The "Boss" endorses London to MC crazy riders!

Hi there all - just thought id fire up a quick blog entry from the END POINT of this adventure!!

Being the lone ranger away from the rest of you, I've had to do a few solo runs on the bike - which gets a bit tiresome after a while (prefer to see George smoking a cigar up the hill, or be guest DJ for the team)!!!

However, I'm now training with the local Monaco crew (10 of them) who are doing a ride from St Tropez to Monaco, which is about 130KM. We are doing around 50KM to 75KM 3 x a week now, and soon  we will crack the 100KM mark (with coffee in between), which is effectively Monaco to Cannes and back. It will also simulate the last day or our ride, so ill be good with Nigel (the human GPS), our Garmins, Bespoke Tours Support Vehicles and some local knowledge of where all the good bars are!!!

I've also alerted the "boss" (his royal charmer - Prince Albert of Monaco) of our ride, as he is part of the training crew doing the St Tropez ride, and he has shown full royal support and promises to wave from his castle to us (I explained we were looking for more of a "head of state" type welcome reception, with 21 guns and the whole motorcyle convoy, which he is thinking about ha haaa aaa).

On a serious note he thinks we are completely mad, and I explained we caught a highly infectious disease from this lunatic called Nigel Payne where we do an off the wall thing for charity once a year - he as an adventurer with many expeditions under his belt (North Pole treck for example and was in 4 Olympics as bob sledder) was very humbled and extended his personal thanks etc etc. He isn't quite the Queen of England (can you imagine her coming past on the bike with a helmet!), but he has shown full support and asked what co-operation we needed. I said we were all under control save for our massage therapist which Renata is sorting, and we are ready for next years halloween festivities with George & Bunny supplying all the fancy dresses ;)

Anyway - off to do some work then prepare for saturdays ride, speak soon all and keep up the training, im motivated by you guys and not long to go!!!!

Best matt

Why oh why oh why: Nigel's woes

In 2009 when I first climbed Kilimanjaro, I managed to break my left wrist in training. Would it heal in time? Would I be able to go? Fortunately it did. But only just.

Then, almost defying sense and reason, in 2011 whilst training for the second attempt on Kilimanjaro I managed to break my right wrist in training. Only me yeah? Would it heal in time? Fortunately again, it did. But only just.

And so it is with this challenge. My last cycle was over a week ago now and I cannot at the moment even get on a bike. Just over a week ago I tried an endurance period of 4 days cycling 40 miles each day one after the other and, at the end of the fourth day my knees started to swell up. The left leg is swollen in the picture but the right is just as bad now. Six days later and they are still the same and stubbornly refuse to go down. I'm unable to cycle and they hurt. I've tried physio, anti inflammatory tablets...........you name it and it's been tried. 

Hmmm. So I'm going to rest up totally until Thursday when I'm off to Portugal with Antonio, Ally and Lisa for a few days on a bike. At the moment that thought is a bit of a pipe dream.

Pray to the knee gods people !!

We have a mascot

All good adventures should have a lucky mascot right? 

And so have we - in the form of Matt's wonderful new puppy Rio. Courtesy of the delightful Deborah Davies who arranged for Matt to get Rio. Rio is doing fine and is learning to bark freely every morning to remind Matt to get off his posterior and onto his bike !!

And as if that wasn't enough, Deborah's eldest son is getting married in the next few weeks and instead of gifts, guests are being asked to donate to charity. And some of those donations will be used to enhance our charity cause. Quite amazing to be honest that. 

Rio has also learn't to be cute and if - and only if Matt actually does some cycling then Rio has already learnt to reward his new "Dad" in the appropriate doggy way.

 

  

We have our kit.........

After much to-ing and fro-ing we now have our cycle kit to adorn the roads during our little picnic jaunt in a few week's time !! Using the quite excellent Scimitar sports (www.scimitarsports.com )we have designed our own shirt and shorts which are currently in production. The aim was to be bright and bold and be noticed..............and hopefully we've achieved that. What does anyone think???

The only real issue to be honest has been the sizes! Now okay some of us are not the thinnest in the world but when one takes an L sized shirt and a 36 inch waste that's not too bad - but you still need an XXXL cycle shirt !!! It really makes you wonder why cycling kit is so incredibly small..............

Update from Tony and Renata

Hi everyone - hope the team training is going well. We had a great weekend and finished it on a bit of a high after a few weeks struggling in the doldrums feeling like we were a long way behind. We went out yesterday (Saturday) and Ren suggested we mix it up so we did total of 16 miles, but half was off road in the woods, and on mountain bike tracks, this was great and lots of fun. 

Today (Sunday 18th) we did 26 miles on the road, and we felt really good. So a total of 40miles over the weekend, and we really are feeling fitter every week now, the cumulative effect of putting in the miles really does improve your fitness quickly!! 

Ren got a puncture yesterday, and fell off today cleated in, but cycled on smiling))

We are cycling with Nigel and Lisa on the weekend of Apr7/8 up in the Milton Keynes area and we aim to put in 60-70 miles that weekend - though with Payne in charge lord knows what that'll turn out to be !! Ren starts her new job tomorrow, and will cycle to work 3-4 times a week and get 50-75mls a week doing just this. As I am in Canary Wharf, I struggle to put in more than 50 road miles per week, but I am in spinning classes now every day at HSBC, and this will help a lot I know. Good luck this week team training, see you all soon Tony and Ren xx

Typical girl - no spacial awareness!

That's me - told you this
cycling malarky isn't stylish!

It seems cycling is a funny old business.  Since our training weekend last week I have been a little lacklustre on my cycle training. Then on Saturday I decided to head out for a decent ride, circling Regents Park a whopping seven times (approx 21 miles) However, in order to get to lovely Regents Park I have to embrace the wonders of Kentish Town and Camden high streets. Let me quickly remind you this was on Saturday ... possibly the busiest day of the week for these areas!

So there I am, calmly cycling along, thinking its good to be back in the saddle then suddenly I reach a massive traffic jam! I hover behind a bus for 2 minutes then think maybe I can squeeze through the traffic and beat it.  So, I slowly move my way through identifying the possible gaps.  So far so good.  Then, a gap that looks feasible but oh how wrong I was.

Kentish Town High Street -
Not my most favourite place!

What happens next was like watching a film in slow motion.

I approach the gap the, ack, I clip my left handle bar on the cars wing mirror.  As I attempt to apologise to the driver I lose my balance, and unable to release my foot quick enough I end up effectively sprawled across the car door to my right - literally whole body hugging the drivers door!  How embarrassing! Obviously I apologise then quickly regain my composure and get out of there as quickly as I can, only to hear a cabbie shout 'careful luv' as I escape!

I reach Regents Park without any more hiccups then absolutely cane the seven laps - adrenalin can be a wonderful thing.  Average speed 13.5 miles per hour ... I'm on track!  But then I have to get home!  No issues in Camden then I hit Kentish Town and almost in exactly the same place as earlier (obviously going in the other direction) I misjudge the width of my bike again! Not only to I hit a wing mirror but I took it completely off, releasing the mirror from its casing.  Panicking I manage to frantically put the mirror back in its casing and then fix the whole thing back in place.  Thankfully the car was parked, driver was nowhere to be seen and I don't think anyone else noticed.  Almost in tears I cycle off heading home.

Now as I approach home, I have two choices - big hill that adds an extra mile to my journey and is good training or quick short cut home.  With adrenalin pumping and tears almost in full flow I choose the hill ... time to feel the burn.  I've attempted this hill 3 times before and never achieved  it.  Saturday ... not only did I get up it, but I then took on a second hill just to prove a point!  Accidents forgotten!

Morale of the story ...
1) yes I am I typical girl and admit I have no spacial awareness (this goes for driving my car too)
2) I probably shouldn't be cycling on London roads alone!
3) adrenalin rocks
4) when I hit a tough point on route to Monte Carlo, could someone please make me angry or scared ... that should get me through!

On a final note, I said I was going to bring some style to the page so how's this for a hairstyle?!

Oh, and fellow cyclists, today I cycled a further 14 miles and tomorrow its 35 through the beautiful Bristol countryside! Just saying! :) 

A torn thigh muscle, a broken bike, 6 utterly drenched riders stranded in the snow, 6 fallings off and a proverbial puncture. Just a normal weekend then for our wonderful group!

I don’t know what it is about us lot. I don’t know if we just make things happen this way or whether we are just mental – but we certainly do not ever have a dull moment! And so it proved on this first assessment training weekend where if it was physically possible to happen. Well it did.

The weekend began early on Saturday morning when Ally Gormley emerged with a sellotape adorned cardboard box at Luton airport. With Nigel in hysterics seeing this coffin like beaten up box of a thing appear from customs…..we were told that apparently her intended bike case had somehow found its way to Hawaii and the cardboard box was a 4am last minute substitute! Okay…….no drama there then.  Well not that we yet knew about anyway. 

We drove down to George’s Hampshire palace (literally) arriving around 11am along with the rest of the 7 person team. We all arrived in great spirits, helped no doubt by the warm spring-like sunshine. We all set about unpacking and building (where necessary) the bikes and things were looking good. Whilst everyone was a little apprehensive, the buzz and excitement was evident.

The weather was warm and sunny and by 12.30 we were ready to attack two scheduled 20 mile rides that afternoon.George had organised two excellent testing courses for our assessment to begin. We didn't really look like a team though George was clearly excited as you can see from the photo (!!) as indeed was Renata and her saddle. Anyway, enough of that...........from left to right in the photo we have Lisa, Ally, Nigel, Renata, Tony, Matt and George. Sadly Keiron (my house has just been flooded by a burst 24 inch water main and I’ve just had a new baby too) Blay, Antonio (good excuse living in Portugal) and Rowan (on holiday) all couldn’t make it this time. 

Ten minutes into the first ride it was obvious that all was not well. Ally’s cardboard box was it seems not sufficient to protect her €2,000 bike from the destructive tendencies of Luton and Dublin’s baggage handlers. The gears on her bike were not working properly, nor was the chain. Ally, being Ally, soldiered on effectively having to climb every hill in an unusable gear ratio which caused her to fall off quite badly at least 6 times. Not fun. And whilst not realising it, the determination induced strain she was putting herself through led to a badly torn thigh muscle which subsequently has required laser surgery treatment back in Ireland. The picture opposite is just one of 5 purple lumps that appeared a few days afterwards. Not fun at all. And can you believe this "I don't do quitting" lady even tried to cycle with it on Sunday! Mad woman….which is why we love her: she never, ever gives up.

For the rest of the team, apart from Matt’s puncture (repaired in 5 minutes flat – yeah) and George continually failing to understand the meaning of “team” and cycling away in the distance, the first 20 mile ride was pretty enjoyable and uneventful. The pace was good at 10.6mph – though not quite good enough for the actual ride which needs to be about 11.5 average - but everyone was getting there. On the second ride improvement was seen all around, and we averaged 11 mph - not quite there on speed but with 8 weeks to go to get just a bit faster everyone was pretty pleased. It had gone well.

We were all however pretty tired after 40 miles: and ready to eat. Saturday evening dinner was simply hilarious. Joined by George’s delightful family we had an absolute blast. What a fantastic, truly fantastic hosts and an awesome group of people on this cycling team. The combination of amazing food, incredible hospitality, stomach aching funny stories and the appearance of George in fancy dress combined to make a truly memorable and fantastic evening.

And then came Sunday. Oh my god. A day we’ll never, ever forget.

We awoke to rain of the sheer horizontal variety with inch to two inch puddles everywhere from the sheer volume that had fallen overnight. And it was incessant: 100% non-stop heaven emptying rain. 

First we ate a hearty breakfast (no idea what's going on with the jacket here....) But, undeterred and cocooned in our supposedly protective wet gear we set off on our 40 mile ride.  

5 miles in, cycling at a rain and wind induced excruciatingly slow 7 miles and hour it was clear that this was going to be very tough. Impossible even. But we carried on. Wind battering our faces, our feet soaking wet, toes frozen and fingers numb we all soldiered on for 18 miles until we reached the Lions Head at Winterslow near Salisbury. Even though we were two miles off the scheduled half way stop point of our 40 mile ride, we simply had to stop. None of our limbs were left working! The publican, Anton O’connor, kindly opened up for us even though it was only 11.30am (yes it had taken nearly 3 hours to do 18 miles….).

As we sat down, a pool of water came out of the padding in our shorts, water poured out from our shoes, all looking as if we had all wet ourselves. We were totally, completely and utterly sodden and numb with cold. Then in one of those “moments” that just happen spontaneously, we all collapsed in non-stop laughter. We laughed so much it hurt. Could it get more bizarre? 

Well yes – it could and it did. Tony, in what we thought at the time was a joke, shouted that the rain outside had turned to thick snow. “Yeah sure” we all said: but it had. And it came down, and it came down and came down and continued incessantly for over 90 minutes. 

What at first was quite funny soon turned into the realisation that actually we weren't going anywhere any more on our bikes. At that point we had no choice but to call for the 4^th Emergency Service in Mrs Bunny Rolls who drove the 18 miles in her Land Rover to come and get us (two trips required). So having set off at 8.30am, we cycled a mere 18 miles over the 6 hours it took us to get back to George’s house in Bunny’s car!!

So what did we learn from our weekend? Well many things to be honest.

- We learnt that we have a great team. A really great team;

- We learnt that bikes need to be in proper cases.....

- We learnt that our wet weather gear was nowhere near good enough;

- We learned that this is one mother of a challenge

- We learned that the next 8 weeks need to be spent training.....

And we learnt that this is going to be one hell of a lot of fun. Bring it on.