 Time to talk Donegal Atlantic Way Ultra 555, which is taking place this year on Friday, the 2nd of July. And I'm glad to say we're going to go live now to Dubai to talk to race organiser Sean McFadden. Good to see you again Sean. Hi Austin, good to see you buddy. We had 21 degrees here in Donegal on Monday. What's it with you at the minute? 47, 48. Ridiculous. Oh, it's tight going now. It's this last, say, two weeks, the temperatures just really ramped up like it was really good there. But we're still not bad. The humidity is not up or the humidity is normally high, you know, but it's kind of, it's just nice, dry. So at the moment, but it's hot, it's very hot. How do you cycle in 47 degrees Sean? Yeah, it's early morning and late nights, you know, so we start most mornings when 4, 35 o'clock and by the time the sun comes up, like the real strong sun, you've kind of got three hours done or four hours done. So you've got 100k in the bank and you've got the whole day then to do the sunbathing and try and do a bit of work. Right. Okay. Is it hard to get that mix is it? No, man, I manage it pretty well. Anyway, let's talk 555. Before we look at this year, Sean, the race got fantastic exposure last year, particularly during the wonder months. Connor Dunn, of course, we knew he was here. We knew that he was following with the GNC network and the exposure you got off the back of that was phenomenal. And likewise, just last week is also going to mention the Giro d'Italia as well, so you said it. Yes, last year was a special year for Connor, common with the GCN crowd, you know, like the video alone on the YouTube channel, the man, I think it's like 220,000 views and to watch it like if you weren't from Donegal or if you didn't know the area and you're watching the video, you were thinking, wow, this place is just and it was just beautiful. The scenery was just incredible. The TV covers that they had got and then to top it off there on stage 17 of the Giro, I think it may have been the one Dan Martin won. They were actually talking about the 555, you know, so to get that publicity on like a wee local race in Donegal, it's huge for us as organisers myself and Eugene, you know, it's really, really good, you know, so unfortunately, Connor's not coming back this year, but he reckons he will come back someday and finish on settled business. So yeah. Well, that's phenomenal that the wee race in Donegal is getting so much exposure, Sean, as we said, but this year, it was August last year, it's July this year. Again, it's under cycling, Ireland COVID restrictions. So things are going to be very tight again for the competitors and fuses race organisers. Yes, everything's going to be the same as last year. But we're going to have to be more strict this year, you know, on the start ramp. We're going to have no spectators at all. It's just going to be rider and crew. If you want to support your rider or support your team, you're going to have to do it on the road. And what's the tracker? Like there is 555 kilometres of road, you know, there's loads of really nice people, places that you can see your rider. Or if you want to go down to like a hornhead or any of them icon spots and meet them there and have a chat with them there, you can do that. So we're just going to have to be by the rules of cycling Ireland and sport Ireland that they've put out to us for us to run the event. We've been very lucky. Last year, we're very lucky with COVID. This year, we've been very lucky. There's been a lot of races cancelled. You know, we know a lot of endurance races, the big ones like the race for Ireland and the Joe Barr and all them was have been cancelled because it's just a bit harder for them because it's bigger. And they're bringing in international riders where ours is a small local community one and his families and friends and businesses. So we're very lucky again this year to get the race to go ahead. What's different this year than showing you've been a couple of changes, particularly to entries and you've added a few more categories. Tell us about it. Yeah, well, we've just we always try to make it better and try and make it fun. And so this year, we've added a non support non supported category. So that's going to be very exciting. So we've got five people signed up for that. So they're going to leave the ramp on their own unsupported and cycle 555 grammars. Like this is going to be challenging for them to do this because, you know, don't it go all around the Ghidor area or Glengesh or around them areas. There's no shops open. There's nowhere to stop. There's nowhere to help you. So it's going to be very, very challenging for them to carry all their stuff, you know, carry their water, their nutrition. They're going to get a halfway point the same as everybody in Dolfanahi. They're going to get a bag drop off there. So they're going to leave the bag with us at the material, and we're going to drop it off at the halfway point. So that's a new addition. We've entered. We've given another addition of a mountain bike category. So people challenged us last year that they wanted to ride it on the mountain bike. So we put it on. We've got two teams. So it's very good. So we've got like two two man teams. So that is another race on its own. So it's at least then if somebody to challenge them, you don't mean they're racing against each other. And I suppose this year, you know, it's a special year because we've actually got a women's category, a very, very strong four, five women category where for years, for probably two or three years actually, we had no women in the race at all. So we're blessed with that. And we're looking forward to that. And then just back to the four man teams, the two man teams in the solos, you know, so it's exciting times and it's, there's a lot of stuff in there. Yeah, a lot of stuff in there. We're all witnessing what's Roland McLaughlin going to do. He's the world Everstein record holder. You were back last year and he broke it. And he's broke it out. I don't know, many times since then, Sean, since we last spoke, he's had a couple of runs at it and he's been to Alberta, camp the door. And when I spoke to him at the time, he was mulling over the idea of doing the five, five, five. He is the record holder. He smashed the record last year. Is he going to come back this year, Sean? Is he going to come back? That's the million dollar question. I can't answer that. We have left, we have left a couple of, we have left slots for the legs of Ronan and Mark McGinley and the top three men that was there last year. So Ronan, he has contacted me and said that he would love to come back to five, five, five. And since it's in the back of his mind, he's very busy with his new job, cyclingtips.com. He's a lot of stuff going on. But listen, his slots there, if he can make it good, if not, there's a real top class fill there as well. We've got like 36 solo riders. So 36 solo. So we have the current winner, Roger Brown, that you interviewed yourself on the ramp that year. Roger's back. He done 21 hours and 40 minutes. We have Colin Richardson back and we have the lights of Conor Gallagher from Castle Bar that is a quality young rider that has ridd for Ireland in his time and has ridden the roads of Donegal before in the Arigal useder. So he's no dozer. You know, the Jennings family from Portamites, his first cousins of the Jennings family. So he's made of good stuff. Yeah. Not forget, Tommy Hughes of Dairies coming. Tommy's got a couple of world records under his belt, so he has. And you want to go 555? That's incredible. Tommy Hughes, as everybody knows him, like he's an amazing runner. He's just actually broke the 50k record in a time of three hours, six minutes and 28 seconds for over 60. Tommy's coming back with a brother has to do a two man team show where, like, you know, every year we seem to get somebody special, you know, and to get Tommy as a world class athlete as he is to put him on a bike, just shows you, you know, you know, you can do everything in sport, you know, it's not just all a bit wrong. So Tommy's going to, he's going to, he's going to have a rattle at it. Yeah. Yeah. What's going to happen now between now actually, which is the start of June until the start of July, if you use guys and organizing this show. Well, we've closed the entries. We had a closed entries because as I said, we've got like 34, 36 solos and we've got the four unsupported. We've got 17 two man teams and we've got 16 four man teams. So we've a lot of work to sort out. We've a lot of like prep. We, you know, we, we're, we're working hard to cycle in Ireland and primal tracking to get all the stuff across to them. And fair, fair play to Eugene and the team and, and Donegal, you know, I'm not there, but like at the minute, like, as we know, everything's done on Zoom and done on, on, on phone and everything. So we're working, working well with all our new sponsors. We're working well. I would like just been meeting just if I could thank the sponsors, like, you know, we couldn't do that, this without them. There's like, there's so many sponsors, but the main ones this year is like the Mount Derry Hotel, Terry McEnuff, that what we have there just couldn't be done without Terry. That, that spot because it's like banks back in the middle of the 555. It's phenomenal. We've got head rough this year. We've got Sean Daury, footy fruit. And we've got LK bikes for the car check. So, you know, without them, this race couldn't be possible. And so cyclists in Ireland. Yeah. Have you changed the route at all this year, Sean, or are you sticking to the same route as what you've done over the last, well, this is the sixth edition. There has been some sort of changes along the way, but there's nothing major to take it, is there? No, nothing major, usually like we're asking, we might have to change things. Like this time of year, people know there's a lot of roadworks going on, surface and a new road. And as we know, there's a couple of roads closed. But hopefully, like with Eugene in the country, and I know his engineers, we've been closely talking with them. And hopefully, you know, there will be no road closure because we don't want it. We don't like changing the course because there's times on the course, the records are on the course. People know their own times, you know what I mean? So, we want to keep the course as close as we can to the normal course. So, as we said, there's nothing changed at all, you know. This is a really, really serious challenge, as Connor Dunn from the GCN network found out last year. But off it all, Sean, and you've been over this route, many's of time. And obviously, as race organiser, usually the guys that lay out what is a really difficult route, what's the most testing part of this circuit of the 5-5-5, do you think? It's all tough, you know. But when you come back from Memorial Gap and back to the Mount Aerial, you've got 206 kilometres in your legs. And you're not even at the halfway point, you know. So, and like, riding through the night down around, as we've seen with Connor Dunn, down around Carrick, Kilkar, and around over Memorial Gap, you think when you get over Memorial, not Memorial, when you get over Glen Guest, you think you've built the work done. After that, it's still testing. It's challenging. It's up and it's down, and it's up and it's down, you know. So, the whole thing is challenging. Like, I was chatting with a guy here in Dubai, he was telling me, oh, I know the toughest race is in the world. I said, no, you haven't come to Dunn at all, son. You know, he'll show me a race this morning, actually. And I said, there was only like 3,500 metres of climbing, and I said, we've got one in Donegal, that's got over 6,000 metres of climbing. Like, if you get a hard, windy day in Donegal, you know, washing, that's a hard, that's a hard one to do. You've seen Ron McLaughlin, you've seen Roger Brown, you've seen all these boys at the finish line, they're in butts, absolutely in butts. What's the best conditions for a 5-5-5, if you're going to be a competitor, and you're going to head out at, what is it, eight o'clock, is it, on that Friday morning Well, I would say this year, the times is not out this year, but we'll probably put away the unsupported riders, probably go first, we'll probably put them around, maybe I'm not sure yet, like we haven't set the times up, but they'll be forced away early morning. And this year, I think we're going to have to spread them out more, just to give that gap for second Ireland, and just for the rules and regulations that we have. But best conditions, I suppose, last year, Ron McLaughlin probably got it right, we had a tailwind the whole way down, the one turned around, and then when Ron needed the wind behind his back, when he went over Glen Gasch, it turned again and it blew him all the way down. No, he still had a pedal the bike, his time last year was phenomenal, and I do have it, was it like 17 hours and 16 months or something? It was incredible time, you know, but before we finish off, the solo women category this year is going to be probably the blue ribbon race for me, because we haven't seen a women's race before we've had women in it, but we haven't had women that's going to really challenge the record. There's two girls there, Vanessa and Lorraine Marilarete, she's from Monaghan originally, she currently holds the record here in Dubai for the Seven Emirates, she's currently done a 400 kilometre ride there in the middle of the night, she's ridden 400 kilometres in 12 hours, you know, so she's coming for an Irish record, she's coming to give it a really good rattle. Now, cycling Dubai is definitely cycling with Donegal, but she's from Ireland, she knows the rules, she goes home every year to cycle, but Vanessa herself, this young lady triathlete, has done a lot, a lot of climbing in France and all over the world, and she's raced at ITU level, so that's going to be a cracking race, and you've got Russian McDade, another woman that has done it on a four-man team before, a four-person team, she's coming, so this is like, this is exciting, I'm really excited about the women's category this year. Okay, listen we always get excited around the 555, so we do, Sean, we're a month out from it now. We wish you and your team, you and Eugene, the best of luck in your organising, your continued organising off the event, because it's coming on Friday the 2nd of July, it'll be here in no time, and we can't wait for it, Sean, so the best of luck. Thank you, Austin, and thank you for the support over the years. No problem, Sean.