Google+ Running in Cork, Ireland: Gerry Forde gets a new assistant...

Monday, December 17, 2012

Gerry Forde gets a new assistant...

The news story that crept under the radar this week was of course the fact that wheelchair athlete Gerry Forde had a new assistant at the Clonakilty Marathon last Saturday! Due to the severe gradient of the first hill around 400m after the start, Gerry needed someone on hand to stop him rolling backwards in between pushes of the wheels.
Gerry with his new helper
Mind you, even though he took off ages ahead of the rest of the Marathon field, I think it still took him around 30 minutes to get up this first hill......and it's only 100m long! When I passed him, there were beads of sweat dripping off his helmet.....and that's when he was stopped ;o)

Rumour has it that he has already block booked entry to the Clonakilty Marathon for the next 10 years. Next time you see Gerry, be sure and ask him where is his next hilly Marathon ;o)

3 comments:

rom said...

Go Gerry :D

Anonymous said...

just aswell jerry you,ve no wing mirrors, are you bringing your helper to all hilly races now. Goodman jerry, always cheering us up

Donal O'Donoghue said...

Back in 2010 Jerry Forde and I were both at the Touraneena 5k in the West Waterford Summer Series.

This a a relatively uneventful 5k until you get to the last 300m, where there is a sudden sharp drop to a bridge over a small river, followed by an extremely steep rise on the far side.

Jerry had a good head-start and had just reached the bottom of the hill when I passed him.
Fifteen minutes later I was wondering "where's Jerry", and inquired at the finish line, if had finished okay.
No sign of him. Apparently none of Santa's helpers were on hand to help him that day, and he had to do a million zig-zags from side to side to cover about 200m uphill at the end!