<\/p>\n\n\n\n
What a week and opportunity for me that I will carry with me forever. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
I was the youngest rider of over 100 women.\u00a0 I am a Navan Road Club rider and have to thank Navan for all the help, coaching and advice I got from the club to get me to the Ras 2021.\u00a0 I did not think I would get the opportunity at 16 years of age to ride the Ras but when I was selected by the Women’s Commission Cycling Ireland team I knew they saw that I was ready for this huge challenge ahead.\u00a0 It is difficult to say how to prepare as its as much mental as well as a physical push with everyone fighting for positions, trying to stay in the peloton at speeds of up to 70k an hour on stretches, seeing accidents happening in front of you and listening to\u00a0the slipping of gears and watching wheels but also passing encouraging words to each other and helping each out in the peloton.\u00a0 I was really honoured to have such great team mates and a great support team and really \u00a0people don’t know how much work went on behind the scenes for us 10 riders.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
On the start line each day when the whistle blew, the motorbikes were rolled out ahead, the flashing lights and sirens, the commissaries\u00a0cars, the 20 support cars, the doctors car, the school children out in each town we passed supporting us all, the lines of local people shouting us on at every stage, my Navan club supports who travelled down to support me.\u00a0 My school St Joseph’s Mercy Navan who gave me a huge send off supported me for the Ras.\u00a0 My most\u00a0memorable stage will have to\u00a0be Stage 3 – Castlecomer-Newtown-Swan-Timahoe-Portlaoise-Mountmellick-Rosenallis-Clonaslee-Kinnity-Slieve Bloom the cut-total 105k and what a fast race this was with Portlaoise being the most memorable town for me where my Nana’s family the Earleys are from.\u00a0 \u00a0I knew going into this week that it would hurt, that is would require willpower, that it did require sacrifice, that I needed to push my body to the max, that there would be tears and temptation to quit but I knew when I reached my goal that all the sacrifice\u00a0and healthy\u00a0decisions made have all been worth it.\u00a0 \u00a0We fought hard everyday for positions and we brought home the overall team prize for the best Irish\u00a0riders of the Ras 2021 over the 5 days 6 stages.\u00a0 We are not Pro riders like many of the teams that did this Ras but we are women that are determined and love this sport.\u00a0 I am so proud to say that I am now a Woman of the Ras.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Women’ s Commission Cycling Ireland Ras Na Mban Teams 2021-thank you all: <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Yvonne Doran\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0Clodagh Allen\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0Team Support:\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0Ray Allen\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0David BrennanCarthach McCarthy\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0Elizabeth Kent\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 Brendan Mac Hale\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 Brendan WheelanClaire Ni Reachtagain\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0Keela MacHale\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0Michael Garvey\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0Alison SmithEmma Smith\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0Agnieszka SamselElia Tutty\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0Lauren Garvey <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Read all about Emma’s 20201 R\u00e1s na mBan experience here!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":7085,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7084","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mercynavan.ie\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7084","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mercynavan.ie\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mercynavan.ie\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mercynavan.ie\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/16"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mercynavan.ie\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7084"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.mercynavan.ie\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7084\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7088,"href":"https:\/\/www.mercynavan.ie\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7084\/revisions\/7088"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mercynavan.ie\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7085"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mercynavan.ie\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7084"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mercynavan.ie\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7084"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mercynavan.ie\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7084"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}