Tag Archives: bike

CLARE County Council, in conjunction with Ennis Rotary Club, is bringing the Rotary Ireland School Bikes Africa project to Clare. The Rotary Ireland School Bikes Africa project, with the support of Clare County Council, gives members of the public across Clare the opportunity to bring their unwanted bicycles to the Central Waste Management Facility at Ballyduff Beg, Inagh. From there, Rotary Ireland will deliver the bicycles to the open prisons at Loughan House, County Cavan, and Shelton Abbey, County Wicklow, where they will be refurbished by prisoners. They are then shipped to Africa and distributed to school children, giving them the chance of a better future. To date, Rotary Ireland has delivered 4,000 bikes and therefore helped 4,000 children to get to school each day, but the work is far from done. At a launch event for the Rotary Ireland School Bikes Africa project, at the Central Waste Management Facility in Inagh, the Mayor of Clare, Councillor Mary Howard, welcomed …

QUIN man Declan McEvoy has always been a big dreamer. One of his mantras is “if your dreams don’t scare you, maybe they’re not big enough”. However, his next endeavour, which he plans to complete in March, will make the hairs stand on the back of your neck. Cooly and calmly he reveals, “I am going to attempt to ride a motorcycle on ice crossing 636km of frozen Lake Baikal, the deepest lake in the world, in mid-winter Siberia”. If he completes this solo ice ride, he will make it into the Guinness Book of World Records but with temperatures expected to be -20° Celsius by day and -30° by night, and storms and freezing fog to contend with, this is no walk in the park. The idea came to him two years ago, when he was on the second leg of a round the world solo motorcycle trip. His journey took him to the shores of Lake Baikal in …

Another year, another Brompton World Championship but unfortunately, this year I didn’t manage to win a place in the lottery to get an entry to the race. Fortunately, only a week before the event, I managed to ‘acquire’ an entry and made arrangements to ship both myself and my Brompton folding bike over to London. Last year, I competed with a bulging disc in my spine and the rain was incessant. I had high hopes that this year’s race would be better on all counts. On the day before the race, I met up with friends from the London Brompton Club near Buckingham Palace and we cycled through St James’ Park and Hyde Park to end up at the Brompton Junction shop in Long Acre, near Covent Garden for champagne and nibbles. It was an enjoyable run, despite the heavy rain that fell for most of the hour. I got talking to an Australian who had come over specifically with …

You might think that bikes have no place in a motoring column but bear with me. Bicycles, particularly in an urban environment, are often the ideal way to get around. A bike journey can often replace a trip by car, reducing traffic and pollution and making a positive contribution towards fitness. I’ve ended up owning a number of bikes, including the iconic Brompton folding bike, which is still hand-built in London. It gets its name because Andrew Ritchie, who invented it, could see the Brompton Oratory from his flat as he developed the first prototypes in the 70s. I use it around Ennis and when I’m picking up a test car in Dublin, it invariably gets chucked in the boot. I find it’s the easiest and fastest way around the city. I’ve even rocked up to car launches on it, which raised a few eyebrows initially. Owning a Brompton is like joining a club and our equivalent of the All-Ireland …

An eight-year old boy, seriously injured in a quad bike accident near Whitegate on Thursday night, has died in hospital from his injuries. Young Ultan Hayes was travelling on the bike with his father near the family home when the incident occurred at around 9:10pm. He was rushed to University Hospital Limerick, and later transferred to Temple Street Children’s Hospital in Dublin, where he lost his fight for life on Friday. His father was also treated in hospital for injuries which were not serious.