This image of Donal Harrington on stage 1 went viral (Photo: Paul Mohan – Sportsfile)

Riding for the Mayo Centra team on this year’s An Post Ras, Donal Harrington became the face of the opening stage when a photo of him covered in blood from a crash went viral. The Cork truck driver and latecomer to cycling tells Brian Canty what happened and why he was so determined to battle on.

One look at the picture and you’d be forgiven for thinking he’d not only gone 15 rounds with Mike Tyson but tried to escape from a barbed-wire protected prison on top of it, such were the scrawls on Donal Harrington’s body after the opening stage of the An Post Rás.

The Castletownbere man is new to cycling and was a whopping 110kilos two years ago. That was before the truck driver took up cycling and entered Padraig Marrey’s stable in Mayo.

The west Cork native became something of an internet hit when his battered body was posted on message boards and chat forums with headlines ranging from ‘This ain’t football’ to ‘No blood-subs here’.

He scratches his head when asked how it all came about in his debut Rás?

“I wasn’t certain how it happened,” he laughed.

“But one of the lads told me a motorbike came up on the right hand side. We were on the right, in against the ditch. (Greg) Swinand was ahead of me. One of the lads said there was a car parked up on the right and the motorbike tried to go around him. A whole load of riders got clubbed across the road.”

“Greg got shoved up against the ditch, he went down and I just went straight over him. I was almost still on the bike when I landed because I went head over the handlebars. We weren’t hanging around either at the time. We were at full tilt on a flat stretch of road.”

“I didn’t know what I was at when it happened. I got up straight away and tried straightening the bike. I got back on the bike anyway and some fellas tried stopping me. I didn’t know why. I didn’t realise I was bleeding. I threw away the glasses because I couldn’t see where I was going. I motored away on then. The ambulance wanted to stop me. But I couldn’t stop because I wouldn’t have come in within the time limit.”

“The girl (in the ambulance) said ‘stop’ but I said I’d only stop if she had a bandage ready when I stop. She didn’t so she threw a bit of water on me and I went off again. I knew I was never going to get back on because they were just going too fast.”

“We were very lucky though, I rode very hard for the next 40km. I was up around 90km done and another bunch that had crashed previously came up behind me and about a dozen of us rode in then and we came in about 50 seconds inside the time limit!”

The drama didn’t end there though because just as he was headed for the safe sanctuary of his team car he was directed to the race doctor.

“I got 10 stitches over my eye; the doctor saw me straight away. I was a bit out for a while. I was sore. My shoulder and neck were sore so the stewards and marshals were saying, ‘up here you’. So I went up and the doctor was there. He said to me that if he’d seen me he would’ve pulled me outta the race.”

Harrington got through yesterday’s brutal second stage, but just about. He suffered for every second of it.

“I was sore, but I’m hanging in there, it was a rough day now. I couldn’t settle. My body was like a plank. I was sick all morning.”

“I didn’t sleep two hours last night because my eye is bruised on the right and then my leg was at me because I landed heavy on it and I couldn’t lie on that side. Then my jaw was locked so I couldn’t chew properly.”

His focus is now just on finishing this sufferfest eight-day.

“Skerries is all I’m worried about. At my age (37) it’s all about Skerries. I’ll tell you, we put in so much work into this since last October that if my Rás was ended after 40km I’d never be able to get over it. Never. Back at the start of the year it was all about the Rás. We were talking; ‘will I make it, will I make it’ but you couldn’t accept not finishing. If the doctor pulls me out, the doctor pulls out, but you go on otherwise.”