Exile

As the Summer begins to fade and my fitness continues to increase I find myself in a strange two wheeled no mans land.

Cycling has always been a social event for me, yet as my fondness for road biking grows my rides are generally solitary affairs.

The number of mountain bike miles added to my annual total since June can be counted in low double digits, whilst hundreds of miles have been covered exploring an expanding area centred around home.  Local climbs and descents have been learnt and my Strava times on segments continue to improve, once happy with getting somewhere close to the top 10 or an occasional KOM off road, I have gathered multiple crowns in my Strava feed in recent weeks.

And yet...

Something is missing, as I said, I'm a sociable creature, my mates are mtbers, they have seen me at my worst and best and carried me through in both cases.  My road experiences have none of this camaraderie, and whilst I get an occasional enquiry I can see that the interest is surface deep, routes and distances mean nothing to them and I feel increasingly the same when descents, jumps and trails are discussed in return.

Requests for company on the road have met with refusals and excuses, the option left to me is to join a bike club, something I can't yet bring myself to do.  I'm proud of my increased fitness and reduced waist, I take a passing interest in cadence and understand what my HRM is telling me during the stages of a ride but to me a club means stern chairmen and arm patches, rule books on club conduct and inevitable posturing and club politics.

On the rare occasions I have met riders on the road they are invariably going in the opposite direction and I'm too nervous to spin around and ask for company.. fearing that I'll be dropped unceremoniously on the next climb as my mouth writes cheques that my legs aren't able of cashing.

A mates brother road rides, I've seen him a couple of times and in each case we have spent 10 or so miles together discussing the world and his adventures as an ultra runner.  Whilst Pat is happy to spin along at tick over however I find the pace too low and we soon part ways.

During the 77 mile Peak District Sportive however, my ride companions were a tall and powerful ex work colleague from Sheffield and a Cat 1 semi-pro bike company owning cycling monster.  I was suffering a migraine and my pace was humiliatingly pedestrian in comparison to these gods of the road, they pulled me round though, dropped their pace and protected me from headwinds as we covered miles in the stunning scenery of the Peaks.  I felt immense gratitude for their actions and this further fueled my love of the road, returning home though I was back to lonesome rides.

My confusion grows; too slow for Cat 1 Racers, too quick for an evening bimble, too nervous of speed and fitness and politics to join a club, too disinterested in throwing myself off gap jumps to ride off road.

For now, then, I'll continue to experience the solitude of the road.. if you see me out please say hello

Farewell to old faithful

I've never adopted a revolving door approach to bike ownership, in fact, going back three generations would see a bike that was bought and ridden during the late 90's.

I can still reel off every bike I've owned and how I eagerly awaited their purchase, planning components and the trails I would try them out on.  That covers the mountain bike side of things, road bikes are even rarer, my first road bike was bought for me as a ten year old, countless miles were covered until I became enchanted by the possibilities of off road biking and it was sold to help towards the cost of its muddy replacement.

The next foray into road riding came as an 18 year old, my aging car transported me and a mate 50 miles from home to buy a bike which I had read a description of in the free ads, the test ride consisted of bouncing down the curb and pedaling to the end of the road and back to ensure nothing fell off.  I still remember the sweaty afternoon spent cutting off the solid rear tyre which the previous owner had fitted in an attempt to reduce maintenance requirements to zero.

That bike was upgraded and much loved, accompanying me through my early triathlon outings, a high speed crash which saw me run over and transported to hospital consigned the bike to the garden shed for a few years until I had the heart to admit the frame was beyond salvage.

A few years ago I had the urge for a return to the road, a work colleague at the time was a massive cycling fan, a member of the cycling club to which he belonged was selling his winter training bike, a few weeks passed and the bike was still for sale.  Turning up at his house on a wet saturday afternoon I saw a bike which would do me fine, I stared in awe as he proudly showed me the 2k road bike which he kept for best, wondering why the hell anyone would spend that money on a bike that would only ever feel tarmac under its wheels.  I handed over the money he was asking for though and a Ribble Audax came to stay.

Commutes to an old job were done on it and although the guy I bought it from had barely ridden it despite spending money on good quality components, I just didn't get it.  Like the faithful puppy which, although beaten still loves its owner, the Ribble sat in the garage, never feeling the sun on its matt black paint for longer than the 16 mile round trip.

With Redundancy came the prospect of selling stuff, whilst my On One received Diplomatic Immunity from all such discussions, the future of the Ribble was uncertain; eventually being saved at the eleventh hour by the offer of employment in Sheffield.

Shortly after starting my new job it joined me early one Monday morning as I turned the nose of the car north and suddenly, it had a purpose.  My car was left parked Monday to Friday and the daily cycle to and from work became extended to include 30 or 40 mile long forays in the Peak District.  My Ribble was my link with home and between us we set out to get lost, find ourselves again and plan adventures for the following day.

I was still a mountain biker, but I began enjoying the tarmac again, time had healed the mental scars from the crash and endless roads through stunning scenery exorcised any remaining demons of road riding.  Returning home, I settled back into off road riding, but at the start of this year I set out to complete a half Ironman triathlon.  This necessitated the use of a road bike and once again my faithful pup was waiting.

The Sportive I completed last Sunday sealed it, I was officially in love with road riding again.  I admit that when racking my Ribble alongside the high end carbon bikes already in place I felt the kind of shallow embarrassment normally reserved for being caught by your mates whilst kissing an ugly girl.  My Ribble transported faultlessly me round the course though, overtaking many of the high cost, low speed velos of the other competitors to a silver medal time.

Since then, an accelerated purchase plan has seen a new bike arrive and the Ribble which has served me so well be consigned to an advert on ebay.  I may have a brand new and high end road bike to face my new adventures on, but the bike it replaces holds a place in my affections which will take a long time to fade.

The start of something new..?

Silver Time!

When I originally came across the advert for the Wye Valley Warrior Sportive I saw it as an opportunity to get some road miles in ahead of the Tri I had in mind for late August, even better, the 66 mile route would be further than the distance I was going to ride in the race and offer (in my opinion) an ideal chance to see how the training was going.

Given I was going to be spending a fair amount of time among the 'weirdos of the black top' I thought it best I had someone who had some experience (albeit limit, but still significantly more than me) of riding in such events.

Step forward Al, already a partner of Wentwood and just crazy enough to give up half a day to not only spend it in my company but also that of several hundred MAMILs and their expensive accessories.

Al had appeared keen to join me and we had, in true Al / Ian style, spent the week running up to the event talking down fitness, talking up our game and generally not taking the whole thing very seriously.

It's fair to say that our arrival time saw us on the keen side of things and we had about 90 minutes to kill before our distance group could set off.  We managed to fill this time admirably lounging in the early summer sun sipping free coffee and laughing (possibly a little too loudly) and all the fat blokes in full team kit pushing £8k road missiles whilst searching out the cake stand.

I had already owned up to some road riding (a 40 miler two weeks before) just to see how my legs would hold out and received numerous acerbic comments from Al who admitted his own preparation for the event was to pump the tyres up on a road bike which had sat unridden for 18 months and then spend 200yds of a 300yd test ride trying to clip into to his road pedals.  Like I said, we weren't taking it too seriously.

If my training admission had caused Al amusement, pulling my brilliant white roadie shoes out of my kit box resulted in the piss taking being taken to a whole new level, I soon earned the nickname Liberace, and, looking around feeling a little embarrassed I could see that our MTBers attitude was decidedly unwelcome at a roadie convention.

Heading to the start, we faffed with GPS units and enjoyed the last few minutes of quiet before the exertions of the coming hours, our approach may be light hearted to most things, but riding is a serious business and we weren't about to show ourselves up.  The inevitable safety briefing and careful explanation over how  'Arrows' worked and we were off, across the road from the stunning Chepstow race course and the rest of the bunch we were with pulled in to repair a puncture.  We may take the piss but at least we were mechanically sorted.

I found myself out front and we pulled quickly away from the start point, miles being given up by the twisting road which hugs the River Wye.  As was the case with Wentwood, Al reminded me that we need to go slow to go fast, pace ourselves right and we'll fly by the early racers in the latter stages.

10 miles in and we were at the scene of an accident, a rider lying face down and covered in blood, the obvious loser after a disagreement with a car, a large crowd had already formed and we decided to push on, too many cooks and all that.  It was a sobering reminder, as a biker normally concerned with missing trees I needed to be thinking of other road users to.. especially the sunday drivers who wouldn't want to waste 20 seconds so a cyclist could pass safely.

Approaching the turn which would see us hit the first real climb of the day, a group of riders including Rob Lee (link to his blog on the right hand panel) caught and passed us, we'd been a two man convoy for some time so upped the pace and joined their chaingang, whilst they took turns in the front, we slunk around at the back, enjoying the tow and feigning ignorance to the rules of the road.

Turning onto the climb, it's fair to say I let my competitive side have the reins, I know the climb and was probably showing off a little, but I kicked down a few gears and went for it.  A long couple of miles later saw me cresting the hill, I was sat up and spinning when Al pulled alongside.. I admitted to possibly making a tactical error and Al once again started banging on about heart rate zones and eating plans and saving his 'mighty thighs' for an assault on the 'monster hill at 80k'.  I then made a second tactical error, with Al flexing his legs I pointed out the triple chainset sitting on my bike, it's fair to say that gave Al ammunition for the remaining 70 kilometers.

Remember that group that had a puncture? well, now it was our turn, Al's rear tyre had gone  (possibly aided by him bunny hopping off every available pavement) and, pulling in to the roadside, I had to admit that the rather sexy carbon mini-pump I normally had attached to the bike was sitting in the kit box back at Al's car.  Al used his one time only CO2 cannister without issue and we were soon on our way again.  Me kicking myself for my terrible memory and Al sweating slightly as we had 40 miles to go and no means of tyre inflation should the need arise.

I have to admit, as days in the saddle go, this was right up there, I've primarily been an MTBer for the past 10 or so years, but during my late teens and early twenties I spent a lot of time riding road bikes, I've always enjoyed the speed and ability to pass miles under the wheels with such little effort.

As the day progressed I found myself falling in love with road riding again.  Whilst Al was killing me on the on the climbs, I found a lost bravery and pushed hard on the descents, reeling in riders and leaving my brakes alone well past the point other riders were sitting up for corners.

Back in Wales and we were approaching the monster at 80k, not a crap B movie from the 50's but a very real and very big bump in the course profile.  I admit that upon hearing Al exclaim he couldn't even see the top of it on his Garmin, I was quietly (very, very quietly) grateful that I had a triple, I wouldn't have admitted it to Al as he'd have probably ensured I wasn't in the car when he left the car-park and headed for home at the end of the day.

Proudly informing me that his energy bar of choice was used by none other than Sir Bradly Wiggins, I asked how it felt to take a warm and soft Brad in the mouth, I may be getting my arsed kicked, but I was sure as hell not going to let Al have it all his own way, the resulting laugh caused about £2's worth of Wiggins endorsed half chewed energy to be ejected all over his handlebars.

At the bottom of the hill Al suffered cramp, we stopped and whilst Al stretched his legs I downed another Gel shot.

The hill didn't disappoint, whilst my good mate powered on ahead, I ground out the distance, I didn't humiliate myself, but I wouldn't have wanted it to be much longer.  As was the case at Wentwood, the last few miles saw Al go from strength to strength and our last regroup was short lived as yet another hill separated us.

Whilst Al spent the last 10 racing a couple of lads half his age (and winning) I got my head down.  Back at the start finish area with just over 4 hours on the clock, I was presented with my finishers medal and we sat  drinking yet more expensive energy products whilst planning our next road adventure.

It's going to be an imperial century and I can't wait...