Surrey Hills

Having conquered Shap, I was inspired to do some more hills. So I set out for another 50 mile trek across the hills near my home.

I actually ended up doing more ascent & descent than I had in the Lake District, but the hills were much smaller!!

The Dreaded Shap

I had offered to help my mum clear out my great aunt's flat in Blackpool on Saturday. Hence I took Friday & Monday off in order to get some miles in while I was up there.

Friday morning was spent at an appointment at the bank (I closed my accounts after 22 years!). Thankfully the lady that saw me handled the situation very well, and quite understood my reasons for moving, so the meeting was less stressful than I had feared.

Then we set off for Blackpool. We made good progress up the M42, but around junction 11 of the M6, things started to slow down a bit. I managed to get off the motorway, and was very soon glad that I had, because they had closed it due to a nasty accident. Everywhere anywhere near the motorway was complete mayhem. Consequently it took us over 7 hours to get there and I did not get time for my planned evening bike ride.

Saturday was spent clearing the flat, then Jules & I headed up to the Lake District so I could see what the infamous Shap was going to be like.

We were only able to get accommodation in a village called Glenridding, and I planned a 50 mile route from there to Shap via Windermere and Kendal and on to Penrith.

I set off at 5:30 so I had a chance to get back to the hotel before they stopped serving breakfast.

What I hadn't really thought through was that I had to go over Kirkstone pass to get from Glenridding to Windermere. This involved a 1000ft climb in 3 miles (Leith hill is about 500ft over the same distance by comparison).

The Garmin came into its own again to get me cross country from Windermere to the A6 just north of Kendal avoiding the main road. Then I started my ascent of Shap.

I have to confess that after Kirkstone pass it was a bit of a disappointment. Admittedly it is a 10 mile uphill climb, but only 700ft, so more gradual than Boxhill. I can see its going to be a bit demoralising, because you think you've hit the top, and it just gets steeper. Then when you do get to the top, there is a sign that says "Shap 2 miles", which makes you think you're still not there, but Shap itself is just a village a couple of miles beyond the summit.

Still - I know what I'm letting myself in for now.....and I'm sure after the 100 or so miles I'll have done before it on the race itself, it will seem much much worse!

Effingham once again

Did my usual plan to ride on Tuesday night, but worked too late. However, this week (feeling tired from working late) I did not go out on Wednesday morning instead, but waited til the evening.

Felt strong...probably after the long ride this weekend. So got all the way to the traffic lights in Effingham and back in just over 50 minutes (16.5 miles).

Quite pleased with myself.

Training ride 3 (Day2) : Chesham

Ciaran, Simon and I set off at 6am on Sunday to meet Paul on the way up to Windsor. Plan was to meet Rich on the normal loop to the west of Windsor. Paul managed to get another puncture in almos exactly the same place as last time we met up there - he really hasn't had much luck recently. Still, at least his cycling shorts weren't foaming: that would be very embarrasing.

We met up with Rich easily enough, and then he took us on a tour of Berkshire & Buckinghamshire ending up near his house in Chesham.

At around 9am, Simon mentioned the idea of a bacon sandwich. How completely unfair. I dont remember much about the rest of the ride, so focussed was I on getting home to have a bacon butty!!!

Ok - I remember some of it. Rich took us over some of his favourite hills. They weren't really what we call hills in Surrey, but they at least kept us warm!! Once we got to Chesham, we turned around and headed home.

Again I am struck with how much I have progressed, because when we arrived at Windsor on the way back I remember thinking "nearly home"; where we still had 25 miles to do. I can't help thinking back to December and our first 22 mile training ride and how far that seemed!!

Anyway, we got home having done almost 90 miles after 6 hours. So that makes almost 200 miles in a weekend; 13 hours in the saddle; and the knowledge that I can actually cycle that far in that time - just need to be able to do it in one day now.

Training ride 3 (Day 1) : Brighton

I didn't get a chance to train again prior to the training ride on Saturday. Actually thats not strictly true - I could have done some training on Friday morning, but decided it would be prudent to conserve my strength for the weekend.

This training ride would not see the full-compliment of riders; Henry was busy in a rowing event, and Tim & John are both injured/ill. Also, Rich could only make Sunday.

However, on Saturday morning the remaining four set of from Guildford for Brighton. The weather was miserable, but the good news was it was miserable everywhere we went. It would have been really disappointing to hear that we had had a ride in a particular area only to find that the weather was much better somewhere else, but it really didn't seem to matter where we went, there was a constant damp demoralising drizzle. I have shamelessly used alliteration there so I can now mention my foaming friend Paul. After a couple of hours in the damp demoralising drizzle, foam flowed from friends cycling shorts!!! None of us could work out why (nor did we really want to think too hard about it), but plenty of theories were put forward. It was a great way to pass the time, and before we knew it we were in a place called Ditchling.

For those of you who have ever cycled the London to Brighton ride, the word "Ditchling" will probably be giving you some bad memories. Ditchling beacon is a hill which cuts Brighton off from the rest of the country. The one time I did London to Brighton, I had to walk a part of Ditchling, and I was actually quite looking forward to seeing if I could get up it after all this training! Ditchling is the third highest peak in the South Downs at 814ft, and the route we took rises 550ft in around 1 mile. It was (surprisingly) easier than I thought it was going to be; Leith Hill is harder....

In Brighton, we took the cycle lanes along the sea-front headed towards Worthing. It has to be said at this point that the cycle lanes are fantastic in Brighton. Unlike the ones in Guildford, the Brighton ones seem to be designed for people that are on bikes. This ought to be a design requirement for all cycle lanes.

Here we were lucky with the weather, as the wind was coming from the East, so we went quite
quickly across to Chichester. Then we turned up the A285 back to Guildford. This required us to go over Duncton Hill in the opposite direction to what we had done previously.

We were travelling a little slower than normal, but still managed nearly 110 miles in 7 hours which is not too bad. My first time properly over 100, and I felt strong afterwards.

Early start again

This is starting to become a habit. Plan to ride Tuesday night. Something comes up at work, end up going out on Wednesday morning. Not helped by the fact that for the last couple of weeks I've had a social on Wednesday evening, hence long days & tiredness!

Managed my Effingham route easily enough, and headed into work nice and early to make sure last nights excitment had settled down. Unfortunately for the first time in ages, South West Trains let me down, so I ended up getting in at 9am just in time for my first meeting.

Tonight I was out with my friend Robin who doesn't seem to be comfortable with the idea of me not drinking very much!!! Good to see him though, and decent food at Browns near Bank station.

Since my posting on the weekend, I've got the details of John & Tims ride. Wow! 150+ miles on Saturday followed by nearly 80 on Sunday. Good effort....especially compared to my 140 mile total for the whole weekend. I haven't read John's blog yet, but I assume he will have mentioned he fell off his bike at Sheffield and hurt his leg. His wheel got caught in tramlines and he ended up travelling in a different direction to his bike. Ouch.

In adding labels for this post, I noticed that I haven't used the "green poo" label a 2nd time yet, so this is a blatent mention just so I have more than one. There really is no reason for adding it here except that I know more people are reading the blog now, so may be tempted to explore a little.

London bound

Today was the London marathon, and Jules had volunteered to help the CHASE support team look after the 50 or so people who were running in support of CHASE. Hence I had the whole day to go out on the bike! (although I had promised to get back by 2pm to do a few things around the house).

Paul & Simon both said they could come along for a while, and we all met up at 7am. Paul had to be home by 10am, so we thought we'd gad about a bit on the hills around Dorking again. We were a little late setting off, and Paul had yet another puncture just outside Guildford. By the time we'd fixed that and got going again, it was 8 o'clock already and we'd only done about 3 miles!!

Simon showed us a less steep route up Ranmore, which was a really nice climb. Then we went down via West Humble towards Boxhill.

Paul & I were much faster up Boxhill this week than last time we did it, and we stopped at the top for a quick snack & a drink. We then took a lovely route off Boxhill, again guided by Simon, and found ourselves at the base of Boxhill where we'd started.

At this point, Paul & I went ahead, and returned up Ranmore the same way we had come down.

At East Horsley, Paul had to head home & I was on my own. My plan was to cycle in towards London. I had a route planned, and was keen to try it out. It went from East Horsley to Cobham, and then past Claygate towards Esher & Kingston. I made good time, but by the time I'd got to Claygate it was pouring with rain. I carried on to Kingston but by then I was soaked & quite cold, and I decided to head back towards Guildford.

It was a good decision, because the storm was travelling west to east and I was soon out of the rain. Back at East Horsley, time was ticking on, so I decided to go home.

Another 70 miler, although a lot slower than yesterdays!!

Back to Windsor

Rich & Paul had planned a long ride for Saturday, so I decided to join them for the first 50 miles or so.

I wanted to be back around 10am, as Jules is helping the CHASE support team at the London Marathon tomorrow, so we wont get to spend much time this weekend otherwise.

Paul wanted to set of at 6am, so I headed out at 5:30 so I could get to his house by then. Finally I get the extra bonus miles before we meet!!

Once there, we quickly set out for Windsor & Rich's infamous 'loop' just to the west. We made pretty good time really, although Paul got another puncture next to Windsor Great Park which lost us a bit of time.

We managed to miss Rich somehow on his loop, but met him back at Fifield just up the road from where Paul had his puncture.

Although we had made good time getting up there, Rich set off at a much faster pace, and before we knew it we were almost back at Woking. Rich had a route in mind, and took us off to Pyrford and then on to East Horsley where I peeled off home, as time was getting on.

By the time I'd got home I'd done almost 70 miles by 10:15 in the morning!

Taxi!

I was out on wednesday night at a work do.....a table-football competition. It was great fun, and I was surprised I stayed awake after my early morning bike-ride. I was drawn on the same team as a colleague of mine, Lindsey, and we did really well thanks to her unnatural ability in goal, and my flukey diagonal shots.

Anyhow, so I was tired on Thursday morning, and indeed Thursday evening, so decided to get an early night & go for a ride Friday morning.

At 3:10am, our front-doorbell rang & a nice man informed us that our taxi had arrived.

Unfortunately we hadn't ordered a taxi, and it took quite some negiation to convince him of this fact.

This meant I slept through my alarm & missed my ride today...

:-(

A new light

After my ride on Sunday, I popped in to Beyond Mountain bikes to buy some more energy drinks & some recovery drink of my own (I got to feeling guilty about taking Ciarans all the time, and in any case his is beyond its sell by date!). While I was there I decided to buy myself a new front light....one that I can see by and not just be seen by.

I had planned to ride/turbo on Tuesday night, but ended up working late, so decided to go out before work on Wednesday. The new light makes a huge difference, and I managed to get all the way to the traffic lights in Effingham & return home within an hour.

I was quite pleased with this ride because once I was out of Guildford, I pretty much only used 2 gears all the way to Effingham and back, AND I was on the big cog at the front. My legs are certainly getting stronger than they were a few weeks ago!

Apologies to the weathermen

I got up at six and looked out of the window. The weathermen had said there would be snow overnight and lots of it, but when I looked there was none. Indeed it was quite mild, and dry outside.

Hence I decided to set off down the A31 to get some more miles in.

At the bottom of the Farnham road on my way up to the Hogs Back, it started to drizzle, and by the top of the hill, it was kind of sleet. I still didn't worry too much, as it seemed way too mild to settle. On the open road, I started pushing a bit harder on the big cog, and the sleet started to hurt my face. 6 miles out of Guildford, I was suddenly surrounded by snow, and it was an inch thick on the ground. Quite bizarre. If I hadn't seen it I would not have believed the sudden change in weather. I figured I'd better head home.

Having walked across the Hogs Back, my cleats had all frozen up with packed snow, and I was busy trying to sort that out when some kind guy stopped and offered me a lift. He was a time-trialler who had also decided today was not the day for cycling. I thanked him for the offer, but decided I was only 6 miles from home, so I'd push on. If you're that guy and you happen to be reading this, THANKS SO MUCH FOR THE OFFER! (I wish I'd taken it).

I pushed pretty hard to get home, and figured that as long as I made it to the top of the Farnham road, I could coast down into Guildford and I'd be fine. I finally made it to the top of the hill and started my free-wheel down. After not very far, and having skidded on a yellow line hidden by snow, I decided I was going too quickly. That was when I realised my brakes had frozen up with packed up snow, so I stopped the bike my skidding my feet on the ground. For a few seconds, I really thought I was not going to stop without falling off.

Anyhow, long story short - here is a picture of me as I returned home....

Back to Chichester

John cycled down from Bishops Stortford to Guildford yesterday afternoon. He did really well, as it's 80+ miles and he was by himself.

He stayed with us on Friday night and then Paul joined us on Saturday so the three of us could cycle to Worthing via Chichester. John only wanted to go to Worthing where he was visiting family. I say "only", but Guildford to Worthing via Chichester is around 50 miles which is quite impressive the morning after an 80 mile bike ride the previous afternoon! Then Paul and I would head home, hopefully ending up between 90-100 miles.


View Larger Map

We set off around 6:45 after a breakfast and juice. We travelled down past CHASE and out towards Godalming then Haslemere. I dont recall cycling south on this road before. There were some great hills!! (although "great" wasn't a word I heard John using!). After 30 miles or so we stopped for 2nd breakfast at Singleton. I must have driven through it many times, but had never realised what a beautiful little village Singleton is.

I had Google'd a route into the Garmin around the back of Goodwood racecourse to avoid having to go through Chichester centre. Once again, I was really pleased with the Garmin under these circumstances. It was not an obvious route, and certainly not one that any of us had done before, but we found our way down to the A27 without incident. Then it was just a case of blasting along the A27 for 20 miles until we hit Worthing. This part of the trip was very quick due to the road being pretty flat.

At Worthing, about 1/2 mile from where we were dropping John off, we noticed Paul had a puncture. So we stopped and changed his tube and said farewell to John.

Paul and I were feeling great. 50 miles already, and we were doing fine. Just outside Worthing, coming up the A24, there is quite a long hill and we realised why we were feeling so good; the wind had been behind us on the way down!! It was tough going, and it took us pretty much the same amount of time to go 40 miles home as it did to go 50 miles down there! Although part of that was due to Paul getting another puncture, and us stopping to pump his tyre up a few times and eventually changing the tube again at Cranleigh.

When we eventually got home, I felt the best I've felt after a ride of that distance. Maybe I'll manage a ride tomorrow, although the weather forecast predicts snow.

Morning Turbo with Mr Sugar

I had originally planned to train last night, but ended up working late again. Also, I was not feeling great, so I got an early night and a good nights sleep so I could get up early this morning to train before work.

Since the clocks changed again, it's too dark in the morning to go out on the road (must buy myself a proper light), so it was back on the turbo. I watched the iPlayer again, and Wednesdays episode of The Apprentice. Very entertaining.

Another 15 miles...

Turbo to Torchwood

Back on the turbo tonight. I watched another episode of Torchwood, which I'm getting quite into now. The first 50 minutes went quite quickly. I then watched the brilliant penguin April fools joke from the BBC.

Got my 15 miles in anyhow....