The Gap was the first proper bike park I ever rode. A long drive from Clonmel but worth it — long drive from Clonmel but it was worth every minute of it.
I'd ridden local stuff before this — Faobam, bits around Tipperary — but nothing purpose-built. No berms, no proper drops, nothing designed to be fast. The Gap is different. It's a serious bike park and the whole place is built for this. You get there and you just feel it immediately — this is what a bike park is supposed to be.
We started on the green trails to warm up. I always do this on a new trail centre — get the legs moving, get a feel for the ground, get your head right before you start pushing. The green at The Gap is actually good. Not boring. There's flow to it, proper corners, a bit of speed. Some trail centres their green trail is basically a path. This isn't that.
You get there and you just feel it immediately.
Then we moved up to blue. That's when it clicked for me — what a berm actually is. You ride into it and instead of having to slow down and turn carefully, the bank holds you. You just lean the bike and the trail does the work. First time I hit one at proper speed I was absolutely buzzing by the bottom. I went round again straight away just to do it again.
A mate was smoother than me on the berms — he's ridden more built trail than I had at that point. A mate was already on the red before we'd finished our second blue run. That's a friend. He's always like that.
We moved to red in the afternoon. There's a drop section near the top — not huge, but it was bigger than anything I'd ridden before that day. I walked up to it, had a proper look, committed. Landed it. Not perfectly — came down a bit back and the bike squirmed — but I kept it together. Second run was cleaner. Third run I was barely thinking about it.
That's always how drops work. First time your body braces up and it's messy. By the third time it's just part of the trail.
We didn't ride the black. Had a look at it. Some of the features were above where I was that day — there's a gap jump section that none of us were going near. a friend thought about it for a while and then didn't. When a friend doesn't go for something you know it's properly gnarly.
Drove home tired. Arms were wrecked from gripping the bars too hard — that's always the sign that you were tense on descents. I talked about it the whole way back. a friend's dad was very patient.
Would go again tomorrow if someone was driving. Best day out on a bike I've had in Ireland. If you're anywhere in the south and you haven't been — go.