The Girvan: Diary of a Stage Race

Friday 6th April

Friday was getting ready day. I'd cleared it of everything else. The plan was that I was going up to Girvan with my friend Dougie, but I wasn't sure that Dougie was really going to be able to go. If Dougie wasn't going to come, I'd take a bike up with me. Dougie had asked if I was I was taking the Dolan, but I didn't want to risk it and so I'd said I wouldn't take a bike. But having the Raleigh up might be useful. So I got it loaded into the truck, got myself ready to go...

I'd under-rated Dougie. He showed up at the agreed time, so I left the Raleigh in the truck and heaved my bags into Dougie's car. [After we got back from Girvan Dougie finally took his hand to the doctors. He'd broken it.]

The weather for the drive up was glorious, wonderfully clear. And driving the roads made me realise how good they would be to race over... which is not necessarily the same as enjoyable to ride. The hills are steep, the straights short, many of the bends unsighted, most of the bridges narrow and on tight bends. But very scenic... Suddenly Ailsa Craig was ahead of us and we were dropping steeply down into Girvan.

We'd come up this evening for the race officials' meeting, and that's when we really got a feel of what a big deal this race is. There were about forty of us. Motorcycle outriders. Motor-cycle outriders' national examiners. Commissaires (three of these). Judges. Neutral support. Driving standards observers. Announcers. Drivers for all these people. Chief timekeeper, photofinish operator, marshals. Dougie metamorphosed into broom-wagon driver, while I remained humble routing/derouting crew. And we each had not one but two race manuals; the Race Manual itself, same as the teams and (I think) the press get, and the Race Technical Manual. The attention to detail is stunning.

Between them they spell out exactly who has to be where doing what at each point for the next three days. One remarkable thing is how normal running a big bike race seems to the people of this town. I asked our landlady whether she found all these cyclists odd, but no - for her it's just part of the routine of the year, returning every spring like the swallows. She's provided accommodation to the race for twenty years. It makes you think of the tradition of this race, and the benefits of having an established race. Over the past two years we've had at least as much resentment as praise for the amount of disruption the Tour of Britain has bought to Castle Douglas. For most people in Scotland a bike race is a strange, foreign thing, and a nuisance. Here, it's normal.

At 08:45 tomorrow the routing crew van will be waiting for me outside Race Headquarters, just four doors up the road from the very comfortable B&B I've been allocated to. It's 22:00 now; I'm going to sleep.

Saturday 7th April, afternoon

Well, it's 15:50 now and already I've run more today than I've run in the past six months. At 08:45 this morning I was in a van with two wee wiry guys both called Jimmy, both of whom had played football at Old Trafford. The driver, Jimmy Mullen, had as his special boast that he was the only person who'd been a member of the support crew for all thirty eight editions of the Girvan. Jimmy Mullen, needless to say, knew the route, and he drove us rapidly. At each junction we'd stop and leap out with appropriate signs, tie them to any suitable post, and then hare after the van which had very often moved onto the next signage point.

Jimmy was always conscious of the race behind us, although we had started more than two hours ahead of it. 'It's amazing how the time goes', he'd say. But by the time we were three quarters of the way round the route for the day, he'd begun to relax. He took us to meet the race as it came down Blackie's Brae, for a thrilling ten minutes of spectating.

And then it was back into the van, planning the tactics for the final bit of signing. The problem was that the race would go over the same bits of road more than once. Somewhere behind the race, a separate crew - the derouting crew - were taking down some of our signs and replacing others with new signs routing the race a different way on the next lap. But the logistics of the route meant we had some of this job, too.

So we went and set out the five miles to go sign, more direction signs, and the one mile to go sign. But we couldn't set out the 3Km to go sign (why 3Km,when all the other signs are in miles? Ah, the mysteries of bike racing) until the race had passed the place where it was due to be put. Instead, we stopped again for our second spectating opportunity at the last sprint prime of the day, actually at the side of Victory Park. The race barrelled past, first a small lead group, then a bunch, then dribs and drabs of tail enders. We got back in our van, drove out to the 3Km point, put up the sign,and drove back into the finish. At the second last turn there was no marshal to man the barrier, so I got out of the van to man it.

I only had a few minutes to wait, and then the race was roaring in. 61.6 miles, and they completed it in two hours twenty-two minutes. But even that doesn't really give you a fair picture of the pace: at one point race radio reported that the peloton was doing 42 miles per hour, up hill!

Stage 1:

1 | Chris Newton | Recycling.co.uk | Elite | 2:22:33 | 25.9mph

Saturday 8th April, evening

It just so happened that Dave Martin, a friend from Dundee, was standing on the corner where I was due to marshal for the criteriums. He'd brought down a fair bunch of children from the Dundee Discovery club to contest the junior criterium. There was a good field for the juniors, and they put on a good show.

Another Martin - Dean Martin from Castle Douglas - was doing particularly well. The commentator made a mix up on the commentary - he announced the final lap one lap early - and Dean made a huge effort to take the lead up the finish straight, only to find that there was another. I thought he wouldn't be able to win the lead back, that he'd shot his bolt. But not Dean; he's a real competitor. He was trailing two other lads coming into finish straight for the very last time, but passed them both in the last two hundred metres to win on the line.

Then came stage two of the Girvan, the criterium proper. Most of the peloton managed to hold together despite a very high pace, with the lead changing all the time. There was a small group who gradually lost touch, and a few desperate stragglers following on alone; but the bulk of the bunch stayed together, hurtling past with a driving whirr.

Stage 2:

1 | Tony Gibb | Plowman Craven | Elite | 37:52 | 26.1mph

GC: 1 | Chris Newton | Recycling.co.uk | Elite | 3:00:07 | 26.0mph

Sunday 9th April, afternoon

On Sunday we have derouting. Except that, of course, being the Stewartry man, I'm somehow responsible for marshalling in Newton Stewart. And I'm also expected to be the expert on Newton Stewart when it comes to routing. So we're the derouting crew, except that we're routing the circuit through Newton Stewart, and marshalling the start. Oh, and we're setting out barriers for the finish first of all. At 08:15 I was waiting by the van, but there was no sign of either Jimmy. At 08:20 the first Jimmy showed up, but still no sign of the second. So we took the barriers up to the park, where I hauled them out of the van at their respective junctions. Then back through by Race HQ ��' the Westcliffe Hotel ��' to pick up Jimmy Two, and off to Newton Stewart.

Setting up the route through Newton Stewart proved less hard than I'd feared. We passed my partner Juliette and my club-mate Marcus walking up, went round the route and met them again at the leisure centre. All but one of the marshals I'd expected had turned up ��' on time. We were short of marshals, but then I'd known we would be. So the derouting crew joined in marshalling. We had a short briefing by the police, and spread out down Newton Stewart's main street for the start.

Our side of the hills the race gets joined by a police escort group - one of Dumfries and Galloway's few big Mercedes police cars and all two of our police motorcycles. This adds to the race's existing caravan of half a dozen motorcycle marshals, the additional motorcycles from the National Escort Group, the two motorcycles from Cycling.TV, the three commissaires' cars, three neutral service cars, two announcers' cars, two judges' cars, two leadout cars, the first aid car, one ambulance, eighteen team cars, and (this morning) eighty-eight riders. It all made an impressive show as it came through Newton Stewart, first at controlled pace, and then a second lap at race pace. A fair crowd lined the street to watch, some at least of them having come specially to watch the race.

One the race had left town, the derouting crew sprinted around the circuit, removing all the direction and hazard signs we'd put up an hour and a half earlier, and got out on the road towards Wigtown in time to see the race coming back. The lead convoy swept past, and then the road was empty... and they came over the hill in a rush, first a scattering, and then the bunch, flashing past in a smear of colour and a smell of embrocation, and making that curious and indescribable rushing whirr which is the sound of the peloton at full pelt.

For me one of the interesting things about Sunday was that it was almost entirely over roads I'm familiar with. I route the 7/24 up the same climb out of Creetown that marked the day's first mountain prime; I've ridden the climb out Gatehouse - both up and down - many times; and the mountain prime at Dersalloch on the road between Straiton and Dalmellington I remember (especially its vicious cattle grids) from a bitterly cold, wet audax two years ago.

Up the first hill, we met a judge's car coming down. As the road is narrow he pulled off in a passing place, and as we came alongside Jimmy One wound his window down and leant out.

"You're going the wrong way!" he said.

"No I'm not," replied Hughie the Judge. "Soup is this way!" And thus I began to learn another of the mysteries of bicycle racing. If you're in the lead convoy, you cannot stop - at all - even for the call of nature. If you're in the rear convoy, you can stop only if there's a major accident (there wasn't one), and then only while it gets cleared. But the judges... the judges plan their day around tea shops. Judge at one prime point, zip off to a tea shop, indulge in a leisurely refreshment, navigate cross country to the next. And all this is made easier in that there are three judging teams, who share out the prime points on the course using a mysterious algorithm having much to do with the locations of favoured tea shops.

Over the top of the first climb we saw many spectators out on bikes to see the race go by - a cheering sight. It would have been more cheering if the spectators had not included most of the people who had volunteered to marshal in Dalry... they know who they are.

What this account doesn't give you a flavour of is the speed of proceedings. Particularly on Sunday, most of the route was on minor roads in remote country with few junctions. There were signs only at junctions, and, at those junctions, Jimmy Two and I would leap out of the van, sprint - or, in my case, hobble - to the signs, take them down, sprint (hobble) back to the van, hurl the signs in the back, leap back into the cab, and away!

In between these infrequent halts, Jimmy One would drive as fast as he safely could. Thus we roared through Gatehouse, hurtled through Laurieston, shot through Mossdale (where the feed station had already been dismantled), and zoomed up the west shore of Loch Ken...

[The Girvan is now a traditional event, which takes place every Easter. Another traditional event on Easter weekend is an angling competition, and now the shallows of the loch were dotted with anglers, each seated on his little stool with his keep net and three or four rods, gazing solemnly at the wind ruffled surface. If any of these focussed fishers had been ruffled by the storm of colour that had just swept by behind them - if they had even been aware of it - they gave no sign.]

...but it was only as we came into New Galloway, 60 miles into the stage, that we came up with the broom wagon, and the last stragglers of the race. A group of thirteen riders, still riding vigorously, eating up the miles across the upper Glenkens.

As derouting crew, we fell in behind. We lost touch briefly in New Galloway as we took down signs, and again in Dalry; but apart from that we stayed in touch with them for the next thirty miles. Just before Carsphairn there was a brief hiatus. A direction sign was missing at a junction, and the riders were in confusion. I ran up and directed them onto the route, and with a little more confusion we pressed on up towards the watershead, and the Galloway border. It's a long, gruelling climb. It isn't particularly steep, but by now there was a brisk headwind, and the riders were feeling it. Still they kept on. The broom wagon pulled up alongside each rider in turn, but none was ready to abandon. Now should they be; they were still averaging over twenty miles per hour.

And then, over the border, the long descent into Ayrshire, down the narrow glen of the Bonnie Doon. Three grinning female tourists were patiently grinding their heavily laden bikes up the slope towards us, as our riders poured down. Then through Dalmellington - where the route went over a series of 'traffic calming' bumps that must have been acutely uncomfortable for the leaders - and left onto a narrow, beautiful, long, tough climb up to Straiton.

The weather was still beautiful. There were occasional ragged clouds now, and a wind in off the sea; but it was still sunny, still warm. And the high hill country glowed in the warm light.

There is, I learn, a tradition among routing and derouting crews. The routing crews seek to position signs in places from which the derouting crews can't remove them. In Straiton there was a wonderful example: a right turn sign on a lamp-post, considerably above the gutter level of the nearby house. I took one look and said no. There was no way I was even going to try to get it down. Jimmy Two, however, was made of sterner stuff: he shinned up the pole, and returned in triumph with the sign. Back into the van again, we pelted after our stragglers...

We didn't find them. Indeed, we never saw them again. Instead, we found the broom wagon stopped alongside rider 74, Andrew Stuart of Ashfield Merlin. He'd been out on his own after an earlier puncture, and now he'd punctured again...

I've been glibly referring to 'the broom wagon', but in fact the vehicle which had been hired as broom wagon for the race had resolutely refused to start. So the vehicle which was standing in for broom wagon was in fact neutral service three, a blue Volkswagen van of the kind which has two rows of seats and a cargo area behind. Among other things, neutral service three had a supply of spare wheels, and very soon Andrew was rolling again, over another big shoulder of hillside, all on his own after ninety three miles of riding, and now lanterne rouge.

It was tough and I really felt for him. At last he struggled over a brow and started a beautiful sweeping descent... where he punctured again, shortly before the ten miles to go board.

I felt sure he would abandon then, but not he. Another change of wheels, and he was off again, coming in 34' 40” down on the stage winner, who was

Stage 3:

1 | Ian Wilkinson | Science in Sport/Trek | Elite | 4:22:45 | 24.6mph

GC: 1 | Ian Wilkinson | Science in Sport/Trek | Elite | 7:22:44 | 25.1mph

Sunday 8th April, evening

This report would not be complete if it did not recount that the 'officials' (which included us humble humpers of signs and barriers) went off on Sunday evening for an excellent and convivial meal. Over what was discussed, however, a veil may safely be drawn.

Monday 9th April, morning

Monday dawned to that thin, chilling rain which seems a peculiarity of the west of Scotland. An insubstantial chilling precipitation which is intermediate between fog and what other peoples know as rain, which penetrates clothing and saturates hair...

Our crew were delegated to set out the finish area. Jimmy One's plan had been to get this set up quickly and then get a lift out onto the course somewhere to spectate. Unfortunately, neither he nor I had a car with us, and Jimmy Two had other plans in mind, so this didn't come off. And what with one thing and another, we didn't actually get up to the finish area to set it up until after ten o'clock. Setting up the finish area is a matter of setting out heavy steel crowd barriers and advertising banners, then converting the truck they came on into a sort of stage. It is heavy, intense work, but it did not take us long. As we worked we watched riders warming up round the park in the wet, and rolling into the assembly area the other side of it.

It was a bleak morning, the cloudbase scraping the tops of the steeples, the wind moaning eerily in the tubes supporting the advertisements, the thin rain saturating everything. And a sharp, chill wind blowing in off the sea. We finished ten minutes after the depart fictif, so we missed it. Jimmy One walked off to catch the race at the bottom of Blackie's Brae, where we'd seen it on Saturday; twelve miles of walking to catch a couple of minutes of action. Jimmy Two was off into town to the bookmakers. I really wanted to get up to the legendary Nick o' Balloch to see the race there, and went back to Race HQ to see if I could scrounge a lift. Unfortunately, almost everyone had long since left.

Louisa Drive, in Girvan, is a terrace of large Victorian houses which look out directly towards Ailsa Craig; a wonderful view in good weather. Most are guest houses; probably, most always were. At the north end of the terrace, two have been knocked into one to form the Westcliffe Hotel. It's a family business that's been in the same family for a long time; it's been the headquarters of the Girvan since time immemorial. It isn't a flashy or high class establishment; a little seedy, a little faded. But a friendlier, more helpful staff you couldn't imagine, and obviously well used to hosting Britain's oldest stage race. I went into the bar, and ordered a coffee; and sat down with two legends of bike racing, at least in Scotland; two ancient soigneurs, Gordon Johnston who is in his seventies, and 'H', who is more ancient still. Both are still working, although H says he's now too old to do feed zones. Both have soigneured in races all over the continent; Gordon has been a national coach and chief commissaire as well. I had a fascinating half hour listening to their ever so slightly barbed - but very polite - conversation.

Monday 9th April, afternoon

Then back up to the park to watch the final sprint prime and wait for the finish. I had no duties at the sprint prime, so could get myself the best possible position to watch and photograph. I wanted a shot of the riders crossing the line, with the judges on both sides of the road. I got it lined up and focussed perfectly, and practised on the lead cars as they came through. But when Gordan McCauley, wearing the spotty jersey for Plowman Craven, came in to take it from David Clarke of OANDS (an amateur ad-hoc team, doing very well), I pressed the shutter a moment too soon - I've got the riders, but not the line.

Then I was on duty as marshal for the finish. One of the most difficult jobs in cycle racing - one which everyone hates and few are good at - is marshalling a road closure point, particularly if you have no support from the police. The point I had to marshal was an important one, as it closed off the end of the finish straight. It also closed off a busy road, and a bus route. Soon I had two buses and a line of cars and trucks stopped, and some very unhappy drivers. Fortunately Richard Todd, one of the organising committee, came to assist me, and walked down the queue working a wonder of diplomacy.

Thus, as usual, I didn't see the race come in; and although I could hear gusts of the announcements I didn't get the name of the stage winner. The peloton came in soon after the riders, and after that there was no visible activity on the route; the bus drivers got steadily more fractious. At last a motorcycle marshal came out, I think going back to his hotel. I stopped him, and asked him to check for me whether I could reopen the main road; he disappeared back to the finish area, and the bus drivers, slightly mollified, started to get their passengers back on board. Shortly the motorcycle marshal reappeared with approval to open the main road; I shifted the barrier, and the traffic roared through.

After I'd finally reopened the park road as well, I walked back through the parked team cars. I met a young rider for Rapha Condor whom I'd helped to load bikes onto their ream car that morning, and he greeted me happily, thanking me again.

"How did it go?" I asked. He beamed at me. "We won."

And so they had:

Stage 4:

1 | Dean Downing | RaphaCondor RT | Elite | 3:10:35 | 22.6mph

GC: 1 | Ian Wilkinson | Science in Sport/Trek | Elite | 10:33:25 | 24.4mph

2 | Chris Newton | Recycling.co.uk | Elite | +0.03

3 | Gordan McCauley | Plowman Craven | Elite | +0.16

Points: 1 | Gordan McCauley | Plowman Craven | Elite | 29

Mountains: 1 | Gordan McCauley | Plowman Craven | Elite | 54

Conclusion

The Girvan Three Day race is Britain's longest running stage race, this year in its 38th year. It is organised by the Wallacehill Cycle Club of Kilmarnock and sponsored by Scottish Power Renewables. Additional sponsors include Dersalloch Windfarm, Active Office, Dumfries and Galloway Council, Carrick Gazette, Endura, and the Westcliffe Hotel, Girvan. And it's great fun ��' one of Scotland's sporting gems.