raw egg that that means that if if a raw egg is cracked in the presence of your daughter severe reaction and that's exactly how we found out I accidentally broke an egg she was toddler at the time and you know didn't consume any egg but just happened to touch it as kids do and then we're not sure exactly what happened but either touched her lover touched her face or something and within 15 minutes I think we had to rush to hospital and she had passed out and we had to give her an epi pen and she was in hospital overnight and and so you know that that sort of you know the nut allergy that she has also you know we find out about that because when she was a kid as well as you got a tiny bit of peanut butter and had a similar reaction so and you know obviously we've had loads of tests and that done since that have highlighted a few other allergies also and we just have to be hyper vigilant about about all those sort of ingredients and you know double check and triple check everything that comes into the house and everything that she may be able to get her hands on it doesn't contain any of those those ingredients and yeah I wanted to sort of not you know I'm not making a campaign for people to stop eating nuts or eggs or anything like that that's that's not the goal here the goal is just to sort of highlight that you know food allergies are it's actually a global epidemic at this point and it affects thousands of people in Ireland alone and you know the scientists tell us that the numbers are only going to increase in coming years where four years ago there might have been one kid per school that had an allergy of some sort it's now you know the handful or maybe even more per classroom that have an allergy and those numbers are on the rise so I just wanted to sort of improve the or raise the awareness around for the for that food allergies through this record attempt and just sort of you know put it in people's minds that actually you know while something that is completely harmless to us could actually have life-threatening effects to all our people and just to to consider that and mostly just to sort of improve all of our own you know understanding of because I was completely oblivious to food allergies before my before we found out about my daughters but you know if you if you see someone has maybe hives or difficulty breathing or you know swelling of the face or anaphylaxic shock you know recognizing these signs can actually save someone's life and just knowing how to you know apply an epi-pen if someone has an allergy chances are to have an epi-pen but they may not be able to administer it themselves so just knowing how to apply one of those could save someone's life and then also just you know trying to ask that we maybe have a little bit more consideration for for people who may have food allergies like for me as a parent my biggest fears are actually air travel and we all want to bring our children away on planes but you know a closed environment like that thankfully a lot of the airlines in Europe are quite understanding and they won't serve nuts if somebody on the flight has an audiology for example and but all our airlines are not as as friendly unfortunately and you know we hear horror stories of other passengers who refuse to not eat nuts on a short flight despite the fact that you know could be life-threatening to someone else so just things like that and the other the other big fear for me as a parent is just actually our Irish hospitality like it's fantastic but you know if your kid has an audiology and goes out and someone hands them a Snickers bar not knowing you know just trying to do something really nice um it could actually have life-threatening effects also good examples would be a lot of schools now where they you know they they ban nuts from the school and they advise all the parents please don't send anything with nuts in with your child in their in their lunchbox just in case and and then the other extreme then would be an international airline who still serves nuts on the flight and and for me I can't really understand the airline's position because if anything you know if something should go wrong and they would have to make an emergency landing it you know it's going to cost them a fortune so that that to me is a difficult one to understand the schools are fantastic like my daughter's nursery and the primary school she's going to in September have both been fantastic her her fresh before that it was also fantastic and everybody has a great understanding I think you know part of the message I wanted to get out there was actually when you know if you are sitting on an airplane and there's an announcement about an audiology just that we do take it seriously and if you do get a notification home from school that you know we're not sending nuts in you know we we I certainly didn't before my daughter was born consider the ingredients of different foods and you know it's very very easy to to miss an ingredient that actually could be life-threatening so just you know not trying to heap work load on the others but just a quick thought for for what is going on the schools also could could make a life-saving thing a life-saving difference and just to mention the two charities one was the Natasha Foundation which is an established in honor of Natasha Eden who was she was a teenager who tragically died after suffering an allergic reaction and the other was red sneakers for Oakley and that similar story there unfortunately a kid lost his lost his life after an allergic reaction and part of their awareness campaign is International Red Tuesday and that was kind of why I wore red shoes on Sunday for the record attempt to sort of tie in that and hopefully any time a picture of that record comes up with the red shoes or seeing someone will remember the message behind them great well listen congratulations once again I never even got to talk about your mishap last year and that you missed a lot of the year from cycling broke your leg at two places the but I think the last kind of many places it was broken all right it was it was it was a tibia so that's top and bottom is it it was a tib and fib but they were broken a couple of places each all right but I had a you know great care and and was well looked after and all the Alvin and they put on all those hatties looking frames that held my leg together and I thought would be a disaster but actually turned out to be the best thing we could have done so I was back on the bike within four months and yeah never looked back well now obviously obviously there's a pleasure chatting to you Ronan and keep up the good work on the bike and and the best look there's a go fund me page as well just guess someone wants to donate how would they find it just under your name and yeah it'll be on there's a link there on my instagram and there's also I think the link was included in the highland video news story that went up around the record there was it yesterday in the rest of that that's during top so thank you for that right thanks Ronan thank you this father's day why not surprise your dad with a model from tennies talk