Another Sportive Coming Up

I didn't manage another ride last week and had to settle for the 'cross trainer' instead because of foul weather. Had a great club ride though yesterday, 60 miles over a very hilly Dartmoor route and had to work really hard to keep with the leading riders the whole way. Had to have a little lie down afterwards!
Our next goal is the Magnificat in Newbury on 12th June. We are both doing the 127 mile route and will be the furthest either of us have ridden in one day! Looking forward to it now!

Fast and Furious

I've just done my first evening club ride. Evening rides are designed to be faster over a shorter distance (25 to 35 miles). There are usually two groups covering the same route but at a different pace.
For some reason tonights turnout was low, about 12 riders, and apart from myself and one other, they were all from the faster group and included a few 'Shred' riders who are the super elite riders. This was going to hurt!
The route was approx 32 miles up to a reservoir on Dartmoor and back. I was working at my absolute max for virtually the entire ride trying to hang on to the back of the pack, and failing most of the time. They had slowed their usual pace as well! It was great experience though, I would never be able to push myself that hard riding on my own, and thoroughly enjoyed the ride. I am definitely going to try and do more of these evening tempo rides as they are probably the best training there is.
That takes this weeks mileage up to 170 miles because of last weekends trip which is a new record, so if I manage another evening ride this week I might hit 200.

Bath Trip

Another good day with a bit of a westerly blow. This was going to be the first ride fully loaded up. Each pannier weighed a bit over 4.5 kg plus the tent was perched on top. We wobbled off down the road from Georges place but soon got used to the extra weight. The first time I tried standing on the pedals and rocking the bike from side to side was when I really noticed the weight, but I soon changed my motion and smoothed things out.
The route we took to Bath provided a very pleasant ride, and what a lovely city it is. We seemed to ride right through the middle of it and it looked great in the afternoon sunshine. We arrived at the campsite and set about putting the tents up. It was the first time I had set my tent up properly and it did cause some amusement amongst the other campers. No it wouldn't be much use in a howling gale and torrential rain but we'll be in a B&B if we get that kind of weather on our End to End - although I think George has really got into this camping idea after his initial reservations and might want to prove his tent is better than mine in adverse conditions!
After a couple of beers and something to eat in the on site bar it was time to retire. Rain was forecast overnight and it did! It sounded pretty heavy at times as well but I slept fine thanks to the self-inflating matt, and I woke up fresh and raring to go.
We had another good ride on the way back with a strong westerly which was fortunately mainly behind us.
So all in all it was a great success. We had covered 140 miles in two days fully loaded, managed some big hills and survived camping overnight! A few tweaks here and there to what we will need to take with us is all that's needed now and we're ready to go! 

Our Trip to Bath

This weekend was our first trip carrying all our camping equipment. Adie arrived first thing on Saturday morning, we were meeting Phil and John at the campsite near Bath that evening. Phil has done a lot of bike touring so we were keen to pick his brains to gather tips for our trip. John is riding from Ludgershalll to Italy later this year, unfortunatley he has been poorly all week and will just be doing the camping bit this weekend. We set off at 08:30 and again we were really lucky with the weather. We climbed up to the causeway towards Hungerford, before taking the back roads towards Swindon. We passed through lots of beautiful villages on quiet roads. We stopped for lunch at a little cafe in Wootton Basset, I was amazed when the bill arrived and was only £7 for both of us. I was using the Garmin to navigate for the first time and it took a while to understand how to set it so that I could clearly see when to turn. It was doing quite well until we got to Bath and then the screen had far too much information on it to make any sense. Fortunately I had had the foresight to make a note of the postcode. After entering it in the Garmin, things started to become clearer, until it decided to take us round and round a park. We finally forced it to work by sticking to the roads and ignoring all attempts to take us off road. We finally arrived at the campsite about 15:30 having ridden 75 miles. Phil was already there so we pitched our tents down in the meadow.

The campsite was lovely and the shower block was excellant. After a shower and a change of clothes, we popped back to the meadow, where lots of other cyclists from Bristol CTC had arrived for a weekend camping trip. There was a lot of talk about Adie's tent, comments like "thats's the smallest tent I've ever seen" and " I have one of those but I wouldn't use it for more than one night" are among some of the more useable comments. I must say that it does pack down well and for under 1kg of weight it doesn't take up much bike space.

At 18.00 we headed to the bar for something to eat and a beer. John arrived just in time for dinner, he had driven over, but had still brought his bike and touring gear. We spent a few hours talking about bikes, touring and camping, getting loads of good advice from Phil, before retiring to our tents for the night. This was the first time I have ever slept on a self inflating mat and I must say that it was the most comfortable night I have ever spent in a tent. I was woken by heavy rain in the middle of the night, this put a smile on my face, at least in the morning we would get an idea of how the tents coped. I woke around 5:30, went for a shower and started to pack my gear. Adie surfaced about 6.00 and by 7:30 we were ready to go. We had both had a good night sleep and were raring to get back on the bikes. Sitting on the saddle was initially painful, but after a short time the aches disappeared. We headed West into a strong head wind and up some steep hills, before turning South then East again to gain the advantage of the wind behind us. By 10.00 we had reached Melksham and stopped for breakfast, it was Sunday and there were no cafes open, so McDonalds provided breakfast (we will need to remember about Sunday hours on our trip). We carried on towards Calne and then Malborough, where we were lucky enough to stop for coffee and cake, missing a really heavy shower. The rain passed quite quickly and we managed to get all the way home without getting caught in any of the heavy showers, Phil however, who had taken a different route home, later told me that he got soaked on the way back. We arrived home about 14:30 having completed 65 miles and our first camping trip. We had carried everything we would need to our End to End without any problems, we're ready now and I can't wait to start our tour. 

Preparations For Weekend Camping Trip

George had organised a weekend trip, camping overnight in Bath on 21/22nd May. At this time I hadn't bought any camping gear so it was time to get some essentials sorted. When it came to a tent, weight was the deciding factor and I purchased a Coleman Exponent Rigel weighing in at less than 1kg. Next was a self inflating roll matt by Vango and the same panniers that George had gone for, the Raleigh Avenirs.
When the tent arrived I popped it up in the lounge. Its single skin design is very basic and easy to put up but there really isn't much to it. But what the hell, I am only going to sleep in it and as long as it keeps me dry that's all that matters!

We're moving the End to End forward !

Training has been going really well and May seems too far away, so we have decided to move our dates for the End to End. After a lot of discussion we have agreed to start on the 26th of August 2011. I rang the bike shop at Wick and they were very helpful, we can send our bikes up by courier and they will set them up ready for us. We have looked at lots of different ways to get to the start, trains, hire cars etc, but we have decided that flying up to Wick is the easiest option, we will fly from Bristol to Edinburgh and then on to Wick. All we have to do then is cycle home. When we first talked about this we thought that we would need 14 days to complete the ride. However having mapped the ride out and looked at where we will camp, it looks like it will be more like 11-12 days (the last day is from Okehampton to Lands Ends, at 102 miles, so we may split this into two days due to the hills, we'll see how we feel when we get there). We have all our equipment now and we are planning to do a camping trip in May to try everything out. Being a bit of a geek I have a spreadsheet detailing the campsites, their tariffs, the daily estimated mileage. I have also mapped the route out on bike route toaster (what a great tool) these can the be uploaded to the sat nav, I just need to work out how to keep it charged up now.

Start	Finish	Miles	Campsite
Wick	Thurso	37.03	Thurso Bay Campsite
Thurso	Lairg	75.56	Dunroamin Camping Park
Lairg	Fort Augustus	81.17	Cumbernalds Campsite
Fort Augustus	Inveraman	90.88	Beinglas Farm
Inveraman	Abington	85.64	Mount View Campsite
Abington	Pooley Bridge	82.42	Waterside Campsite
Pooley Bridge	Croston	75.83	Royal Umpire
Croston	Presthorpe	89.76	Mill Farm Caravan Park
Presthorpe	Clevedon	105.23	Bullock Farm Campsite
Clevedon	Okehampton	87.93	Betty Cottles Inn
Okehampton	Lands End	101.89	Home

New bike and the New Forest Sportive

My new bike arrived and it was well worth the wait. Its a Secteur Elite, I chose this because I could use it for my club rides and it also takes a rack, ideal for the End to End. I had the week off following the Cornwall Tor, so I signed up for the New Forest sportive, 85 miles in beautiful countryside and very fast smooth roads. Again it was a fantastic day and Wiggle was very organised. Registration was not quite as good as the Cornwall sportive, but it wasn't long before we were on the road. I was going really well and thought that I was in for a good time. I met up with a young lad from Wales and we spent the ride taking turns up front, to give each other a rest. I kept telling him I would need to drop off the pace, as I didn't think I could keep going at that speed. However I did, and managed to complete 85 miles in 5hrs and 9 minutes, so if I can just avoid hills on the End to End, I should be ok. :-)

Joining the YOGI's

George has been riding with his local club for a while now and is always saying how much he enjoys it, so I thought I'd give it a go ( though I really wasn't sure about it ). The nearest club to me are YOGI in Plymouth which is approx 25 miles from Looe.
I joined them on a Saturday morning for a 'long and steady' ride of approx 55 miles. Its always a bit awkward joining a new group but I was made to feel very welcome. I enjoyed the easy going nature of the group ride and managed the pace fairly comfortably without holding anybody up. Comparing it to riding on your own, you are riding harder but in shorter bursts with more stops.
The following weekend a 100 miler to Exeter, Dawlish Teignmouth and back was organised. Approx 30 riders turned out which surprised the organisers who weren't expecting so many. Another glorious sunny day with a tough first section up over Dartmoor followed by a long downhill into Exeter.
Another brilliant day and looking forward to the next one.

Cornwall Tor

At last the day was here. Although I felt my training was going pretty well, this was going to be the first opportunity to ride with and measure myself against other riders. I knew the course was going to be tough but felt confident that I could at least cover the distace as I'd already done several 70's, a couple of 80's and a 100 miler. I had fully completed the training program so felt as prepared as I could be.
Again we were dead lucky with the weather, a lovely sunny morning with light wind. George and I set off together but we were amongst a lot of other riders in the early stages. The field was fairly bunched as we hit the first climb and we were quickly separated. Never mind I thought, he'll catch me when we get on the flat.
Well someone with a very sick sense of humour set this course, with climb after climb through the villages of the north Cornwall coast and all the time waiting for the infamous Millook hill. The only flatter sections are in the last third where I fortunately teamed up with a Truro rider and we worked together to keep up a good pace. He dropped me though on the final steep climb with a few miles to go.
I finished thinking I was ahead of George but was not sure - had he gone past me at one of the feeding stations? But no, he came in a bit behind me. We were both on a real high from having made it round such an insane course! It was a great experience and look forward to doing more of these sportives in the future.

The Cornwall Tor Sportive

Well the day has come to do our first sportive, we did a short ride yesterday and it was a lovely hot day. Adie is just back from Spain so this weather is suiting him, but it's a bit hot for me. The sportive was very well organised and Kilo to Go had sent out all the registration equipment and timer tags the previous week, so it was just a matter of turn up and go. I was amazed at how many people were there and such a friendly atmosphere. It was quite cool in the morning so I had worn some sleeves which I could remove if it got hot later, a great buy if you're trying not to carry too much gear. It wasn't far before we hit the first hill and Adie's hill training came into play again, before long he was disappearing into the distance. My plan had been to conserve energy at the start to make sure that I had enough to finish the course. We had one main objective in this ride and that was to finish in front of an old colleague. This was the toughest ride I have ever done, it was just hill after hill, running along the North Cornwall Coast, but I was determined to climb every one of them, including Millook, a 30% hill. I finished in 6hrs 12 minutes, roll on the new bike, which should be waiting for me when I get home. Adie finished 45 minutes in front of me, I really must start to do these tempo rides and hill repeats!!

First 100 miles

We were both progressing really well by now and were both getting up to an 80 mile ride, so a few weeks before the Cornwall Tor we decided to meet up and try to do a 100 miler(I am in Cornwall, George is in Wilts). It was a glorious day and the route was pretty tough(they all are in Cornwall). It was a great ride. If it had finished at 85 miles I would have been absolutely fine, but I did hit a bit of a wall at 90 miles and the last 10 I really had to dig deep. But we had done it, our first 100!

First 100 mile ride

I was working in Cornwall a few weeks ago and I met up with Adie for a short training ride. I had taken my Scott Sporster down, as this was the bike I was going to use on the End to End. Well that needed to change, I needed to get myself a bike that will keep up with Adie. I knew I was poor on hills, despite training regularly. However Adie had been following a strict training program which includes hill repeats and he was leaving me standing. So its time to visit my local bike shop and spend some money. We arranged to meet for a longer ride this weekend, my new bike is ordered, but it doesn't look like it will arrive until after the Cornwall Tor Ride. First of all we were planning to do 80 miles, but by the time it got to Saturday this had increased to the first 100 miler. Anyone who has ridden in Cornwall will appreciate that there is nowhere to hide from the hills. We left Looe early and headed out towards Bodmin, there were a few hills on the way, but nothing too treacherous. We climbed out of Bodmin towards Camelford and onto the Atlantic Highway. Wow what a road! We were flying and heading towards Bude where we found a nice little cafe about a mile from Bude. What a welcome stop, at exactly 50 miles. Leaving the cafe we headed towards Launceston and this is where the ride really started to get hard. After a great downhill into Launceston, there was a huge climb out, up to about 900ft and then back down again... and up again... and down again.... 5 times this happened and my rubbish hill climbing was really starting to show. Adie was kind enough to wait at the top for me, but by the end of the 5th climb I was virtually done in. We had to stop for a drink and something to eat. But by the time we hit Liskeard I was feeling much better (many thanks to Soreen). We headed back to Looe using the back road that runs alongside the railway line. By the time we got there I was feeling great and my legs were full of energy once again, we had already done 97 miles but we weren't stopping there, we had a target. So after a few trips up and down Sandplace and up to the Barbican we had done it .... 100 MILES!!!

Tough Ride

I have been training regularly with the club and everything has been going really well, so when the club calender said that there was a longer ride on Sunday, I was raring to go. I woke up looked out the window at the dry frosty day, 1.5C, but at  least it was dry ad sunny. I left the waterproof coat behind, I wasn't going to need that today. About an hour into the ride the heavens opened, the wind picked up and I found myself pedalling into a very wet head wind.  That wasn't too bad, about 50 miles in, winter arrived with a  vengeance, it started to hail so hard it was stinging me through my clothes. By this time I had lost all feeling in my fingers and when I squeezed the handlebars a waterfall came from my gloves, adding to the amount of water running out of my shoes. My brakes decided that it was too wet for them and the hail was piling up on the road, this made the down hills very scary (the blocks had completely worn out). The initial plan was to stop for coffee and cake around about 40 miles in and do 80, but because it was raining, we decided to cut the ride short, missing out on the food stop. I had only taken one flapjack with me which was well and truly used up by the time we had done 60 miles. I considered just pulling up at the side of the road and letting nature have its way with me. I had no energy left my legs felt like I'd torn every muscle and I was carrying 2 stone of water. I crawled home the last few miles in a great deal of pain, poured my clothes into the washing machine and soaked in a hot bath. After a hot bath I found myself sitting on the sofa with a big smile on my face, what a Buzz!! :-)

Spending the pennies

So time to get riding. I had an old mountain bike in the garage that hadn't been ridden for years, so I brushed the dust off it and gave it a go. I found it really uncomfortable and quickly realised that it wasn't going to be much use to me, there must be something better than this. A visit to the local bike shop was needed, and a shiny new Tricross caught my eye. With a discount on last years model and 12mths interest free the deal was done!
My first ride was about 15 miles and I repeated it the next day. By the following evening I was sat on the sofa with a an ice wrap around my knee. Perhaps this was going to be harder than I thought! After a few days I started again. This time I concentrated on getting the bike 'fit' right and made all sorts of adjustments so that I had pain free riding over shorter distances. I then slowly got the distances up to about 20 miles.
When we entered the Cornwall Tor sportive it was three months away and attached to the entry was a suggested training program. The program was based on a long ride at the weekends with two or three shorter rides in the week. The longer rides started at 30 miles and over the weeks built up to 80 miles. The mid week rides consisted of short high pace sessions on rolling roads and separate hill sessions. I followed this program pretty religiously and could feel myself getting stronger week by week. By this time I was hooked, I really was enjoying this new sport!

Well there's no backing out now

Up until now it's just been an idea that we were chatting about down the pub, but today, Adie went and bought himself a bike. It's a shiny new Tricross Sport, so it looks like we are really going to do this. I am hoping to do the ride on my Scott P2 Sportster. We are thinking of doing the End to End over 14 days which seems quite realistic, having read some other blogs on the net. Just to be on the safe side and make sure we are fit enough, we are looking to do the ride in May 2012, but we'll see how the training goes. One of the biggest decisions is whether to camp or to use B&B's, most of the blogs we have read so far are recommending the bed and breakfast option, if only because there's a soft bed and hot bath at the end of a hard days riding and the luggage requirement is lighter. I have joined a local bike club "Behind The Bike Shed" in Andover to help me get fit for the End to End. I am learning a lot about spinning rather than grinding gears, along with the benefits group riding has on the energy required to cover longer distances. Hills are my biggest weakness and I'll need to do lots of work to improve this, it feels like I am in reverse as everyone else goes whizzing past me on the hills. Adie and I have signed up to do the Wiggle Cornwall Tor in April,  this should give us some idea as to our levels of fitness. This will be the first sportive we have ever done, so we have opted to do the 73 mile route, which still covers a lot of hill climbing, including Millook, reputed to be the steepest through road in the country.

With a rapidly approaching 50th birthday looming it was time to do some of those things I'd always been threatening to do before I was too old!
So when George and I had met for a pint one evening and he told me he really wanted to do a LEJOG I didn't hesitate in saying that I would do it with him. I'd actually been thinking of something bigger, but this sounded like a great idea, reasonably achievable and could be a brilliant adventure. And as George said, we would be crossing three countries!
We quickly agreed a few basics, neither of us could take more than two weeks off work, it would be unsupported and would probably include some camping.
All I had to do now was buy a bike and start training!

What were we thinking?

Well like most great ideas, this one was born over a couple of drinks in the pub. Adrian and I were discussing the adventures we would like to undertake before we were too old to complete them. I happened to mention that I had always wanted to ride from John O'Groats to Lands End. Before long we were talking about buying Bivi bags and sleeping at the side of the road and what a great challenge it would be to do such a long ride. Well that was a few months ago now and things have moved on. We both now have new bikes, we've set a date of 26th of August 2011, we've been training hard and this blog is to keep you all informed of the progress we're making with the training and the ride. Along the way we are hoping to raise some funds for the Childrens Hospice South West, so please click on our Just Giving link and help us to help them.