Kilkeel

You go out and you do your best and you get fit and you give it a lash every day.

But if the weather says no... that has the final say in this you know I just wanted to see the best I could do and that's why you have to push on every day if you want to try and set a decent time around you have to do that but some days your gut feel and I trust my gut Sue I trust my gut because your gut is I suppose your subconscious is hammering and saying no don't do this right and there's other days you're pushing on and you know that caught me up heading over towards Carlingford and I wasn't after making the kind of up towards Clarehead up there and this is about two or three days before the finish and this is where I kind of lost another time and I was looking across and Carlingford was only over across there but there was a small craft warning out from Metairn and I said to myself do you know what I'm not taking on an 18 or 20 mile open paddling over and heading over to Kilkeel, let's say, or whatever like that in a mid-air.

And even though the wind showed it was a little bit further out into the Irish Sea, I kind of thought, no.

And I actually went to do it And then what happened was that I was about two or three miles out.

And when I got over onto the far side over there, the tide was out.

I suddenly hit these bloody waves.

And running along, up along Kilkeel and heading up towards Annelon, I, yeah, I got a fright that night.

Do you flip yourself on to your

Because at this hour in my life, I'm not what you'd call a long-hitter.

As I pointed out earlier with Jonathan being 55 yards outside me or whatever it was and there was lads hitting it even further than that again too but anyways so yeah so Strandhill that was lovely to win Strandhill I had won I led the qualifiers actually in Turles the first year I played and Cardboard Woman beat me in the quarter final Pat Murray went on and won the Irish won the match play won the match play close that year so 23 and then of course 24 in Kilkeel

did you beat someone who defeated the final yeah

I had a handy win in the final that day, Will.

We're just waiting for the DUP leader to join us this morning.

Let's talk to Gerard in Kilkeel.

Gerard, your thoughts on this matter?

Morning, Stephen.

And I was like...

So for those that don't know, Newry is a border town on the northern side of the border, in the north of Ireland, but it's very near where my grandfather's from, Kilkeel, County Down.

And but, like, it's just an odd stop for a band that's, like, not known in Ireland, unless they have, like...

Do they have, like, a following?

Jim Allister, thank you.

Gerard's in Kilkeel.

Morning, Gerard.

Yeah, morning, Stephen.