Phil O'Brien inducted into Cycling Ireland Hall of Fame
Cycling Ireland is very proud to acknowledge Phil O’Brien as one of our 2023 Cycling Ireland Hall of Fame inductees.
Phil O'Brien
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O'Brien joined Bray Wheelers in May 1957 in his early teens and enjoyed a distinguished competitive racing career having raced with the Co. Wicklow club across a 17 year long career.
His first major win was Leixlip Grand Prix in July of 1964, and he enjoyed continued success as a competitive rider both as an individual and a member of the Bray Wheelers team who won the national team prize seven times in-a-row from 1965 to 1972. Phil became the National Road Race Champion in July of 1969 in Kildare and the Time-Trial Champion in Belfast in October 1972. He rode ten Tours of Ireland in which his Bray Wheelers team enjoyed huge success.
After he stopped racing, he became a team manager with Bray and did that for eight years – even getting a chance to manage both Sean Kelly and Stephen Roche in a race in Germany in 1978. Sean Kelly had just turned professional and Stephen Roche would go on to win the Rás the following year.
After his racing and management career Phil also had a distinguished 31-year career as a commissaire, primarily leading the Rás as moto commissaire. Beginning in 1984, he officiated countless races, including the National Championships, the Gorey Three-Day (23 consecutive years), and major international events like the Nissan Classic.
O’Brien was also a member of the tripartite executive responsible for uniting Irish Cycling and Vice president of the Irish Cycling Federation and is now a Life President of Bray Wheelers
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His retirement from officiating in 2015 marked the end of a remarkable chapter in Irish road racing, having been a consistent figure in the road racing scene for almost 60 years in Ireland as both competitor, manager, administrator and commissaire. He remains involved with Bray Wheelers.
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Bray Wheelers recently produced a podcast series, with Phil O’Brien featuring in Episode 1. The Podcasts are available on the Bray Wheelers website at www.braywheelers.ie/podcasts or from Spotify or Apple Podcasts.
Martin Grimley added to Cycling Ireland Hall of Fame
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Cycling Ireland is very proud to highlight Martin Grimley as one of our 2023 Hall of Fame inductees.
A stalwart of the off-road scene on the island of Ireland, Martin has been integral in the development and growth of cross country and cyclo-cross in particular on our shores. The Dromara Cycling Club man has played a vital part in the growth of the Cycling Ireland Off-road Commission.
Martin got into off-road when he took part in a local cross-country race in late 2005. Although he DNF’ed he was hooked. He joined Dromara Cycling club the following year and added cyclo-cross to his competitive disciplines. Martin’s passion was event promotion through webpages. He joined his club committee in 2008. He was invited to join the newly established Cycling Ulster Off-road Commission in 2009. Through this commission he contacted local clubs and formed the first Ulster Cyclo-cross series that year. In January 2015 Martin joined the Cycling Ireland Off-road Commission. He is also a level 1 coach and an Elite National Mountain Bike Commissaire.
Martin was presented with his award at the UCI Cyclo-cross World Cup weekend in Dublin, where he again acted as commissaire for domestic races on Saturday and the international races on Sunday.
MTB Supreme Robin Seymour Inducted into Hall of Fame
Robin Seymour continues to race domestically with Team WORC
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Robin represented Ireland at three different Olympic games: Sydney 2000, Athens 2004 and Beijing 2008 in cross country mountain biking.
Along with being a three-time Olympian, Seymour won three consecutive UCI Masters Mountain Bike World Championships from 2016-2018, and in 2022 took a UEC European Cyclo-cross Championship in the M50s category.
On the domestic front, Seymour has taken the XC National Championship a staggering 20 times, including 15 in a row from 1993-2008 and most recently in 2014. He also has an equally astounding 18 CX National Championships, between 1991 and 2012.
Seymour continues to race domestically with Team WORC, while also playing a key part in nurturing and mentoring some of the country's best up and coming off-road riders
Following his European Championship win, Robin gave an insight into keeping motivated and staying competitive in his fifties. You can read that interview click here
This year Robin won the Masters 50 Cross Country Championships, 30 years after he won the first MTB Cross Country Championships in 1994.
A video of this years event is here...
A video of the 1994 event is here...