The High Life (in the High Peak)

How amazing is winter riding in the High Peak?

Staying with The Wife, The Husband and The Arthur for the weekend was already going to be a pleasure (think amazing food, an open fire, underfloor heating and a lot of banter) but when we set off for our Sunday ride, which had The Wife hopping up and down with excitement ("you'll love it, it's amazing, there's this bit with this drop and then this other bit with this rocky section and...") we had no idea how gorgeous the next 3 hours of our life would be.

I've ridden in the High Peak a few times. Admittedly mostly at night. But I'd never been here










or seen this











or seen The Boy ride so well before:










I tend to restrict my riding to trail centres in the winter. No longer. I'm moving North.

F

All good

Sometimes it's about riding hard. Elbows in, breathless, screaming muscles, making that climb, adrenaline pumping, stomach rising, no dabbing, nailing that descent. And sometimes, it isn't. Sometimes it's rolling up the leg of your jeans and pootling to the shops for smoothies to have with a loved one. It's all riding. It's all good.

Rain

On Sunday in the Lake District it rained. All night Saturday and all day Sunday. I was doing a 5hr adventure race with a friend (who recently produced The Arthur but is still fit as a fiddle). We set off on the run, feet splashing down the tarmac lane and then mud oozing through the mesh in our trainers as we turned up hill on the muddy bridleway.

Steady, slippery rocks, lethal roots. "This'd be fun to ride", I'd say.

2hrs later we jumped on our bikes and wheeled them over the churned up field before slinging a leg over the saddle and pedalling hard up through the village to try and warm up (pancake in mouth). A strong climb up a gravelling bridleway got the blood flowing and saw was our first experience of the River Cumbria.

All of Cumbria was a river.

Every bridleway had a few inches of white tumbling water frothing over it, rushing down the hillside. Some steeper hills had become waterfalls and it was like night riding, not being able to quite see where the obstacles were. Weight back, heels down, let the bike bump over the invisible rocks. Feel your feet hard back on the pedals, socks full of water. Gorgeous technical, rocky descents, dancing over slimey roots and popping the bike around steep, rutted corners. Through the water.

Shooting hard along a flat bridleway the puddles got deeper and deeper. The description for the checkpoint was 'stream crossing' but how could we know? Everywhere was under water. Ploughing hard through a deep puddle, the ground suddenly sunk away and I was up to my hips, still pedalling, giggling. Sue screaming at me with a big grin on her face. Then 'whoosh'. the bike swept away and I slid off on my side into the water. I watched my bike tyres float up to the surface and get stuck in a bank to our left, caught by the torrent that was coming from the right, down the hillside... the stream! We found our checkpoint and hurried on through to get back before our time limit was up.

Fi

'Tis the season

for night riding. Gotta love a slightly spooky pedal round unfamiliar trails in the dark. Especially when those trails turn into bike and rider swallowing bogs. Nothing quite like a Friday night carrying your bike across a quagmire. Still, justifies the chippy tea doesn't it?

Vikki

The rubbishness of 2009 continues apace with this:

However, before that happened I went here:

...and rode lots of stuff like this:

...with friends like this:

...and finishing up with this:

Despite being confined to the road bike, I'm still enjoying plenty of this:

and have even more of this:

...to look forward to.

New year, please.

j.

Note to self

Errands
Originally uploaded by jumbly

When cycling to the parcel office it is best not to forget a bag or the ride home will involve my jacket having to accommodate more than just my belly.

Vikki

Emily writes:

I'm not usually the miseryguts you'd expect from my last couple of posts. And I'm begun to realize that, just when it's all terrible, and it's raining, and my bike's broken again, and I'm beginning to question why I do this bloody job in the first place - the gods smile on me, and I have a really good week, with blazing sunshine, no mechanical failures, and enough jobs to offset my guilt over how much I spend on cookies every day.

This has been such a week - and two things in particular have really improved my working life, and made me look forward to winter with actual anticipation, rather than dread.

The first is, courtesy of my mate Lawrence, a brand new cafe, slap bang in the middle of town, catering to cyclists, and particularly to couriers. As well as all the usual coffee paraphernalia, Lawrence has a track pump, a toolkit, a workstand, and all sorts of interesting bikes for sale. And, most importantly, he offers a huge discount to working couriers - and doesn't mind me bringing my bike in and standing around making the place look untidy while I try to warm up. And his coffee's really really good - just what I need after a chilly dash into work, and the belated realization that I need to start layering again.

(He's at 74 Leather Lane, EC1, in case you're local, and want to drop in and say hi.)

And the second thing? Waterproof socks!

We've had a couple of days of steady rain this week, but it no longer bothers me in the slightest, because, even though I can hear my feet going "squelch squelch squelch" with every step I take - inside they're as warm and dry and cosy as if I were curled up in bed!

The first day I wore them, I rode around for the whole afternoon with a huge smile on my face. Last winter I was regularly brought close to tears by my soaking wet socks and gloves (horribly painful when the cold wind blows through them), and I cannot tell you what a difference it's going to make to my life - and my feet - being warm and dry. Bring on the winter!

Back in the saddle

My first 'Tuesday Night Club' ride tonight since April. On the way down to meet the guys I was all stiff legs and slow revolutions. My bum was bouncing up and down on the saddle (it's been 5 months since I rode a singlespeed off road). I felt skewed and wrong.

The ride up the hill was fine. Fast, sore, sweat ringing down my face, breathing laboured and heavy. But good.

Once into the singletrack I lost the plot. I couldn't keep the pace. It was so fast flying round the trees, sliding out on the corners and dipping over the rocky drops and into the black shadows beyond them. They fly, those boys.

PC overtook us all on the road between the woods manualling and one hand in the air, pedalling fast and giggling like a child. I laughed until my ribs ached.

Despite the rasping breathe, my 'race cough' and my aching legs I had a great night. Back to normal. Tired Tuesdays, happy Tuesdays, muddy kit on the bathroom floor, half drunk bottles of FGS strewn around the kitchen. Piles of work ignored in favour of a good hard bike ride.

Mojo... welcome back.

Fi

Old dog new tricks.

One of the benefits of living where I do is proximity to that great cathedral of cycling, Manchester Velodrome. I've ridden here before and loved it, so when the chance turns up to grab a place on one of the one-day accreditation courses I don't have to think twice about it. I'm in. And then promptly forget all about it until the week beforehand. No track practise has occurred at all and a rushed reminder session only serves to remind me just how scared I was last time and how steep that banking is. Eek.

Sunday rolls around and a domino rally of disasters leads to the car and the borrowed track bike being left behind and the road bike and I cruising into Manchester at what is really quite an uncivilised hour for a Sunday morning. The mist is lifting and the roads are empty - swooping in and out of the white lines on the A62 is a treat to be savoured but it's bloody cold and bloody dark at 6am and by the time I get to the track and swap Times for Looks my toes are numb and blue and I already have that chill hunger gnawing away. The hire bikes here are not half bad these days and after a few cursory words of introduction we're clipped in, pedalling raggedly and utterly failing to maintain the most basic of warm-up lines.

The shambles fails to sort itself out and we're beckoned down from the boards for stern words and further instruction. Back up, and we manage a few more laps this time before the neat changes disintegrate into a chaos of slowing riders, elastic gaps and wobbling wheels. Down again for more words. Nobody is laughing. There are frowns. And, after being forced off the track for the second time I'm starting to wonder if this will not work for me. Being openly critiqued for efforts to mitigate someone else's mistakes is unpleasant but required learning. These are "old legs" and we would do well to listen. Even though it seems some still can't and our really-quite-handy chain gang disintegrates at the eleventh hour.

Still, we're getting there and the mood has lifted. Encouragement and criticism distributed even-handedly. Bad jokes, better riding. Soon we are reeling off laps of the black, the red, the blue and the fence, we're sweeping (gingerly) up and down the banking and riding in pairs right around the top of the track, nervous chatting interspersed with polite calls of "pace!" and "move up please". It's entrancing how slowly you can actually go around the banking before the heart-stopping squeak and slide of one or other wheels kicks in.

Thankfully I don't have to deal with that because my own personal bugbear turns out to be learning not to put the power down as soon as I have an open track in front of me. It's not 'red mist', as the coach sagely assumes; just the release of riding unimpeded, relief at not having to watch the riders in front, the change in the feel of the air we're flying through that feels thinner, cooler, faster (faster, faster). Well, pink mist, perhaps, but it means I pull an unnecessary and unhelpful gap when I'm at the head of the line and take far, far too long to rejoin the back of it once I've swung off.

I resort to counting pedal strokes; the required pace is 20mph, 20mph on this gear is 90rpm, the maths is easy and soon enough I think I've got the hang of it. Then the rider three places in front slows right up or pulls a gap and I have to start all over again. It has been a while since I've had to apply my brain to learning. I had forgotten it can sometimes be a two-way street. Progress is not always forward, fast or easy and maybe I have been coasting too often. Perhaps I should stop thinking about this and just concentrate on counting the pedal strokes...

After lunch comes exam time. We warm up, getting it halfway to correct and nobody panics when a shout and a clatter behind indicates a minor crash. The same exercises are reeled off and before I've even clipped in I've forgotten them and the order they will come in. Instead, I concentrate on remembering the first and hope the rest will follow by association. It works. We are up there for a while, long enough to become dizzy, long enough to swing through each and every line, make reasonably tidy sine curves up and down the banking, change on every lap and half lap, pair up and take the chain gang's square dance beyond the point of its previous untimely demise to fruition.

Then come flying half laps, not enough, there could never be enough of cruising round with a wary eye on the pace of the group on the other side of the track waiting for the whistle that marks your turn to swing down - no, look and then swing down to the black line leaving the line behind on the blue, momentum increasing as the shorter distance pulls you hard into the curves, breathing, working, concentrating on the sprinter's lane until you come up on the rear of the group you were until moments ago only matching, looking again and then swinging up above them, waiting for the gradient of the banking to draw away the excess speed, dropping onto the back of the line to begin the whole hypnotising sequence again...

At the end of the session we have all passed. Smiles of relief all round and I confess I'm paying only cursory attention to the brief descriptions of derny etiquette, because I'm too busy looking with glee at the form which says I am now accredited to train here and at every other track in Britain and trying to work out where I can slot a weekly SQT session into the calendar in my head. Best buy that overwintering Pista some new tyres, then.

j.

A Series of Unfortunate Events

Emily writes:

It's been a particularly trying week. You know when someone says 'well, at least things can only get better now', and then they proceed to get much much worse? Well, quite.

On Tuesday it rained all day, which was initially horrible (think getting into a cold shower with all your clothes on, then getting out, drying off briefly, then having to get back in, over and over again), and eventually just became miserable. (It was the first time I'd really tested my new Montane 'waterproof', and I'm sorry to report that, since they changed the design, it's about as much use as a paper napkin for keeping the rain out.) All the marble floors in receptions were super-slippery, and I have new cleats that stick out just a little bit more, so I fell over twice - both times in front of lots of people, and the second time skinning both my knees and knocking over a pile of chairs with a big clatter.

And of course, rain means punctures - and Sod's Law means I only ever get a puncture when I have four packages on board, two of them urgent. So, after riding very quickly, yet very carefully across town with a rapidly deflating tube, I got rid of the packages, settled down to fix it, and discovered a hole in my tyre so big I could see daylight through it. (That's the last time I'm buying Gatorskins.)

And then, when I was finally rolling again, I discovered that my padlock had all-of-a-sudden seized up, so my lock was stuck around my waist. It took a gallant chap in a bike shop half an hour, GT85, and lots of fiddling and swearing to free me. (Another bad review: Abus locks are brilliant security-wise, but they don't stand up to rain - this is the second one I've got through this year.)

I got home, discovered that my 4-month-old SIDIs already have a hole in them (bother!), hung up my wet kit (most of it would still be damp the next day), and woke up the next morning to discover just what a stupid idea it is to lock your bike up with a lock you know to be on its way out.

I had given myself two blisters on my right index finger before I reluctantly admitted that there was no way I was going to get the key to turn, apologized to my controller, and spent the rest of the morning desperately chasing bike shops, firemen, and anyone else who might be able to cut the lock off, and fielding calls from the office, who kept saying that it was the busiest day of the year, and why wasn't I working?

Eventually someone with boltcutters agreed to come round that evening, a friend lent me a bike so I could work the rest of the day, and I wobbled off uneasily, having not ridden with a freewheel for the best part of three years. The first hour was absolutely terrifying - habitual fixie-riders will know that sliding-around-all-over-the-place feeling you get when going back to gears and, given the run of bad luck I appeared to be having, I was frightened that I'd end up crashing and writing off my friend's bike.

But after a while, things started to look up - once I got used to not being able to trackstand or leg-brake, once I worked out what do do with my legs when descending, once I got over how counter-intuitive it feels to be controlling the bike with your hands rather than your legs, once I remembered that you can change gear to make you faster (and realized that doing so made me quite a bit faster), once the cold sweat of fear subsided, I realized that riding a 'normal' bike is actually quite fun.

Eventually, I stopped in St James's Square for a well deserved rest, sat back, got out a sandwich, and told myself that things were finally starting to look up. It was then that I felt a sharp pain in my ankle, looked down, and saw a horsefly...

Marbles

I've been back on the bike. In the best way possible. Great friend, check. Newly fettled bike running beautifully, check. Perfect dry trails, check. Perfect sunset with suitably picturesque silhouettes, check and double check.

I snuck in a ride in the High Peak on Tuesday night whilst Op North with work. Fab. The Husband (hers, not mine) put the tea on and conversed with The Arthur (5 months old, budding adventure racer) while The Wife (his not mine) and I ragged around the local trails.

I was really nervous after my 4 week sabbatical, but the spin classes I've been sneaking in meant fitness was reasonable and The Wife is an adventurous and technically charismatic rider so the route was varied and challenging.

I breathed in the evening air and the darkness and felt that old bubble of excitement as the lights start picking up deep shadows on the far side of mystery drops. Sun down, moon up, MOOD up. Flying.

I found rattling down the broken Peak pathways a bit battering but that's just time off the bike. I also found the marbles on one particular descent rather difficult to brake on and rode full pelt into a gate. It was closed. We'll skip over that (although I won't be doing much skipping in a while).

Anyway let's raise our glasses... night riding is HERE!

Fi

long days.

Up at 6.30am to ride cross bikes before the day begins. Catch the sunrise and blue sky before the lifting fog smudges it grey again. A quick one-two with the time concertina as things fall magically into place and off to Manchester for a track session. Monstrously painful fun and so absorbing I forget to save anything for the ride home with Trio, which turns out to be a long one, skies turning chillier with every mile that passes, endless back alleyways and secret trails on a bike that ought to fit but doesn't, really, making everything sore and doubly tired.

Part ways and the slog goes solo, quiet and with purpose, just want to be home but there are miles and miles still to go. Head down, get on with it.

The hill out of Bacup is significantly easier than it looks but still, I'm crawling. Legs grumbling, tummy aching with emptiness after riding straight past lunch and tea.

Pause in the layby at the top. Adjust bag, jersey, jacket for four mile descent. Tug, wriggle, zip. Couple in the car aren't paying me, or the view, any attention at all. Cows stare rudely from the verge and my knees hurt like hell. Weary sigh. Clip in, push off, shrug the bag, roll past the car into the empty road and -

Chips.

They're. Eating. Chips.

They're sitting in there eating chips with the window open just far enough to let the crossswind grab a hefty waft of salt and vinegar fumes and drag it under my twitching nose setting every sense a-tingle. It smells so good I'm already half-turning the bars to swing round and back to the layby before common decency kicks in and reminds me that they are quite likely to think I'm a murdering two-wheeled psychopath rather than a half-starved rider who just wants to mug them for their tea and it really is only ten miles to the chip shop. And at least half of that's downhill.

Just ten miles.

Ha.

j.

long weekends.

Life has somewhat sucked of late. Disappointed by my inability to say no to fixing other people's problems, let down by people full of promises that turned out to be lies.

Time to make things better. Kielder was a beginning. I haven't ridden a century, on the road or off it, for, er... Well, 'a while'. Finishing in second and in a good time was a big, confidence boosting surprise when I wasn't even sure I would finish at all. Cracking event, flawlessly organised and I'm proud to have been part of the new chapter, but the racing thing still just doesn't excite me. Hard to keep your head down and concentrate on the job in hand when you know that trail disappearing off to the left might go somewhere more fun than this.

Then a concerted effort to commit to a proper working week. Fifty hours may fill the coffers but when it's scattered in a hairbrained fashion over seven days it drags and drags and drags. One or two transgressions of switching daytime rides for evening typing when the lure of sunshine got too strong but the regular Thursday night ride was appreciably more enjoyable for having worked harder to get there.

And then a proper weekend off, doing what I wanted to because it was what I wanted to do. Inadvertently left the phone devoid of charge and whilst that was inconvenient it was also a blessing. No texts, no tweets, just riding bikes in the sunshine, celebrating a birthday and the coming together of the crowd, ride-carry-ride-carry through stunning Welsh greenness, digging into epic climbs, falling into bogs, running out of food and water, infuriating the guide, confounding the walkers, smiling and laughing with a group of friends who are a comfortable and unobtrusive presence in my life. Fish and chips and champagne on the beach, bikes lined up and shining, toes in the sand, smiling and laughing, finally feeling warm again after a long, cold summer.

No pictures, the camera's still broken, but I'm working my way down the list.

j.

I've been inexcusably remiss where this blog is concerned over the past few months. The trouble is, cycling is really the least reader-friendly part of my job. Those moments where I'm storming along Clerkenwell Road with the wind in my hair and the sun in my eyes may be indescribably exhilarating, my pinnacle of mental and physical wellbeing, the whole reason I do it, etc., but they really don't make for very interesting posts.

What's far more entertaining is the age-old courier lore of 'stupid things I have done on, near, or involving my bike'. Glance through any courier forum, and you're bound to find whole threads of various laughable and hair-raising anecdotes. And without further ado, here's my latest...

I spent the night at a friend's, and when I left for work the next morning he was already long gone, so I let myself out. He lives in the ground floor of a house, and so has two front doors - the main one, that opens onto the street, and his own personal one, that leads into his flat. In between the doors there's a tiny porch area, about a metre square - just big enough for my friend's two doors, and the one that leads to the upstairs flat.

This in-between area is exactly the right size to contain a half-awake courier and an upended bike - as I discovered that morning, when I left the flat, closed the first door behind me, and immediately realized that I was trapped, since the second door only opens inwards, and with my bike there, didn't have room to do so. And I didn't have a key to get back into the flat.

I spent a good ten minutes thinking 'this is ridiculous - don't panic - there's bound to be some way out', and twisting my bike into various positions to try and give the door enough room to open. And when I realized that it really wasn't going to happen, and that I was probably trapped in this confined space (smaller than any of the lifts I usually spend half my time in) until my friend (or the people from the upstairs flat) came home from work to rescue me, I spent another ten minutes imagining all the worst-case scenarios - not least the likely results of the pot of coffee I'd just had with my breakfast.

And I was on the verge of calling my controller, to admit my folly, and explain that I wouldn't be in work today, because I was trapped in Camberwell between two doors, when I realized (oh miracle!) that someone almost as absent-minded as me had left the door to the upstairs flat unlocked.

So all was well. I (guiltily) pushed open the door, shuffled my bike aside, finally got the front door opened, and was free! Goodness knows what I'd have done if that door hadn't been unlocked. (And this is the first time I've admitted to my stupidity.)

Emily

Work rest and play

So the new job has already grabbed my life with both hands and shaken it by the neck with a death grip. And I'm loving it... For 5 years it's been up, tea, paper, bit of work, paper, bike... and now its up, OFFICE and thinking and planning and wanting to take over the world...

I still daydream at the computer about what my next adventure is and of course am running to work and back quite a bit; plus spin classes snuck in between lectures at the uni gym. Naturally my top filing cabinet drawer is full of bike kit, gym kit, For Goodness Shakes! recovery drinks and spare knickers.

Sport is a life long love affair.

I'm enjoying the new balance and soon my beautiful mountain bikes will be dusted off from their stable and taken for a gallop. But I'm in no rush and enjoying the rest.

Fi

Cake or Kielder

Cake.

I'm not going to race this weekend. Cycling is a hobby - an integral, enjoyable, beautiful part of 'me' but still a hobby. Nothing more. I don't owe it anything and it doesn't owe me anything. We have a mutually agreeable relationship.

At at the moment we aren't speaking.

So I'm going to spend the weekend with my other friends. Running and climbing. Cycling will get over it.

Does anyone want my Kielder number?

F

Right, that's it.

When I get home tomorrow, I'm rebuilding myself a singlespeed.

Not fussy about which one of the three it is, it's just been too long.

That is all.

j.

Some advice please

Fi writes:

Next weekend is the Kielder 100 - the UK's first 100 mile, one loop mtb race. I entered a long time ago and it seems to be right up my street.

But, I've lost my mojo. I'm tired and disheartened after the Trans Wales. I've been away from my home in Bristol all summer and the thought of driving all the way to Kielder on Friday (6hrs) is unappealing.

So, tell me, what shall I do? Shall I be Part Of It and sacrifice a few hours in a car for my sport, all shall I ignore it, find a hill, go running, paint the spare room and bake a cake?

Sigh.

Transwales 09. Dung and Dusted.

Fi writes:

Back is a funny place to be. I haven't been at home, feet up on the sofa on a Sunday night, cup of tea in hand, for many many months. I am home.

Months of PhD research up north, weekends travelling the country visiting The Boy, family, riding bikes, carting kayaks and shifting kit up, down, this way, that way... then home last week, pack, Builth Wells, Trans Wales, mud, sunshine, coffee, cider, home. Bosh.

The washing is in, the post opened, 3 mince pies defrosted for tea because I had no food in and missed Sunday supermarket times. Now time to think.

This year's Trans Wales was Very Different. It was smaller, more intimate, less wet, less hard. It was, in fact, fairly tame. We were eased in with heaps of road and fire road and only at the back end of the week got hit by the Mid Wales bog-stick full on. But this time it was wiggly singletrack, giggling and spluttering across the moors, rideable and fun. I walked maybe 15 minutes of the whole week. Last year? 15 hours.

Last year it was home, dump kit, crawl into bed, sob, shiver, sleep. This year it was open a map, decide on a nice hill to walk up, navigate around said hill, return to Builth for lunch, drive home, wash kit, relax.

It was my fourth Trans Event. I have done 3 Trans Wales' and the Trans Rockies. That makes me unadventurous, so I probably won't do another one. But should you?

Do you love riding your bike and love the idea of munching big miles? Do you like the idea of being fed for a week and sitting around in a marquee surrounded by Welsh mountains chatting to fun folk? Do you like sleeping under canvass and waking up early to the smell of dew and the roar of a generator which you know has produced your morning coffee and porridge. If this is you and you want the challenge of riding for 7 days then go with it.

[Don't go if you want 7 days of singletrack, 7 days of uninterupted sunshine, a comfortable bed, a navigational challenge and a journey from one side of the country to another].

I return with another smile on my face from another great week, better organised and better supported than ever before (sponsored this time by Gore Bike Wear who were utterly fantastic). Riding-wise it wasn't my finest moment, with a summer of missed mad-fast Tuesday Night Rides denting my speed, but it was possibly the finest moment of team mate Mikey T, who overcame a year of injury to storm ahead and carry us onto the podium. The boy is Rapid.

I might not be back but if you haven't experienced Trans Wales, you should. It's a home grown endurance event which has attracted massive attention world wide. Go support it.

Trans Wales

Rumour has it the weather is going to be good for this year's Trans Wales.

Pah! No way. Last year was all knee-deep mud, wind that lifted your tent off the floor (while you were in it), horizontal rain and gritty chamois.

I'd done it before and went prepared in 2008. But THIS time there will be nothing making me miserable. I have waterproof EVERYTHING - shorts, tops, shoes, jackets. I have packed wellies, 2 waterproof coats (one a ski jacket), a down jacket, bin bags for manky kit. And all my clothes are in dry bags inside my kit bag. I mean come on, it's Wales!

I have allowed myself to sneak in a clothes line and some pegs though, just in case the sun comes out!

I am really excited. This afternoon I'll pick up my friend Matt Carr (Trek 69ers) and we'll drive to Builth Wells where we'll faff, register, faff some more, get really excited, go to the pub and then not sleep in preparation for the first of 7 hard days in the saddle.

It is a race, but fulfills my race criteria fully. I used to be a full on race head. Recently. I am very competitive and love pushing and pushing and riding hard. But I reached the point where races had to have a favourable FUN/PAIN ratio for me to be prepared to cart my self and my life to it for the weekend.

At the Trans Wales the pain is there, for sure (I was in bed for a week after last year's efforts) but the fun is bigger, stronger, more obnoxious and unwavering. There are so few points when you think 'why do I do this to myself?' that all is left is happy memories, tired legs and lots of new friends.

Something for the weekend

One full week back at work after two full weeks of Alpine downhills.

The Portes du Soleil was amazing, always is.
I fell in love with the mountains all over again.
Good times with good friends.
Banter with the same lifties who always remember us.
Mutzig and gin.
Blood, sweat and tears (no gears, I broke those).
I even managed to ride 50% of Champery WC track (beats the 20% from 2 years ago...).
Then back to reality and back to work, back to wishing life really was that simple.

But it's going to be sunny this weekend. That's something.

Have fun.

SJ. x

ride

Sometimes bike testing is hard work but this is the last ride of the day, the last of the test, nearly time to untether my own bikes again but this is still a job.

Winch up Jack Bridge. Tired. Bored. Meant to turn right for a quick hit but go left and longer, up into the low sun. So low it's setting and over the hill I end up unearthing kit to fix the pinch flat. One tube, no patches, and a few rocky miles to go.

Um.

I could head home down the road. It would be wiser.

I should.

I don't.

Cruising down the hill there's a barn owl hunting over the heather and a stoat flows across the tarmac ahead. Two neat black ears poke up from behind the wall: hare. The sun is going, going, gone in a burning disc of pink and a fast clear run at Whirlaw clears the gnadgery bit for the second time today.

(all the while thinking without thinking, don't flat don't flat don't flat, don't pay it too much or too little attention, don't flat don't flat don't flat)

Lights on in the houses, yellow without warmth. Sky turning blue again. Everyone's indoors and resting, dogs dads kids and a fat line of geese flies down the valley at eye height from the second turn of Rodwell, melting into the gloom. The bridges in the water are perfect balls of brick, the canal cats are out for mice and the smoke from the stoves of the narrow boats rises like it's on a string.

The locks are overflowing, Stubbings is noise and street light. Chip shop's shut and the key's in the door like it belongs. The thinking stopped some time ago. No flat.

j.

Last down of the day

last down of the day
Originally uploaded by Good Hank

Final descent of the day down into Hope in the Dark Peak. My first mountain bike ride in an absolute age and what a cracker it was. A fab day out with friends old and new, a right mish-mash of bikes from fully rigid and fixed to suspension and gears, a good cross section of ability and fitness, all brought together by a shared desire to get out in the sunshine, enjoy the scenery and eat cake.

Vikki

24 hours but not as we know it

Fi writes:

I was disappointed to miss the 24\12 this weekend. In my view it is the best 24 hour mtb race in the country and I am delighted the field has grown in depth since last year. The course is always fast and fun and the atmosphere fabulous.

However, this year I decided to head north to the Cheviot Hills in Northumberland to support my boyfriend Andy in his own 24 hour effort. He was racing the Open 24, a 24 hour adventure race involving mountain biking, trekking, running, kayaking, canyoning and abseilling. Oh, and of course navigation. You collect as many checkpoints as you can in each of the stages, timing each transition according to your route book and trying to gather as many points as possible.

I am out of running-action thanks to a nasty ankle injury back in April, so thought I'd marshal and then drive the boy home. I racked up a 13 hour training week on the bike in prep for the Trans Wales and was dead tired as I scraped myself out the tent on Saturday morning for the marshals briefing, (leaving Andy to repack his transition box for the nineteenth time and make final preparations to his race pack and scour the maps one last time).

But as I hung around the HQ drinking tea a friend appeared looking lost and sad. "My partner's dropped out. He's got swine flu. I really want to go and race with someone. Do you think any of the marshalls would do it with me?" I laughed and replied, jokingly, "well if you can put up with someone who can't run, I'll come and race with you!" Wry smile, twinkly eyes. Oh dear.

Fastforward an hour and a half and i've swapped my yellow marshall's bib for a numbered red one and I'm lining up with 100 other competitors under the start arch, race pack filled with borrowed food and inappropriate clothing.

Crazy.

So I raced my own 24 hour race this weekend. No laps, no commentary, no pit - just wilderness, tired eyes scouring the map, the satisfying beep of the dibber, the breathless fear after a 20ft jump into a plungepool, giggles as we abseilled down the wall of a castle at 2am, the Farne Islands at dawn, snatched sleep in a campsite laundry room, climbing without a granny ring, evil armppit-high bridleway grass and the ache of my feet as I drank coffee at the finish, under the incredible towering grandeur of Hogwarts (Alnwick Castle).

Then came the prize presentations. I suspected, but did not know for sure, that Andy and Kim had won the mixed pairs. They raced non stop, hard and adrenaline fueled for 23hrs, 59 minutes and 34 seconds. They never said 'it's only worth 5 points so let's not bother'. They raced intelligently and fast. They deserved their win and I had to choke back tears when it was announced. There are 3 races in the series and they have come 2nd in the first 2 (5hrs and 12hrs). This was a well-deserved and hard-fought moment.

Alli and I managed 5th in the mixed pairs thanks to the bike-heavy nature of the event. We had some strategical 'issues' which left us without any point collection for 4 hours (but lots of sleep!)Nevertheless we were both delighted with our result and thoroughly enjoyed being in such a staggeringly beautiful part of the world.

Writers' Block

There's nothing like being nominated as a must-read bike blog (yesterday's Observer) for emptying your mind completely. Happily Jenn was on hand to cover the weekend. Although I can't help noting that she didn't 'fess up to her teeny weep when we realised that Lorraine was going to finish in second place. Blimey, it's usually ME that cries.

Minx

back at it

2412 at the weekend. Raced 12 hour pairs with guest Minx Elaine and had a great deal of fun before, during and after. Good to give the new jerseys an airing, good to go fast, good to get the first race of the year for me done and dusted at last.


Elaine going fast, pic thanks to Kelvin

Bemused by those chewing on the wrong end of the stick, though. Racing is not an excuse to indulge your attention seeking inner self with endless whitterings about new forms of pain; if we only did it to hurt ourselves we'd all be spending our weekends sticking pins in our eyes instead. Efficient, cheap and makes the logisitics of watching the Tour finale between laps much easier. Sod that.

It is, as Trio said, about people. Waiting to cheer in a friend at the end of a full-fat 24 hour solo effort...

(waiting for Lorraine)

Enduring nail-biting suspense waiting for a team mate who may or may not come in ahead of the team chasing hard behind...

(Team Morvelo catch sight of last man in Rob, coming in ahead of 69ers to take 2nd overall)

Coaxing, bolstering and (honestly?) bullying a friend who's lost enthusiasm but you know will feel better for finishing that one last lap...

(Singular Sam struggles to the finish, picture thanks to Kelvin, bullying thanks to me, sorry Sam :-)

Standing around in the rain for an hour to show pride and respect for friends who have worked so damn hard to get onto that podium step...

(Lorraine - 2nd place 24hr solo!)

No, it's not at all about the pain. It's all about the love.

jx.

A Mega Holiday!

Just back from summer hols with Hairyscary, les enfants and their daft Auntie Weezy. Highlights included The Megavalanche in Alpe D'Huez and the British Cross Country Championships at Innerliethen.

Breakfast of cold pizza at 5am without a hangover was a novelty I could have done without, but the family had scoffed the croissants and pains au raisins in the evening, forgetting that the Boulangerie wouldn't be open when I had to leave for the first uplift. Feeling slightly queasy after the pizza, consumed whilst being driven up the notorious 21 hairpins of the Alpe D'Huez road I made my way to the lift station.

Taking a 70 man telepherique full of great big downhill blokes complete with full face helmets, body armour and bikes was pretty daunting. We were marshalled by the lift operator to stand on the platform to await the lift in ranks of 10 or so, helmets on, facing each other, holding our bikes upright in front of us on their rear wheels. We waited like this, in trepidatious silence, wide eyed with anxiety, for the telepherique to settle into it's docking place. You hear stories from history of how young boys got swept up in parades of soldiers and ended up going to war with the big boys by accident. As the only female getting on this particular lift, I could imagine how that might have felt as I stood in line, dwarfed by them all. “Ahem! excuse me, I need to get off, I think there's been some mistake...”

For those of you who don't know, The Megavalanche starts at 3300 metres on Pic Blanc and descends via the Sarrennes Glacier (a black ski run) around Alpe D'Huez town and down to Allemont, at 720 metres, 37 km away. A doddle...

Most people try to go for a lighter medium travel bike; reason being that there are quite long sections that are level and pedally, quite alien to some of the downhill crew who would be entering. However, as I'm usually a jeygirl XC rider, I had chosen my biggest bike, a Santa Cruz Bullit, fitted with dual ply tyres and downhill inner tubes to protect from punctures on the sharp rocky sections. Rather jammily, I had a 'Gravity Dropper' (bought super cheap from the local buy-try-sell on geezer) this would optimise my position depending on whether I was on techy or pedally sections without having to stop and faff with my seatpost quick release. The Bullit wouldn't soak up the rough stuff as well as the 10inch travel bikes that some might be riding, but I hoped it would give me an advantage on the short sharp climbs and the almost level, undulating singletrack around the back of Alpe D'Huez town.

Speeding uncontrollably down a black ski run is somewhat disconcerting at the best of times. Take away your skis and replace them with a bike, and you have a recipe for potential disaster. Add in a mass start of nearly 60 'ladies' whooping and hollering and trying to maintain some kind of control over their metal mounts, and the result is quite bowel loosening. The men start in waves of 400 at a time (usually over 2000 of them in total) so I got off lightly really.

So gripped by the alien experience of riding a bike on steep snow and ice, I had a poor start and found myself amongst the back of the pack. Onward to terra firmish, I got into my stride on the loose but rocky stuff. Passing several women who were more unnerved by the rocky trails than the snow, I started to make up a good few places.

Close to Alpe D'Huez, a moderate climb on a landrover track was lined with spectators. Many riders push up this climb so I was cheered with many an "Allez! Allez! Go now!!" which helped me dig in deep. The road time trialling I've started doing with the local club and my cross country experience helped a lot on the flatter and uphill sections and I passed more riders who had gone for the heavier bikes for advantage on the downhills. It's difficult to pass riders once the trail gets onto singletrack and points down, so it was of more benefit to be able to power up and along.

Picking off another few riders steadily, I came to a long descending traverse across an alpine meadow where the vicious braking bumps began to tire my forearms out badly. I tried to shake out the arm pump as I came into the wooded section down into the valley and started to get into the flow of the tight, dusty and rooty switchbacks. Constantly on the brakes I went from single-finger braking, to two-finger braking, to whole-hand-grip-of-death-please-start-slowing-me-down-sometime-soon! braking. Coming up behind another, slower rider who was walking in this section I had a good close look and taste of one of the huge drifts of dust that were masquerading as berms as I had to brake on the apex of a switchback. First crash, last third of the course, nothing damaged on self or bike, I was lucky. So picked myself up, passed her and got back up to speed.

The lower part of the course emerges at a steel pedestrian bridge at the end of which I could see spectators cheering. My kids were there with my sister, yelling "go mummy!!" which brought a smile and a surge of power for the home sprint.I was delighted to find that I'd managed to make 26th place in the ladies' race overall, 8th woman in the 30+ category and 9th British rider. Angela Proctor was first lady Brit home in 8th place overall, one place better than her ride last year. The winning female rider was the incomparable Anne Caroline Chausson, 12 times Downhill World Cup winner and Olympic BMX rider.

Retuning to Blighty, as a cherry on the cake, I managed to cope with the drastic change from 7 inches to 2 and a half and from sunshine and dust to mud and roots to gain a silver medal in ladies Veteran category at the British Champs at Inners on my way home. Benefitting from being on almost home soil, and having ridden some of the course before during my first foray into downhill racing (yes, they used some downhill trail for the XC course! The cheeky people) I was amongst several Scottish riders who had an advantage on the day. Anne Murray, based in Inverness put in a storming performance on the stiff climbing and hairy descending course and took the gold in our category. Some holiday! When can I go back to work for a rest? :)

Jojo x

More fun in Morzine

Fi writes:

I have just returned from a week spent riding the Alps in preparation for the Trans Wales in August. I thought ‘perfect… 7 consecutive days of big mountain riding’. Should be spot on. Well, on the first morning when we saw the hundreds of downhillers with there eleventy-million inch travel forks and their full-everything padding I suddenly felt strangely apprehensive; what with my 22lb carbon-forked Kona Hei Hei and light-as-a-gnat’s-handbag helmet. And indeed, as we hurtled flat out down our first run (a ‘blue’ so easy…), narrowly missing two 4ft gap jumps, I was a little concerned I had bitten off more than I could chew. I didn’t read any trail guides before I went, but imagined meadows and cows and rolling rocky trails and lots of climbing.

There were cows complete with bells, and meadows, but the climbing seemed to all be done sat on your arse on a ski lift and the descending battered your body and your bike to the point we considered roasting marshmallows on our rotors. So at the end of day 1, over a beer, a plate of stinky French cheese and the Tour highlights, we scoured the map for some more ‘us’ trails. And the first 100km up and down day was devised, taking us over to the Col de Cou.

As the week proceeded our confidence grew and we tackled a lot of the descents (even a black, with an amusing ‘don’t make me’ interlude on a vertical mud slope half way down) and managed to find some serious Wales-style climbs – all big rocks, gushing streams and grunty granny-ring efforts. Perfect. More 6hr days followed and that feeling of earning the descent came back. (Mind you, our lift passes got some serious use…)

Thankfully the last day it rained so hard that we packed the bikes up into our slightly-too-small-to-take-a-bike boxes and headed for the pub to watch Wiggo rule the Tour and laugh at the new arrivals (too keen to say no) returning from the mountains with the cold look of sheer terror written on their mud spattered faces. Ha!

Having had a few days off to recover from the trip I’m back on the bike, picking up the mileage each day and creeping towards 16-18hour weeks in preparation for Trans Mudfest. I feel fit but disappointingly EVERYTHING still hurts, probably thanks to the 6 crashes I had out in the Alps. I currently can’t raise my left arm above chest height, have a broken-bone feeling in my already damaged ankle; I have skin on my calves like a scoured leather writing desk and a strange feeling that my pelvis isn’t quite where it should be.

I love our sport.

Trans Portugal Adventures – A Little Scene Setting...

[Ed. note: apologies for lack of pictures, brain too melted to figure out the links - but damn fine set of accompanying images are viewable here, courtesy of Chris, who also took on the potatoes of Portugal and won...]

The Riders

Having re-read what I’ve already written, I’ve realised I’ve not really set much of a scene. The other riders are such a big part of a race like the Trans Portugal and were really important to me each day. So I’ll create a bit of an interlude by describing some of the other riders.

As well as structuring my riding by when and what I would eat, by day 3 I had figured out that I could tell how well I was riding or feeling by when some of the other riders passed me. As one of the female riders, I was set of up to an hour ahead of the young (under 35) male riders. In between that time, male riders in different age bands would be set off with the oldest being set off closest to my start time.

I was always set off with Shanti and Manuela. I cottoned on pretty quick that Manuela was going to be super quick. Even before we started riding, she had the look of a very quick rider (maybe it was her Merida team kit and bike) and I wasn’t wrong. Every morning she’d stand beside me on the start line and tell me that I was doing really well and that she just knew I’d be able to finish this stage, then as soon as they said go, she’d be off and powering away. I tried to keep up with her but realised very quickly that I just couldn’t ride at that pace for more than an hour. Shanti, and her lovely pink Elsworth, would always slot in between Manuela and I once we started. Despite having a couple of really rough days because of the heat, Shanti always got back onto the start line every morning to try the next stage. I’d generally be able to keep Shanti and Manuela as specks in the distance for the first hour, but after that, I generally wouldn’t see them again unless Shanti was having problems with the heat and had to slow down.

By day 3, I’d realised that Leon and Jan (both of whom were returning for the 2nd or 3rd time to do the race), who were generally set off between 10 and 20 minutes after me, should catch me within 45 minutes to an hour depending on how flat the terrain was up to that point. I’d know they were approaching by the ting of Leon’s bell, so I’d reply with a ting of my bell and make sure that there was space for them to pass. Despite being around 20 years older than me, these guys were strong and fast! Leon had broken his collar bone on day 7 last year, so was determined to finish the race this year.

Then I’d be on my own for a little bit, until about an hour and 20 minutes in when it would start to get busy. Generally I’d hear the whoosh of the 2 lead riders approaching, Frans, the young Belgian who was very studious about his racing, and Joao, the young Portuguese lad who won last year. I’d always get a grin from Joao, but Frans was so “in the zone” I don’t think he even knew anyone other than he and Joao were in the race! Both of these riders amazed us all by just how quickly they were able to finish the stages each day (a sub 4 hour 100k is pretty impressive in my book, but sets a very tough target for next year when the cut offs will be based on those times). Aside from just how quick they were, we were all amazed at just how much food they both shovelled away at dinner each night…a rough estimate would probably be 3 returns to the buffet for each course of dinner and each plate was piled high with food. I knew it was the right thing to eat lots at night, but I just couldn’t come close to matching that amount. A few of us tried one evening, but failed miserably! Joao lost out on his first place because he lost his GPS one day and decided not to go back to find it. This decision cost him dearly and he was penalised by that entire day’s riding being deducted from his mileage and being awarded the longest time possible for the stage. He didn’t seem to mind though and still rode like a demon for the rest of the race. He said he’d only go back next year to win it if his mum would let him.

Frans and Joao were set off last with the youngest group of riders, so by the time they passed me, they’d already passed most of the field. So shortly after they passed me, I’d usually hear Tom Letsinger shout “Hey Jac, how are you doing today?”. Tom is another vetran of the race who rode it on a 3 speed last time but decided to go with an 8 speed this year – he’ d said before the race that if I did it singlespeed he would too, but I wasn’t brave enough. Tom also admitted after day 2 that he sometimes slowed down to talk to me as he passed so that he didn’t have to try to keep up with the fast pack of riders he was with if he feel like it that morning. Since Tom came 9th overall, I’m guessing that after he rested up with me for a few minutes, he must have kept a terrifying pace!

Next, I’d hear a shout of “Good work Jac!” (no matter how fried I was looking and feeling) from Dave the Canadian as he and a pack of very fast, mixed age group of guys flew past. Most days Erik, the soup drinking Canadian, would be amongst that pack and shout some encouragement as he flew by. Erik had really struggled with the heat on days 1 and 2 and had announced that if he lived in Europe he’d be super religious so that he could duck into all the little roadside chapels to get some shade on hot days. He also ran low on energy food so decided to take to take a water bottle of cold soup with him one day. Apparently it worked quite well.

Then things would start to quieten down again for a while. If I was lucky, I’d be able to keep some of the other female riders just in sight. Sandra, who was set off 10 minutes before me in the morning, would usually ride at a similar pace to me, but sometimes I’d manage to catch her and we’d leapfrog eachother for a few hours.

I would usually expect to see the Belgian train after about 2 and a half hours. These were the rest of Frans’ team of riders. Some of them had really struggled with the heat, despite being very strong riders. Sometimes I’d try to jump on the Belgian train and ride with them for a bit – this worked well if we were riding a stage with lots of gates because we’d all work together on the opening and closing the gates (these gates aren’t your usual gates and will get a full mention later on), but most days I couldn’t keep up with their pace, so gradually left them to it as I settled back into my pace.

Shortly after I’d hear the ting of Chris’ bell. Sometimes that was good, other times it wasn’t. If I was feeling bad, riding with a familiar person semed to bring out the worst in me and meant I’d have a good old moan to Chris about how terrible I was feeling, but if I was feeling good, we’d ride together for a while, swap energy gels for flavours we preferred and generally have a bit of a natter. Eventually though, I’d tell Chris to go on and I’d settle back into my own pace.

Some time around then I’d expect Christophe, one of the 2 French riders to catch up with me. I had stopped to help Christophe on day 2 when he ripped his tyre and he was amazed by all the gubbins I brought out of my camelback before I found my tyre boots. Anyway, despite Christophe speaking no English and my French being limited to the very basics, we managed to have a full blown conversation each day as he passed me. I didin’t know what he was saying and I don’t expect he really understood the pidgin French I spoke, but we always grinned and chattered away to each other for a few minutes.

Then I’d hear “Hey Minx Girl!” from Paul and Mack. These two seemed inseparable when they were riding and seemed to work really well together. Paul was always very concerned if I was looking rough and kept apologising for talking me into doing the race and promising me that it isn’t usually as hot. I think he knew that deep down I was secretly enjoying it despite looking like I was about to keel over

Although I was sure that 60 odd riders hadn’t already passed, there were very few riders who passed me after that. Trinidadian Ryan would always catch me at some point and comment on how hot it was. I’d usually pass the Russian riders, although they were set off after me. Because they were really struggling they would often be driven to the first check point so that they could ride a bit of the course. Evgeny admitted to me one morning that he was finding it tough, not only because of the heat and his fitness, but mostly because he couldn’t ride with his specs on, so couldn’t actually see his GPS and usually ended up making up the route as he went along which generally didn’t go well. (After 2 search parties were sent out for him on 2 consecutive days, he was asked to ride with a tracker in his pack so that he could be found if he got lost again.)

What always surprised me was that, although all of these riders were obviously quicker and stronger than I was, they all treated me as an equal. I wasn’t the numpty slow girl, I was a rider just like the rest of them. As far as they were concerned, I was one of them. I think this just emphasised the fact that although the event was pitched as a race, for many of the riders it wasn’t so much a race against eachother as a race against yourself and the elements. Yes, there were a few of the quick blokes who were racing for a podium place or a top 10 place, but the rest of us were just pushing ourselves to see what would happen each day. All of us suffered in some way because of the heat or dehydration and the distances were tough day after day, but we were all in this together, suffering together, and in some bizarre way, enjoying it together. By the end of the 8 days racing, we were all agreed that the race must be some sort of weird communal penance for something we’d all done. We were all chatting quite openly about bottom sores, throwing up at the side of the trail, sore heads because of lack of sleep and dehydration, the bites from unseen bugs. In the same breath though, you’d always hear a comment about how incredible this bit of scenery or that bit of trail was, or about the amount of pave in Portugal (Roman, medieval or modern day, there’s more pave in Portugal than Belgium, but nobody riding it on cross bikes!). We were a hobbling motley crew of funny tan lines, 1,000 yard stares, smiles or grimaces, but we were in this together and we’d make sure nobody was left on the trail in need.

Now that you know a little bit more about who I was riding with (well, for parts of each day), my next instalment on my adventure might start to get a little bit more into context.

More soon….

Jac

x

I rode my bike

Bless me Minx, for I have sinned, it has been nearly seven weeks since I last rode my bicycle. I have my list of excuses, "I've been doing a lot of running" this is partly true. I have been doing some running as I'm entered in the Saunders Lakeland Mountain Marathon, but not so much running that I couldn't find time to ride. "I've been very busy, finishing of my degree," again, true, but not so busy I couldn't find time to ride. The truth is I've just been too lazy and today, spurred on by comments on a friends blog, about not being the woman who became obese through not being able to stand the sight of yourself in cycling shorts, I donned my lycra, dusted off my road bike and went out in the sunshine.

I'd like to wax lyrical about no noticeable lack of bike fitness, how I became one with my bike and cut through the country lanes like a hot knife through butter. That, however, would be about as accurate as your average MP's expenses claim. Oh, God, I'd forgotten how much it can hurt, every turn of the cranks a cruel punishment for my slothful ways. This is the start of a summer of returning to riding fitness, I've done that first ride, I just need to continue to step away from the cakes and onto the bike!

Vikki

Trans Portugal Adventures: Days -1 to 2

My earlier blurble should have prepared you a little bit for the story that’s about to come, but it might be useful to give a bit more background to put the whole thing into some sort of context.

I’ve never done a stage race before, but from what I’d been told, this was a good one to try. There was no slumming it by having to camp or share a gym hall with a thousand other smelly, snoring riders. Instead, the TP organisers arrange 3 or 4 star hotel accommodation for the riders each night, transport all your bags so that they are in your room by the time you get to the hotel, organise evening meals, massage and mechanics. So the comfort stuff was all taken care of. I felt okay about all of that before we left. What I felt less okay about was the actual riding. I wasn’t sure what to expect of the terrain; I was pretty certain the other riders would be gnarly and scary; I wasn’t sure how my body would cope with the sun and heat (given that 20 degrees counts as a baking hot day in these parts); but most of all, I wasn’t sure whether my body, particularly my legs, would do it day after day.

On the technical race side, I knew we had to be self-supporting from the time we left the start point each morning until we got to the finish in the evening (or had to call for help from one of the checkpoints). I also knew that the cut off times were based on the fastest finishing times from last year (I think the sums go like this: fastest finishing time x 1.67 = checkpoint closing time).

I tried not to spend too much time analysing the race before hand because I knew it would just turn me into a bag of nerves (even more so than I usually am before a race), so I just focussed on riding my bike as much as possible and toughening up my bottom so that I wouldn’t get terrible saddle sores. The only real analysis I did was to try to figure out the route. Since we couldn’t get OS maps for Portugal, this meant getting 3 road maps – Portugal north, Portugal centre, Portugal south – and trying to match up some of the place names we’d been given with the tiny specs on the maps. A 3 map ride is usually a biggie, but when the 3 maps cover 1,000km, that’s bigger than the average 3 map ride!

The whole adventure sort of split itself naturally into four parts for me, so I’m going to try to put it down on “paper” that way to try to make some sense of the jumble in my head (yes, even a week after coming home, I’m still trying to sort through all that I experienced!)

Day -1

Edinburgh – Braganca

Quite a few km

Dark Chris and I had an early start to catch the red eye down to the chaos that is terminal 5 to then catch a connection on to Lisbon. That’s a bad start right there. Our flight from Edinburgh was delayed by 45 minutes, which meant it was going to be tight for us to get from T5 to T1 to catch our connection. After a sprint to catch the bus between terminals, we made it just as our fight had started boarding and settled down on the flight in the knowledge that it was very unlikely that all of our luggage would make it.

Surprise, surprise, after waiting in the baggage reclaim area of Lisbon airport for nearly an hour, we gave up and went to report out bikes missing. Luckily, a few other riders had had the same problem, so the guy at the lost luggage told us that Patricia, one of the race officials, was going to be picking up a bunch of other bikes later in the day and would be able to pick up ours which were expected to arrive on the next flight.

There really wasn’t much more we could do, so we went out to meet Patricia, who put us in a taxi and sent us off to Hotel Barcelona in central Lisbon, where all the other riders were meeting up to be collected by the bus taking us all up to Braganca. (I had to take my cardi off when I stepped out of the arrivals hall – it was baking hot, but quite pleasant after a chilly start in Edinburgh).

Most of the riders were already at the hotel by the time we arrived, including Paul West, our friend who had persuaded us to do the race. Paul introduced us to some of the riders he knew, which was great but unfortunately it set me off into panic mode….they were all so experienced! The excited chatter (which I usually try to avoid pre-race) was about how the race went last year and the targets for this year, the other races folks had done over the last few years and the races coming up after this one. There were a lot of experienced riders – Cape Epic, Trans Alp, Trans Rockies, BC Bike Race, Trans Wales, Race Across America, Race Across the West.

What was I thinking – I couldn’t possibly ride with people like this!

Luckily the 8 hour bus trip to Braganca was so hot that most of us dozed off for most of the trip and by the time we arrived in Braganca, we all just checked into the hotel and went straight to bed.

Day 0

Braganca – Braganca

0km

After a strong coffee at breakfast, Dark Chris and I ventured out to the hotel carpark where all the bikes were being unloaded to see if our bikes had turned up. Luckily they were both there and after building them back up, I was pleased to see mine looked to be unscathed. The same couldn’t quite be said for Dark Chris’ – a small crack had appeared in the seat stay, but it was decided that the seatpost would hold it all together, so nothing to worry about.

After bikes were fettled, it was off to register, get GPS’ set up and have the first race briefing. Then we had time for lunch, before another race briefing, followed by a GPS session, then we were all encouraged to go out for a test ride to the first village of the race to make sure we, our bikes and our GPS’ were working.

By this time it was 7pm, so I figured a little pootle would be quite nice in the evening. Unfortunately, it was still around 30 degreed when we venured out of the hotel, so Dark Chris and I just rode along to the first hill after the village and decided to head back (along with a lot of other riders, who were all commenting on how scarily hot it was).

After a quick shower, we all had our first dinner together before the final race briefing where we were given the vital statistics for day 1. These daily statistics proved to be crucial for me each day since they showed the places where we could get water during the day – this turned out to be far more important than I thought!



Day 1

Braganca – Freixo

139km, 3,878m climbing

Cut off 20.33

Because of the handicap system, I was set off at 08.10 in the morning along with the 2 other youngsters (yes, really, I was one of the youngest female riders). The other 2, Manuala Vilaseca and Shanti Tilling, looked pretty capable, so I decided to just let them go and I’d ride on my own. When it was 30 degrees at 08.10 in the morning, I didn’t really have much choice!

I don’t remember very much about day 1. I remember coming across Shanti at the side of the trail some time between check points 1 and 2. She was feeling pretty unwell because of the heat, so had called to be rescued. Since her husband was with her (he had passed me some time earlier and had caught up with her), I plodded on.

Since I was out on my own, I decided I needed to structure my day a little bit…I had set my HRM on when I started, so every hour, I’d have either an energy bar or a gel, every half hour in between, I’d have a sweetie. I also started focusing on how much I was drinking every hour to make sure I was having enough. Unfortunately, this proved to be a problem. By late morning, the temperature was up in the high 30’s, so I’d had to slow right down and it was taking me much longer to reach the water points than expected. So I had to start conserving water.

By mid afternoon, I hadn’t seen another rider, or person for that matter, for hours. I was feeling pretty unwell because I was so hot (I think the thoughts that were going through my head were something like “can a person really be cooked alive?”, “how will they find me if I collapse?” “I’d better just keep plodding until I get to the next checkpoint because they’ll never be able to get down this trail to find me”). I felt pretty bad and was really anxious. Eventually I stopped in a village called To so that I could fill up with water. I sat beside the water fountain and just poured the water over my feet. I just couldn’t get going again. I managed to get along to checkpoint 4, which was at 102km.

Although I was within the time cut off, I was now riding so slowly that I wouldn’t be able to make it to the end, so I decided to call it a day.

So, Jose came and picked me up in the van, along with Nuno, one of the Portugese riders who was struggling in the heat, and drove me to Freixo with the bike in the back of the van.

I arrived in Freixo to find a pretty motley crew of broken riders collapsed around the outside of the sportshall that was being used as race HQ for the evening.

So, on day 1, of the 69 riders, 8 of us didn’t manage to finish because of the heat. That meant that we were awarded the slowest time for the day, but the distance we had covered did count towards our overall placing. The stage winner, Frans Claes, managed to complete the stage in 5hours 35 minutes.

A very downcast Dark Chris met me at the finish and said that his bike was “gubbed”. That crack in the frame had got a lot worse and now went all the way around the seatstay and top tube. It wouldn’t last even the smallest of bumps, so it wasn’t safe to ride. Antonio, race director, and Jose, race mechanic, reckoned they might be able to find a new bike for him to buy, but it wouldn’t be until day 3 unfortunately.

There was just time to get to our very nice accommodation on the outskirts of town, quick wash of kit, eat dinner, check start time for tomorrow, get race briefing with crucial water info, then bed.

Day 2

Freixo – Alafaites

115km, 2,351m climbing

Cut off 18:03

It was a slightly later start for us youngsters on day 2 – we were off at 09.28.

Shanti was still looking pretty wobbly after day 1 and I was already starting to feel like I was cooking, but Manuela (who is from Brasil, by the way) set off as strong as ever. Just like day 1, I decided to let them go and do their own thing, but I managed to hang on to them until the bottom of the first climb, where chain suck meant I had to stop and fettle with my chain to get it sorted and ended up having to push the sort sharp climb. Luckliy I managed to catch sight of them again and was starting to close the gap a little bit (I even saw one of the girls who was set off in an earlier bunch than us!), but I managed to misread my GPS and rode off on a parallel track for 10 minutes and ended up at a dead end with a 10ft drop to shimmy down to get back to the right track – don’t tut too loudly, the GPS didn’t show 2 tracks, so I followed the one with the most bike tracks on it, but obviously I backed the wrong horse!

Not to be beaten, I dusted myself down, picked the thorns out of my bottom and got back on the bike. Luckily, the climb wasn’t too long before it reached a fantastic mountain road which snaked up and down for a few k (I almost wished I had a road bike!). The road then turned into a dirt track which then petered out into a bit of wide singletrack, then it started dropping down into a gorge. The track turned into pretty jiggy cobbled / rocky / exposed descent that was just like the stuff I love in Spain, so I giggled all the way down – passing the race photographer along the way as he shouted “Be careful. Very Dangerous”. To which I think I replied “Can we have more of this please?”

I managed to make some pretty good time down that section (I later found out that I was one of only a few riders who rode it) and managed to catch sight of some of the other girls again. A bit of a push back out the other side of the gorge spat us out onto another mountain road which wound its way down to the Douro river (the natural border between Spain and Portugal).

From the river, we then had a 27km climb through olive groves which then turned into scrub land and then into desert. I was passed by the race leaders and the quick guys part way up this climb, but then the heat started to take it’s toll again. By the time I reached the desert, I was pretty much out of water. I managed to spill half of my reserve water in my panic, so I was running pretty much on empty. Again the temperatures were up in the high 30’s and my body was starting to bake. Just as the climb started to level out, we crossed a stream, so I laid my bike down on the other side and had a wee bit of a paddle to try to keep cool. Luckily, Sidi’s retain water quite well, so I managed to keep my feet cool for a bit.

Erik Bakke, one of the Canadian riders, caught up with me at this point and he was in a pretty bad way. Erik is a strong rider, but he was stopping and lying down at the side of the trail every couple of hundred yards. I managed to keep going until we got to a road and had to shoot off track to find a petrol station to get some water. The nice lady in the petrol station looked pretty concerned when I asked for 3 big bottles of water, but wished me luck when I headed off again. I caught back up with Erik when I got back on the trail and rode with him for a bit, but he decided to stop in the village along with 3 or 4 other riders who were hiding in the shade.

The official water point was a fountain in a village park, so when I reached there, there were more riders hiding in the shade or pouring cold water over their head. I stopped and did the same for a few minutes because I knew there was another big climb coming up.

A big push up to the hill top village of Castelo Rodrigo got me to checkpoint 2 and another welcome fountain, before heading back down the other side of the hill onto the plains below.

This is when the riding changed. I was able to make pretty good time on the plains, and felt I was going okay. I came across lots of riders lying by the side of the trail looking broken. Offers of help and food were generally met with tearful smiles and assurances that they’d be okay and they’d just make it to the next checkpoint.

I was surprised to find that I made it to the next checkpoint in plenty of time (even after stopping to help one of the French riders who’d managed to rip his tyre….emptying my entire camelback on the trail brought giggles from all the male riders who’d stopped to help, but none of them had jelly babies and tyre boots!).

The next section of plain was very, very, very hot with very little shade, so again I started to slow down. I had managed to get to around 90k with about an hour to go and tried desperately to pick up my pace so that I would make it. But then, another incident of chain suck saw my chain get completely tangled in my chain rings, so I had to pull over, break my chain, unstuck it and fix it again. Although this didn’t take a huge amount of time, I felt like it ate up so much time. Just after I got going again, all that water I’d been drinking was suddenly too much and I had to find some bushes (I later found out that when women do Iron Man races, they just wee on the go, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it). This all cost me too much time and a tiny spec started to appear in the distance and slowly catch up…the sweeper. We rode together to the final checkpoint at 102k, and I then jumped in the van with Jose again whilst Rui the sweeper went off in search of Evgeny, the missing Russian rider whom I’d passed at checkpoint 3, but hadn’t been seen since.

So, although day 2 was much more optimistic, I still didn’t manage to finish and felt pretty down by the time I got back to the hotel at the end of the day. Luckily, Jose the mechanic, took my bike to try to sort out the chain suck and Cassie, one of the masseuses, gave my legs a good pummelling, so I went to bed feeling slightly more optimistic about what day 3 had in store. Oh, and Dark Chris’ new bike turned up, so he was a bit cheerier too.

I was also reassured to find that 20 other riders hadn’t been able to complete the day’s stage either – mostly because of the heat, but again the distance I had covered counted towards my overall position. Oh, and I still wasn’t DFL!

Jac.

To be continued...

High noon.

Tour Divide starts tomorrow. Can't help but feel a little like I want to be there; it does get under your skin.

Time moves on.

Pedal!!!!!



http://tourdivide.org/
http://greatdividerace.com/

j.

Tee Pee Day Three

Well, our intrepid adventurers should by now have completed day three of their Trans Portugal experience. Occasional text updates from Jac reveal that they had a tough time of it on days one and two. Chris's frame broke on day one but thankfully managed to source a new steed so is back in the running. Jac struggled with heatstroke on day one and like many other riders was forced to abandon the stage after 110km but, showing the mettle we expect, she still lined up for more on day two. How does climbing cobbles in temperatures of up to 40 degrees, wrong turns that lead to a "shimmy down a cliff" and a course described as "undulating" (uh-oh...) sound to you? Yes, you can stop moaning that the office doesn't have air conditioning now. Take a leaf out of the Supertravissia book and "endureça a foda acima"... or TTFU, to use the more common racer parlance. Well done Jac, keep it up. You are doing the jersey proud :-)

Updates available on Sleepmonsters for the rest of the week. I'm off for a needed holiday...

j.