I grew up on a small farm in the west of Ireland. It was a simple life balanced with time to play and also to work on the farm. I remember we would milk cows by hand, harvest crops and grow our potatoes and vegetables. From 8 or 9 years old I became obsessed with football and would play every day with my younger brother Paul and friends during and after school. I began playing for underage teams as I went through secondary school. I still worked and helped on the farm, I enjoyed driving the tractor and helping Dad with all the various jobs depending on the time of year. Growing up I did have bicycles, I enjoyed cycling around the farm but my main use was for transport to school, football etc. At the time there were no mountain bike tracks or races that I knew of, although it was not something I looked for.
I never enjoyed school that much, the best part was playing football with friends. I was a shy kid who generally hid amongst friends, never been overly extrovert. I was more comfortable playing football than talking to girls through my early teenage years. As the years went by a lot of my friends were going out and drinking, I was not so interested initially. Sadly football suffered, it wasn’t the same anymore and people were not showing interest. Eventually, I joined the gang, I started going out and drinking. The alcohol gave me a newfound confidence, albeit only when I was under the influence, and the football fizzled out.
After finishing secondary school, most of my friends left town to go to college. I did not know what I wanted to do, I was a bit lost, i was looking for direction. At the time the easiest option was to stay at home and work in a local joinery, where I had done a couple of summers before. I was offered full-time work, and it was good as I learned a lot. We made hardwood windows, doors, stairs etc. I enjoyed working and creating with my hands.
My weekends would now involve going to the pub and clubs drinking and smoking. At the time I thought it was pretty great to have money to spend and have fun every weekend, deep down I knew it could not be a long-term solution. I was still living at home with my parents, brother and two younger sisters. At the time drinking and going to the pub was very much part of the Irish culture, ingrained for years and years. I started drinking relatively late, it was hard to resist as there was nearly a pressure to do so to fit in.
During these years I got into heavy music, especially Grunge, I grew my hair and gathered an impressive collection of body piercings. My poor parents had to put up with loud music and some drunken antics for a few years. This had now replaced football as my main passion.
When I was 21, I left home and went to Jersey, Channel Islands with my friend Dave. Dave’s brother had gone there to work the previous year and we heard it was a pretty good place. It was time to leave home and my hometown. After finding a small bedsit to live and jobs on a building site we settled into life on Jersey Island. It was very different to the west coast of Ireland. I enjoyed meeting new people, the weather was better and it was more multicultural. I continued to go out and party on the weekends. After a year Mary Jo came to Jersey, initially just for the summer, but we would get together again and she stayed. Dave went back to Ireland, Myself and Mary Jo moved in together. We had a growing group of friends, interesting people who would travel to exotic places every year. We continued to work hard and party hard on the weekends, dancing all night high on drugs.
Looking back, all the drinking and drugs were escapism for me. Underneath I was lost, looking for direction and purpose in life. Looking for confidence and purpose. The alcohol and drugs gave me this, but only temporarily. I knew deep down this was unsustainable but at the time it helped me to integrate with people and feel like I belonged. Alcohol never agreed with me, I would suffer terrible hangovers, especially if I mixed drinks. I would be vomiting the next day, in bed for hours and still, I would go back for more the next weekend.
A Pivotal time in my life was when myself and Mary Jo went to Thailand for 2 months in December 1999. This trip opened my mind to a whole new world, landing into the craziness of Bangkok was simply unforgettable. We initially stayed in the famous Khao San Road area before moving south to the beaches. It was a sensory overload and I loved it. We made our way to the beautiful island of Ko Lanta where we had a hut on a white sand beach. We were living in a dream, experiencing new foods, people and cultures. For the big 1999 millennium party, we went to Koh Phan Ngan where we enjoyed a massive beach party. We stayed a week, with some more parties on the beach before escaping to some more chilled vibes on other islands.
On returning to Jersey, I knew I wanted to travel more and soon we were applying for a work holiday visa to Australia. Our Thailand experience also gave us a very new perspective on life and how to live. I decided to go vegetarian, it was easy for me, I never really missed meat and was happy not to be supporting the industry of mass production of meat for human consumption. Myself and Mary Jo were getting more and more interested in health and wellness and the drinking and partying lessened.
Before arriving in Australia we landed in Bangkok once again and made our way south overland to Singapore over a few months. We landed in Perth, Western Australia and soon bought a campervan. We spent about 9 months in Western Australia before going through the Northern Territory and across to Queensland. During my time in Australia, I did some building work, I was painting in Brisbane, I picked cucumbers and other fruits in Carnarvon, WA, and I picked Mangoes in Northern Territory and Queensland. It was one of the best years of my life.
After Australia, we went back to Thailand and explored the northern Chang Mai and Chang Rai regions before crossing into Laos via a long overnight ferry on the mighty Mekong River. We continued into Vietnam and then Cambodia before arriving back to Bangkok after a few enriching and exciting months of backpacking.
It was time to visit India, a country we had heard so much about. I was excited and nervous. We landed in Kolkata, we had nothing booked so got a taxi to the Sudder St area as we knew there were some hotels. The rain was pouring down and our taxi driver said the monsoons had just begun. It was late evening and dark, the streets were filling with water and it felt like we had landed in hell. The taxi stopped and the driver pointed to a Hotel across the street. I stepped out into murky waters that was halfway up my calf, we grabbed our Rucksacks and trudged through the murky water and into the hotel, thankfully they had a room.
Mary Jo took a couple of days to summon the courage to leave the sanctuary of the hotel, she would send me out for food. Slowly we started to explore, already India was so different than anywhere else I’d ever been, We organised ourselves to do a few weeks of voluntary work with the Missionaries of Charity working with the dying and destitute. This was an incredibly humbling experience. Mary Jo worked at different centres than me, I would walk the streets every day observing the life of these people. In India, there are people everywhere, people are living their lives on the streets alongside cows, goats, monkeys etc. It’s intense and takes some getting used to. I’ve heard of many people landing in India and simply not been able to handle that intensity.
Volunteering in these centres certainly helped me deal with the poverty that is clear to see everyday. Beggars would plead for food or money, kids would surround us and look at us with curious smiles and wanting eyes, we were slowly immersing ourselves in Indian culture.
The next stop was Bodhgaya, Bihar where we did a 10-day silent meditation course called Vipassana. Another incredible experience and a nice contrast to the Indian street life. This was my first time doing meditation and it was a transformational journey.
We headed west, taking long train journeys that were always an adventure in themselves. At this stage I had long dreadlocks, I guess I fitted in as many of the Sadhus, the Indian holy men had long dreadlocks. I kept the dreadlocks for many years and really loved them, they were part of me.
After exploring the desert cities of Rajasthan we went towards the Himalayas and Rishikesh, where we did a 2 week Ashtanga Yoga retreat. Again it was a first for me doing Yoga, I enjoyed how I felt after doing yoga twice a day and experiencing the peace and calm of the retreat on the shores of the holy Ganges river.
Towards the end go our Indian adventure we both picked up Giardia, resulting in diarrhea and weight loss and some time to recover back in Ireland. Being back in Ireland was a complete culture shock after all our travels. After some months, we had not settled so returned to Jersey.
All the travelling experiences had a huge impact on me, I had changed and grown as a person. Drinking, drugs and partying were now of little interest to me. I got back to playing football for my local side St Lawerence, I practised Yoga and did many detox all while completing a carpentry course.
New Zealand was next on my list to travel to. Towards the end of 2007, we packed up from Jersey and were gearing up for our next adventure. We flew to Costa Rica and spent an amazing month there. We travelled north to Nicaragua, El Salvador, Honduras, and Guatemala and finished in Mexico.
Arriving in New Zealand in February 2008, we soon bought a campervan and started moving about, firstly up to Northland. We stopped in Keri Keri for a while to do some work.
I had been contemplating cutting my dreadlocks for a while, and in the end, I cut them while I was alone at Kai Iwi Lakes. It was a beautiful setting for this moment which I made special. My heart was beating faster as I took the scissors to what had been a part of me for almost 10 years. I hung some dreads off the trees, I threw some in the crystal clear lake water, and I set some on fire as I took some photos. On completion I remember my head feeling so light and all I wanted to do was massage my scalp. It felt right and was the right moment, it was liberating and felt like a new beginning, and so it was.
We travelled through the north Island and crossed into the South Island, going to Nelson thinking this would be the place where we would stop again to find some work. This did not eventuate, nothing was falling into place here so we continued. Christchurch was going to be the next destination, but before that we popped into Hanmer Springs, not really knowing anything about it, just knowing that we needed petrol for the van, which was unfortunately a gas guzzler.
That same day, Mary Jo went into the main Spa and enquired about any Massage Therapist jobs. She walked out with a job. Afterwards, at a local cafe and chatting to one of the employees we had a room in a house. Within a few weeks, I had found work with a local builder. Everything had fallen into place and Hanmer Springs opened its arms to us. I never in my wildest dreams thought I would still be here in 2023.
Slowly over time and after meeting some locals, in particular Fraser and Mike mountain biking was becoming more apparent as a very popular thing to do here. I bought a Scott hardtail mountain bike and clip-in MTB shoes. Riding the single track was super fun and I was out practicing more and more. Hanmer Springs was the venue for numerous mountain bike races, I entered these and gathered experience and confidence. I loved the buzz of being on the start line. Soon I had the confidence to enter the Molesworth Muster, an 86km gravel race. This was another steep learning curve as I went hard initially and blew up spectacularly and finished somewhere around 47th position. It didn’t matter, I had fun, I was hooked.
I had heard about this event called the Kiwi Brevet, that passed through Hanmer Springs. An 1100km unsupported largely off road ride around the top of the South Island. I was intrigued and really could not comprehend how people were completing this in as little as 4 days.
In early 2014, I was in Blenheim, at the start of the Kiwi Brevet, my first bikepacking race. I was excited and super nervous. During this ride, i completed my biggest days on a bike ever to this point. I met some guys here who knew what they were doing much more than me, I was a mere novice at navigation etc. I met and rode with some great riders that I now call friends like Brian Alder, Jeff Lyall, Cliff Clermont and Geof Blance to name a few. I ended up riding with Brian to the finish at Blenheim after 4 days. This was a huge pivotal moment and a massive confidence boost, knowing I could ride multiple big days back to back.
Cycling and bikepacking consumed my world over the next years and the next big one for me was the 3,000 km inaugural Tour Aotearoa in 2016. Taking on this was a massive step up and I felt confident that I could do it. Unfortunately, I only completed four days due to a knee injury. I was devastated at the time, however, after 5 weeks I did go back and complete the ride.
Steve Halligan descending into Clark, Colorado. (Rugile Kaladyte)
Pisa Range Photo BY Lukas Lipton
I won’t go into all the races here as I’ve covered most of them in other blogs. Essentially, I was looking for bigger races where I could test myself and push my limits. I seemed to have a good ability for this type of racing and I was keen to see how far I could go.
In 2015 Mary Jo and myself set up Vibrant Living Retreat, a wellness centre offering Detox, Yoga, meditation, Massage and more. We have facilitated many amazing retreats over the years, meeting some incredible people along the way. I was even able to set up Vibrant Living as a sponsor for my racing endeavours.
Kyrgyzstan 2022, photo by Nils Laengner
About a year before the 2017 Tour Divide, I stopped drinking alcohol completely, initially, I thought it would just be in the lead-up to the race. However, I’ve not gone near alcohol since and never missed it at all. I always say that drank enough in my earlier years that lasted me a lifetime. For years I used to look back with a tinge of regret, thinking of a wasted youth pissing my life away. Nowadays I just accept what it was and that it was part of my journey to where I am now.
Cycling and Ultra Racing have given me a huge sense of purpose. I am hugely motivated to get out there and put myself in uncomfortable positions, to grow and learn. My races are transformational and I come away having learned new things every time.
Cycling is freedom for me, it’s fun, adventurous and empowering. I have been fortunate enough to have raced some of the biggest races in the world and raced against some incredible people. The bikepacking community are a great bunch of people, we all have a certain spirit inside that brings us together.
So my story shows what’s possible in life. I was lost and lacked direction but I did not give up, I pursued and found a deep passion. Elements of Endurance racing has transferred to my life to make it fulfilling and exciting. I am now 100% committed to showing up for myself every day, whether that’s on the bike or not.
Life is for Living
Life is a journey
Live it, Breath it, Be it
Pedal on
