PJ Gallagher on the seafront wall in Clontarf, north Dublin, on a penny farthing (as you do). He has had a long-standing passion for speed on wheels in the shape of motorbikes and BMX racing but has taken to road cycling of late.
By Gerard Cromwell
The rise in the popularity of cycling in Ireland in recent years has seen people from all walks of life, including various celebrities, take up the sport here.
But comedian PJ Gallagher, made famous by his Naked Camera sketch show and alter ego Jake Stephens, has taken his love for cycling one step further than most; the Dubliner deciding to set up his own club in the middle of last year.
Clontarf Cycling Club was founded when former BMX bandit Gallagher and a bunch of mates rode the An Post Tour of Meath last summer and subsequently decided to get more people involved in their locality.
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“I was racing BMX on and off until last year but I kept hurting myself and doctors kept laughing at me,” he grins.
“I was thinking, okay maybe it’s a kids sport... well not a kids sport, but not a sport for a man that takes six months to recover. I got into this because I was motorcycle racing and I kind of underestimated how fit you have to be for motorcycle racing.
“A friend of mine, Mark Kelly, took me out for a few cycles. Cycling just gets under your skin. We said we’d try and start our own club after getting such a great buzz out of it last year but we didn’t expect it to take off the way it did.”
Just over a year later, Clontarf has over 100 active members and is still growing.
“We were hoping we’d get maybe 15 or 20 lads on a good weekend and we’d be delighted. But it’s gone really well and now there’s 50 plus out on a good weekend and 30 plus on a bad weekend.
“If there’s a sportive or something like that happening at the end of the week we do as many of them as we can. But generally we do over 100km around different places in north county Dublin.
“We go up around the Naul, the Nag’s Head and those places, but we change it as much as we can. On Thursday night we have our social spin which is around 30km up around Howth, where we’ll have a coffee and leg it home.
“I often say that Clontarf CC... the CC is for coffee club. There’s not a coffee shop in North County Dublin that doesn’t hate us coming in,” he laughs.
“Forty lads all paying for cappuccinos separately... out of plastic bags. I used to always give directions by pubs. Now it’s coffee shops. Cycling’s a real sociable thing. In the past year I’ve had 113 people in my life that I didn’t have last year. It’s great.”
Although he doesn’t cycle competitively, PJ spends a fair amount of time in the saddle and has, almost predictably, got himself into a fair few scrapes and funny situations along the way.
“My longest spin was an accident,” he laughs.
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“I did the Cycle Against Suicide the first day. I think it was 100km from Dublin to Gorey. I got to Gorey and I went. ‘Alright, what’s the craic with getting a lift home?’ And they went ‘There is no lift home.’
“At the time I was going, ‘Oh shite! Right, just jump on the bike and get it done.’ So I had to cycle back on my own. It was over 200km.
“We did the Down Syndrome Ireland spin in Blessington at the start of the year too. It was a beautiful morning. The lads were all stripping off and throwing stuff into the van at the start. But it turned into the most horrific day.
“We were going up the Sally Gap in wind, rain, hailstones and fog. You couldn’t see anything. When we got to the top, it was actually harder getting down it because of the weather.
“You had the brakes full on because you couldn’t see ten feet in front of you. We got into Laragh and about 20 lads sat down and said ‘We’re not going on, send us a mini bus!’ Only half the people that started it finished it.”
But even on a bad day it doesn’t take much to put a smile on Gallagher’s face and it’s easy to see where he gets the inspiration for some of his comedic characters.
“We did one of our Thursday social spins in the summer,” he laughs.
“I didn’t think I’d need the rain cape but I took it anyway. I got to the bottom of Howth Hill and it started pelting down. The rain was hopping off the road and the thunder and lightning was mental!
“I was feeling sorry for myself, so I stopped off in a chipper on the way home where this genius in front of me goes up to the counter and goes: ‘Can I phone in a delivery?’ Your man behind the counter goes. ‘But you’re here?’ ‘Yeah,’ says your man. ‘I’m going with it. I’m not walking home in that shite!’ It was the cleverest thing. He put a smile on my face after a horrible spin.”
Although he admits spending hours in front of the TV cheering on Nicolas Roche, Dan Martin, Philip Deignan and the rest of the Irish pros and even rode Alpe d’Huez recently to get a feel for their suffering in the Tour de France, Gallagher has never contemplated the competitive side of the sport.
“I like watching lads racing, but I’m not into going racing myself, so sportives are perfect for me. They’re social events and basically, it’s an excuse for a coffee at the end of it.
“One of the joys I get out of cycling is that I’m not racing. I can have that craic and not be competitive. You can just immerse yourself in it, go out with mates, have fun and feel like a kid again on a bike.”
You know it's serious when you're doing selfies on Irish corner up Alpe d'Huez......
PJ on the BMX track in Cherryorchard before he decided to get serious about road cycling. He still loves BMX, even though he's too old for it!
In the colours of Clontarf Cycling Club
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