Posted by Cleggy on May 5, 2010 in
PR
Issue #94 (May 2010) of Irish Racer Magazine hit the Shop Shelves today. Hot off the press it includes features on Glenn Irwin, Marshall Neill, Alastair Seeley, James Ellison, Bridgestone’s new BT023 sports touring Tyre, a preview of the upcoming International Road Race the North West 200 and all the usual monthly columns from riders like World Superbike star Jonathan Rea, World Supersport star Eugene Laverty, Road racing’s funny guy Mr Guy Martin and Irish Superbike contestant Kirk Jamison.
Back in early April I met up with the 2009 Irish Supersport champion, Glenn Irwin on a lovely Spring evening and done some PR photographs with him (Blog post here). The images from that shoot have been used in this months Irish Racer Magazine for this months ‘the big interview‘ feature.
Along with my images of Glenn Irwin I have multiple other photographs published in another good Month for me. Go grab a copy of the Magazine now while stocks last.
Tags: Alastair Seeley, Bridgestone, Eugene Laverty, Glenn Irwin, Guy Martin, Irish Racer Magazine, Irish Superbike, James Ellison, Jonathan Rea, Kirk Jamison, Marshall Neill, North West 200, Photographs, World Superbike, World Supersport
Posted by Cleggy on Mar 27, 2010 in
General
Today’s plan was to travel to Tim Martin’s House a few miles from Lisburn and assist the Team’s PR man (Stephen Henderson) to take some studio style Photographs of all the Team members against a White background for their Website, and then in the late afternoon/evening do a shoot of my own with one of the Team’s racers Kirk Jamison at Scrabo Tower near Newtownards.
The MAR-Train racing shoot went well and was all wrapped up within a couple of hours at which point Kirk told me the afternoon shoot wasn’t going ahead as his new Leather race suit wasn’t ready yet. That itself was disappointing, but to then later receive a text from Derek Wilson (who was returning from a days shooting at Kirkistown) informing of a nice sunset over Scrabo was very disappointing as we don’t get a lot of sunsets in Ireland!
Ah well you can’t win them all. Maybe I should start charging cancellation fees…
When I returned home I then travelled on to Dungannon to catch up with Ryan Farquhar and have some ‘craic’ with him discussing the upcoming racing season and how he was getting on at preparing his race bikes and his new race truck. We then went back to his house for a cuppa Tea and watched the World Superbike qualifying from Portimao.
Tags: Kirk Jamison, Kirkistown, Lisburn, MAR-Train racing, Newtownards, Portimao, Ryan Farquhar, Tim Martin, World Superbike
Posted by Cleggy on Feb 25, 2010 in
Motocross,
PR
It feels like ages since the last issue of Irish Racer magazine was published as the staff at Careva Publishing took a well earned Christmas/New Year break.
Today the latest issue of Irish Racer magazine hit the shelves of all good Newsagents and inside its pages are interviews with World Supersport star Eugene Laverty, Road racing legend Ryan Farquhar, Josh Brookes as well as regular monthly columns from World Superbike star Jonathan Rea, Road Racer Guy Martin and of course the ‘Wee Wizard’ Alastair Seeley and Kirk Jamison.
I recently met up with Alastair one bitterly cold day in January and shot some Photographs of him on his new Relentless Suzuki RMZ250 Motocross bike putting in some Winter fitness training. Two images from this session have been published in this issue of Irish Racer magazine along with another eleven of my images getting my Photographic year off to an excellent start.
Tags: Alastair Seeley, Careva Publishing, Eugene Laverty, Guy Martin, Jonathan Rea, Motocross, Photographs, Published, Ryan Farquhar, Suzuki RMZ250, World Superbike, World Supersport
Posted by Cleggy on Feb 6, 2010 in
Motocross
After another long (and mentally draining) week of Work at ‘the day job’ the weekend finally arrived and the destination for me once more was the Desertmartin Motocross track near Moneymore in County Derry/Londonderry. Last evening (Friday) saw me charging up all my Camera and Flash batteries in preparation for shooting the Motocross today. It all boils down to the Five P’s Perfect Preparation Prevents Pathetic Performance!
1/1250th f3.2 ISO640
Motocross Photography is not something I participate in all that often and so I am still learning the ropes and experimenting to get a feel for what which shots work and which do not. Having very recently Photographed Motocross at Desertmartin I knew that it offered good access to a variety of vantage points without the requirement for ‘big Glass’, needing nothing larger than my 200mm Nikon lens. The Motocross photographs that I captured on that previous visit to Desertmartin encouraged me enough to have another go at it this weekend, and at the same time I learned a few things that day that I felt would help me to produce even better images this weekend, if blessed with even a half reasonable days Weather and light.
I was wakened from my sleep by the sound of torrential Rain bouncing off the Roof Tiles and I very nearly stayed in my Bed, but the Weather forecast was for a damp morning, drying up and even the possibility of some Sunshine.
My ‘Jock’ mate Derek Wilson also ventured out to Desertmartin ensuring that there was plenty of good natured banter between us all day long, slagging off each others photographs and the all important debate about whos turn it was to buy the Burgers for lunch, him being a tight Jock meant that I had to buy the Burgers yet again, but I live in hope that one day he will put his hand in his pocket!
The on-track conditions were quite soft due to the overnight Rain but luckily there was no further Rain during practice or racing, but neither was there any decent light which meant that it was a struggle to get decent photographs and come the early afternoon the light levels fell even further so in the end I called it a day, earlier than planned, and headed for home.
1/1000th f4.5 ISO1600 Nikon AF-S VR Zoom-Nikkor 70-200mm f/2.8G IF-ED
1/640th f5.6 ISO1600 Nikon AF-S VR Zoom-Nikkor 70-200mm f/2.8G IF-ED
1/800th f4 ISO2000 Nikon AF-S VR Zoom-Nikkor 70-200mm f/2.8G IF-ED
Star World Superbike racer Jonathan Rea started out in Motocross before taking to the Tarmac racing but he still keeps a keen interest in the Dirt scene whilst sponsoring a rider. Jonathan is a very down to earth guy and is not afraid to dirty his hands, here he is washing down this rider’s race bike (just before he accidentally knocked it over, ooops!).
1/500th f5.6
As always you can purchase from a selection of my vast Photographic Library by selecting from my online galleries.
Tags: AF-S VR Zoom-Nikkor 70-200mm f/2.8G IF-ED, Desertmartin, Jonathan Rea, Moneymore, Motocross, Nikon, Photographs, World Superbike
Posted by Cleggy on Jan 1, 2010 in
Bike Racing Minus Five degrees celcius was the reading on the digital temperature gauge of my Car’s dash as I set off for Crossgar, in county Down, for the annual bike cross country meeting. Some of the ‘B’ roads were treacherous with lots of Ice everywhere (the Motorway and main roads were not much better!) but I got there in one piece.
I grabbed my Nikon 70-200 f2.8 lens, one Nikon body, and threw dumped my Nikon 20mm f2.8 in one pocket of my coat and an SB900 in the other pocket, laced up my Mountain Boots (boy was I glad I put on a second pair of Socks) and pulled on my Loweprowe Photographers Gloves.
I have never Photographed this event before so obviously I done the only thing a man of my ability could do and that was to visit the Chippy Van and get a Chicken Burger – well you wouldn’t expect me to work on an empty Stomach!
Despite the hard weather there was a good turn out of both competitors and spectators for this event. The fields were still frozen from the heavy overnight frost but even so the tough bikers fired up their Motocross and Enduro bikes to tackle the challenging circuit, and challenging it was with many of the competitors feeling the muscular pain from all the ruts in the ground and many were visibly gasping for breath.
World Superbike star Jonathan Rea used to race Motocross bikes before turning to the Tarmac and he was just one of the Tarmac boys to turn up on the day, using this event as some useful fitness training for his season ahead.
Nikon 70-200mm VR at f4
The amount of bikes lapping the circuit soon turned the more boggy sections in to a real quagmire which proved very tricky for some poor competitors who got stuck in the soft mud.
Nikon 70-200mm VR at f3.5
You can purchase photographs from this event by selecting from my online galleries, which will be uploaded soon.
Tags: County Down, Crossgar, Enduro, fitness training, Jonathon Rea, Loweprowe, Motocross, Nikon, Nikon 20mm f2.8, Nikon 70-200mm VR f2.8, Photographs, SB900, World Superbike