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.