Irish road racing

[echomadman]

Just spent a weekend at the Athea Road races, Saturday was practice and the weather was beautiful,
view from campsite


John enjoying my hammock

thats the track on the other side of the hedge


map of the circuit, pic was taken of one of the flying marshalls tankbag

big version at http://www.team-cephalopod.com/gallery/v/bieks/17062006_008_.jpg.html?g2_imageViewsIndex=1
Its a bit Nascar-ish  but there are a few nice spots to watch it from.

Poking my head through the hedge from the capsite to watch the practise sessions




They race all kinds of bikes from 125cc/250cc 2strokes to 600 and litre Supersports, as well as a classic race with lots of old (and really phucking loud) 350s and 400s

it got cloudy after the practise session finished up, and the forecast wasn't great for race day, It rained all night, i was glad i was sleeping in the van and not a tent. it was dry but overcast in the morning so they got racing underway, from here on all my photos are pretty much liek this one

as its really phucking hard to balance on a wall, and take photos of bikes going past you at full tilt, of the hundred+ photos i took, most are either a shot of the road with no bike or a blur in one corner.
It started raining after the first race but being hardcore we stood out in the rain till 3pm, when they cancelled the day after half the races had run.
There was a nasty crash in the 600 race at the first corner, and both riders were ambulanced away (i dont know yet if they are ok) visibility was really terrible with the spray, and barreling down these tiny roads is dangerous anough as it is, so the organisers called it off in case of further injuries or a fatality (unfortunately common at these races).


The rest of my pics from practise and race day are on http://www.team-cephalopod.com/gallery/v/bieks/
videos in nokia cameraphone format are on the last two pages, the thumbnails dont work but you can download them and play them in quicktime.
Thre are loads more pics of all the bikes in the paddock and more of the practise sessions on my friends cameras, i'll be getting them during the week.

[Seanybiker]

Hello Stranger. Heard it was a great weekend. Lot of the lads from biker.ie went there. Some deadly photo's there mate. Must go have a look at the rest of them. Talk again buddy :)

[PitterB4]

Nicely done, Echo!  

So, it's basically a square?  It looks insane.  It also looks like a lotta fun!  

Thanks!