Last week – cold, frosty, super white. Puddles so hard they didnt even creak when you rolled over let alone break!  Rock hard (ice hard?) everywhere – harder than summer but slippy at the same time. DOn’t go turning on top of those puddles! 

Did I say cold?

This week – 10 degrees warmer, feels even colder in the damp. Muddy, sticky, wet. nasty.

I miss the summer

Its bloody cold oot there!

Went riding in the Clent Hills near Birmingham yesterday evening. A fair chunk if ride and some bridle paths. No singletrack to speak of, but some big old hills to make up for it. To be fair there were a couple I had to walk, being limited to my one gear and incredibly unfit

Right at the top of the Clent Hills there was a fantastic view. Just after dark with the faint glow of sunset still on the horizon, the lights of the towns glowing below us, the frost glittering on the ground and breath steaming in the air. Absolutely gorgeous, and closely followed by a wickedly fast descent, which would have been faster if I’d have known the terrain.
Ears popping from the altitude loss, forehead and face getting colder and colder in spite of wearing a buff under my helmet. Condensation pooling in my beard and, close top the bottom, a BITINGLY painful brain freeze as if I’d been scooping Ben & Jerry’s down my throat for 10 minutes!
Absolute, blinding pain and with almost no way to clear it. With Ice cream I normally weld my tongue to the roof of my mouth and warm it up again (albeit never as quickly as I’d like). With this it was just the air temperature and wind chill that had caused it so it was all external and I just had to put up with it.
It passed quickly enough though, and it just remained to head home down the roads at full pelt (I’m sure Nige is a closet Roadie!), by which time I’d lost all feeling in my toes, my bike was cleaner than it was when we left (hard and frosty instead of soft and muddy), and I was very happy to be inside again and warming up.
Only 14 miles, and more road than I like, but I felt MUCH better than on Sunday which has to be a good thing.

My ass hurts tho – consequence of having too much time out of the saddle and then not enough recovery time between rides.

I’m looking to get riding more regularly again in 2009, hopefully my ass will toughen up again and my legs, lungs, body will get stronger again.
To quote the old TV programme – ‘We can rebuild him!’

NB – I’m now REALLY looking to sell the Whyte PRST4 – If anyones interested please let me know.  It’ll end up on ebay shortly if not.

You get to know who your mates are when you hit the wall, don’t you?

Having not been riding for thebest part of 2 months due to large amounts of work from a new job and moving house at the same time, I got a text from Postie on Saturday evening and thought ‘hey, what the hell’, and found myself outside his house in Penn at 0815 on Sunday morning. It happened to be about -1C at the time as well, and it didnt warm significantly through the ride.

I was on the OnOne again, but made one change, having switched the bars to Mary Bars. These are weird btw, and I’ll reserve judgement tol Ive ridden a few more rides. They felt ‘twitchy’ but I think its mainly because the angle is son much different to flat bars, when you turn tightly the angle your hands end up at is completely different that on flat bars you’d be jack knifing the front wheel so its sort of weird to get used to.

I knew it was going to be a tough ride having been off the bike for so long. What I wasnt counting on was not being able to find my camelbak amongst the clutter  in my new home, so venturing out with just a water bottle I just figured I might have to borrow a puncture repair kit. As it was, I started off ok, if a little slow, but after about 10 miles I started getting really tired, slowing down consdiderably and hitting the wall completely shortly after that.

When I say hit the wall I don’t just mean I felt tired, I mean I really and truly exhausted just about ALL my energy reserves and had to struggle just to stay on the bike, let alone move it forward. Unfortunately we still had about 6 miles to go so I struggled on, getting more and more tired, using the singlespeed ‘lost traction’ excuse earlier and earlier on every climb until eventuall it felt hard going DOWNhill, let alone up.  It seemed there WAS no flat, just up, steeper up, and bastard hard up.

Now the guys all knew I was getting tired – there was no hiding it, and they were awesome about it. While I was whinging and moaning and apologising, they were encouraging and forgiving, willing me and helping me to keep going when all I really wanted to do was get off the bike, crawl under a bush, curl up in a ball and cry. Yes I really was that knackered!  I have no real excuse other than not being on the bike enough (or at all), but the lack of camelbak with its associated energy giving goodies that are always tucked away inside became a real hindrance and a matter for much cursing.

At one point the slow factor became too much and I actually lost the group. I’m not sure thats ever happened before, but the lack of camelbak also meant I’d left my phone in the car so I had no choice but to wait at the last decent junction and hope that I was noticed AWOL sooner rather than later.  Sure enough, a few minutes later Steve came trolling back and located me, duely cycling back encouraging me to keep going. (I think I might have sworn at this point – sorry Steve). It WAS appreciated, and even though when I finally got back to the car and saw the temperature had yet to rise above 0.5C, even though I could barely stand up and had to fight with the bike to get it in and shut the boot, even though all I could think of was getting to the nearest garage to get SOMETHING to eat, I was also thinking how lucky I am to have mates like these.

and then Postie came out with a Mars Bar…… I swear I nearly cried.

Cheers fellas

A stream of consciousness sort of thing. Actually an excercise in memory as well – try it sometime.

5PM – bike out. Kit ready. Dry, Mudguards OFF Yaaay. Gate open. On the bike. DOH! Wrong shoes.

Back to the garage. Off again. Do I go for the big hill at the beginning? Its hard. If I don’t I won’t do it. Take the right. Wooo – this is steep, dark, wet and slippy. Bottom of the hill, take a left. Chilcompton. UP!  Hard up! More hard Up.  Kids in the road, playing chicken with descending friends.  “Is it hard going up that?” Damn right its hard!. Legs pumping. Thighs burning. Lungs gasping. “Its easier going the other way”, I say. Not as hard as I thought though.

Made it! Feeling good. Smiling Cross the road. Don’t know where I am now. Quaint village. More up!  Oh wow – picture stop!  What a view. Highest point for a way around? Must be.  Only way is down.

Down, dark, dank, wet. Woooooahhh – gravel. Deep gravel!! oh shite. Sara’s warning? Phewwww. Kept upright. Up again now. In the dark. Ferns – bright green. Water running rapidly in the dell. Its dark here. Lee side of the hill?Must remember this. Remember as much as I can from the ride. Like the generation game. Remember the cuddly toy!

Quarry. Big quarry. What are they quarrying? Wooshing noise. Big tanks. Dairy? Nope – powder of some kind. Powdered milk? More up now. Time on the rower must have helped. Feel good

Where am I? No idea. Head for Shepton Mallet. Rabbit. Dead. Rabbit. Alive, running. Much better. BIG bird. Red kite? no some sort of buzzard. Up hills. Big hills. Down hills – woooooohooooo.

Shepton Mallet – right to the town. check it out. Queer little place. Built on a hill. Church, alleyways. A bit chavvy?  Gurgle of water. Home now. Long way round.

Doh. Lost now. Head for?? Frome?? Main road. Riding fast.  This has been a long ride. Feeling good. Must get out more often.

Rushing of wind. Fantastic views. Feels good. Getting late. WHere the hell am I?? Starting to get tired now. Hmm – long way out. Take a left?  East Somerset Steam Railway. Check it out. Might be fun with kids.

Carry on past it – do a loop round. Looong loop. Getting tired. Muddy road. Slippery. Splattered. UP again. Steep Up. Keep peddling, don’t stop. Made it.

Tired now. Where am I? Lost? Nooo – theres my local roundabout

Doh – different roundabout. Head for…Nunney? No – Mells! that’ll do. Seen signs for that. Hay bales. Great picture Got to get on. Getting darker now. Car headlights on. Should’ve brought my lights. Can’t be far.

Crossroads. Tired. Signposts?? Mells! Keep going. MORE hills. Tired, tired, tired. Keep going. Rabbits out now Vobster! Vobster Diving School. I know that. Wrong side of it, Keep going. I’ll get there. Very tired. Should have brought food. Down hill yeeeeahh – wind rushing, lungs pumping, legs aching. Hope I don’t bonk. I should get out MORE!  THis is coooool. Should have come out earlier though. Getting darker.

Oh crap. Uphill again. Straight uphill. just…keeepp…goiingg. Pedal. Pedal. Tired. Pedal. Keep spinning. Keep going. yeeeah – Top of the hill.

Should have headed to Holcombe. Would have skipped a big loop.

Temporary road surface??? Been like this for months!  Should read – really BAD road surface.  Take a right. Open sesame. Home. Shower. Whats for tea?

Oh bugger – should have gone shopping.

Good ride today. A bit longer than intended, but thats the way I get fitter I guess.  I’m still smiling :)

5 of us started. 4 came back.

Its taken me 6 months to write this. Initially because I was affected quite badly when it happened and it was just too hard to write about, then I wasn’t sure I could do it justice, and more recently I just haven’t wanted to think about it too much.  I’ve never been quite as badly hit by the death of a friend before. Friends come and go, accidents happen, natural causes happen. Normally you hear about them afterward and you think to yourself how terrible it is that lives get cut short for any reason at all. I can tell you now, when it happens right in front of you its very, VERY different and hits you in a completely different and unexpected way.

Obviously this happened a while ago, so I apologise to anyone who was there who remembers it differently. If I could have written it before I’m sure it would have been more accurate, but I’ll do the best I can.

Meeting up outside Steve’s for an 8AM ride, strangely enough, Derek pulled in right behind my car and we complimented each other on our time keeping as between the two of us, we were probably late more than anyone else and took the brunt of most of the (good natured) whinges from the others. On this particular Sunday morning we were on time and actually had a chance to chat for a bit. I handed over a windproof top to Derek that was too small for me (he was only a little chap) , and we had a laugh and a joke, and set off soon after.

Me, Derek, Steve, Phil and Mike. Steve had his new Yeti 575 and between him and Derek they were setting most of th epace, with me following close behind on my brand new singlespeed OnOne 29er. It was actually the 29er’s first ride out with the lads and I was loving keeping up with them even without gears.  Keeping up with everyone except Derek I should say, as he was on fire! Not being the best navigator, Steve had to keep shouting directions at Derek’s back and we were having a giggle as we watched him suddenly slam the anchors on to make a corner that he’d just missed. He never was much good at directions and regularly managed to make wrong turns even on routes that we’d ridden hundreds of times before. ‘GPS’ was one of his nicknames for this reason, and ‘Bailout’ being the other one for his habit of leaving the bike unexpectedly.

It was one of those mornings where everything just seemed right. No major mechanicals, the sun was shining, the ground was damp but not overly muddy for a February. We’d probably ridden about 10 miles when we stopped at the top of a hill for a few moments breather. Taking the opportunity to adjust Derek’s gears which had started giving him a bit of hassle. We chatted for a few minutes, Derek telling me he was looking forward to seeing his kids in the afternoon, and we set off down the hill. I like this descent. Its broad enough to not worry about hitting anything, and fast enough to really have some fun. We scooted down, Mike, Phil, me, Steve, and Derek at the back. At the bottom, it flattens out a bit where the path hits a rutted farm track for 100 yards before it meets the main road.

We stopped, just across the main road and waited to regroup. Phil, Mike and I were chatting. I started to adjust my brake lever which was angled downward a bit much, and Steve pulled up a few seconds later. Derek wasn’t there. Normally we’d have chatted for 5 minutes or so before even thinking about going back, but Steve, chuffed with his new bike and keen to ride anything, went back to investigate where Derek was.

A few moments later we heard a shout and there was something in it that made us all go cold. Mike and Phil headed straight back. I frantically tightened up my brake lever again and shot off after them.

Steve had found Derek lying on his side, still pretty much on the bike. It was pretty clear pretty quickly that he wasn’t in a good way, so Steve had yelled for us, and immediately checked for breathing and a pulse, and started CPR when there wasn’t anything. By the time I got back there Mike was helping Steve, Phil was running back towards the road to find the closest house and call an ambulance in case we couldn’t get a mobile phone signal. I called the ambulance, having to go through two phones to do it as there was no signal on the first, and I did what I could to help Steve, who was first on the scene and was performing most of the CPR.

At some point, Derek had been sick, which made CPR about the worst possible job ever, even though we were desperately trying to save Dereks life. It seemed to go on for ages, but I think it was less than 10 minutes before the ambulance arrived. The ambulance managed to get stuck on the rutted farm road and the paramedic ran the rest of the way carrying all of their gear. 

They used a portable defibrillator to try and restart Derek’s heart (it was clear by now that he’d had a massive heart attack), but nothing helped. They continued CPR until a second ambulance arrived at the scene, and between us we carried Derek on a stretcher with a paramedic still performing CPR as we carried him to the ambulance.

We all hoped for the best, and decided between us to cycle the few miles back to Steve’s. There wasn’t a lot of conversation. On the way home, Steve texted to tell me what I already knew – Derek had died. 

What had started out as a glorious late winter ride had ended in an absolute tragedy.

Derek Rudge 02/12/1953 – 24/02/2008  RIP   You were a riding buddy and a friend, and I’ll always remembder you enjoying riding in the Chiltern Hills on a sunny day.

Steves blog entry

Steve’s eulogy

Well, for various reasons I find myself living in Somerset at the moment. Hopefully temporarily – although its a gorgeous part of the world it’s a little isolated for my taste and a looong way from work.

It IS a great place for riding though, which is difficult because I haven’t been on the bike for 4 weeks until yesterday.  Figuring it was easier to find roads than offroad trails I only brought the road bike with me and decided on Saturday that i WAS going riding on Sunday. Unfortunately, the weather was crappy in the morning so I didn’t .

A break in the weather let me walk to the town and get some lunch in, looking around and thinking both how lucky I was that the weather had broken and I COULD go riding in the afternoon, and how bloody steep the hills were. Very noticeable even walking 1/2 mile back up from the shops!

Dinner eaten and digested, I got the bike out and realised that I hadn’t yet fitted my raceguard mudguards. 30 minutes later (5 minute jobs always seem to fit just right into a 1/2 hour) and I had muduards that didn’t rub (most of the time), and I set out.

Heading towards Shepton Mallet about 7 miles away, seemed like a good plan. There and back – a little loop to use diffent roads. Somewhere between 14 and 20 miles.  Before I’d got more than about 1 mile tho, I realised that the spray I was getting wasn’t ALL from the road and it was starting to rain again.

The roads around here are a LOT steeper than I’m used to, up AND down, funnily enough. They’re also pretty messy – gravelly sand that makes your wheels slip at the oddest times, and with the rain as well it was getting slidy. Downhill had to be slower than I like, ESPECIALLY when braking. I hate having to brake that early, but greasy wet rims, wet rubber and tarmac, and loads of speed don’t make a good mix.  Going uphill was harder – good though. I havent ridden decent hills for quite a while and its good to get my legs and lungs pumping again.

Unfortunately the rain got heavier and heavier, and when my socks got soaked through I deceided it was time to turn back. I took a side road and headed off left just before I got to Shepton Mallet. I figured I’d go down there, take another left and then find another way back to Midsomer Norton. Unfortunately it looped around and I ended up back on the road I’d come down. Even worse, back on the hill I’d come down and having to cycle back up it!

It was raining hard by this time so I decided not to explore too much more, and just to cycle back up and over the hill. It was nasty wet, but not too bad a climb even though my ass was hurting by now ( a consequence of being off the bike for too long) but I was at the top soon enough and on the flat for a while before a zip down through Stratton on the Fosse ( I love the place names here) and a left back to Midsomer Norton.

10 minutes to dry the bike, wring my socks out and strip off the rest of my wet clothes and I was in a hot bath and wondering why I don’t get out more often, even when its raining its fun and I feel so much better for it.

I’ll try and blog more while I’m here. Seems a shame not to get out and about. I’m in the country even when I’m on the road. Best of both worlds

Now if only the weather will go to plan too :s

Sunday morning, 8AM. I’m in the car park at Swinley Forest, wondering how the hell the weather can be this awesome now when two weeks ago it seemed lilke it would NEVER stop raining! Now, its dry, dusty and pretty bloody awesome, to be blunt.

Singlespeeding again. Seems like I don’t really use the Whyte PRST4 anymore, and I am seriously considering moving it on now – anyone want to make me an offer? (Email for details) I have exactly the same setup as last weeks Enduro race, so it should feel exactly the same. This week I’m with Mike (Billy Whiz), Steve (Squaddie) and Rich (Postie), and thats about the only difference. Except, even early on I’m finding it really hard going. Its still fun, but I’m not happy about having to puff so hard.

Its not my legs, they’re still pumping away and propelling me through the singletrack happily up and down hills.

Its not my lungs. Yes its harder getting UP the hills than down them, but no more so than usual, and I maintain that they grow gears when you only have one on the bike, so it gets easier over time.

Its just a general feeling of lethargy, of ……tiredness that won’t clear. Just feeling like I’ve been riding for a LOT further than I really have.

When we got back to the carpark, Postie checked his trip computer and I think he said 11 or 12 miles. 11 Miles was about 1 lap last week, and I did 33 Miles(ish) in 4and a bit hrs. We were out from (roughly) 8.30 AM to 11AM – 2 1/2 hours. Stop start riding, hard and fast one moment, stopped and chatting the next. Now I know the chatting takes time and thats nothing but good, riding’s about enjoying the company as much as eating miles, but thats 2/12 hrs to do what took me 1hr 20 last week and I feel KNACKERED!

Whats up with that?

Even after, I came home and fell asleep in front of the Turkish Grand Prix. I know, it wasn’t that interesting and I didn’t miss anything, but why the hell should I feel so tired.

I shall have to keep an eye on this and see what sort of pattern (if any) there is.

Plus side is I seem to be keeping post ride headaches at bay a bit better now. A bit of salt and a paracetemol after each ride, and make sure I’ve had something to eat before and, if required, during, makes me feel much better – Torq bars rule!

31minutes 11 seconds. Better than last time

Happy with that, but I KNOW I can get it under 30. I don’t do it enough, thats the problem!

Well I entered to do 3 laps, I completed my 3 laps, and I’m happy. Exhausted. but happy.

Once again I didn’t leave myself enough time to do any sort of warm up, but I did at least get there and was at the start for the start, and not chasing after people (as has been the case on at least 1 event in the past).  About 200 yards later at the top of the first hill though, and I was wondering whether riding on a singlespeed was the wisest choice.

These are supposed to be 10 mile laps. I’m todl that this year they were closer to 11 miles, so I did a little bit extra. A few years ago they turned out to be 12.5 miles, and I was extremely glad to only be doing 2 laps!

First lap = hard. Doubling up as my warm up, I sincerely regretted having that can of ‘Relentless’ energy drink as my stomach cramped. An ‘orrible graunching noise had me scanning the back end trying to figure out HOW a singlespeed bike could make such noises, and realising that its never a good idea to enter a race straight after fettling. I readjusted the disk caliper to fit the new wheel location (sliding dropouts and different sized cog – I won’t bore you with details) and 10 minutes later had to stop again to retighten teh skewer that had come loose. (Brant – if you’re listening I REALLY need that replacement skewer you promised me over a month ago).  After that, mechanical troubles were over and I could get on with just turning pedals. The first 1/2 of each lap was HARD! Damp, slightly claggy ground sucked at the wheels. Singletrack sections seemed to be all uphill, and putting ‘the wall’ in at about 4 miles was just sadistic! (I decided to save my legs and walk this on each lap, vindicating myself by looking around at all the bikes with gears that were still being pushed up!) After that though, the lap got fun. Much more flowing, even where the newly hardpacked trail was still lumpy and stony it seemed to flow well. My only problem was after 1 lap I felt so knackered I didn’t want to carry on!

But carry on I did, the second lap feeling a bit easier in some places, an I settled into a rhythm of just plodding along, turning the pedals, knowing that I was just there to complete, not compete, and knowing all I needed to do was keep going.  i got my nutrition better this time, stopping to eat a Torq bar 1.2 way round lap 2, and shovelling a gel pack down early on lap 3.

Lap 3 was hard. Actually the hardest bit was going past the finish and turning right to do a 3rd lap! It wouldve been so easy to just stop there! But I carried on, getting slower, but determined. and plodded round another time.

Cramp set in 1/2 way round lap 3. My thighs cramping up whenever I went to really crank on the pedals. this is NOT a good thing on a SS, as cranking on the pedals is the only way you’re getting up any decent hill! Luckily, pedal rotation forced my knee to bend again each time and avoided the sheer agony that can come from cramp. I was forced to push up most of the steeper hills, although this was somewhat of a relief to have a legitimate excuse.

I had to concentrate really hard on my last lap. I was getting so tired it would have been very easy to run off line and hit a tree or something. I was devastated when anothe singlespeed came past and I realised he was on lap 7!!! – Well done that man!  made my puny 3 laps seem ……well……..puny.

But I finished. Somewhere in the mid 60’s out of a hundred or so. There were a lot that didn’t make it past 1 lap, and even more that didn’t make it past 2, so completion makes me proud

Resuts are here if anyones remotely interested

I forgot to order my new 18 tooth ring for the SS until Thursday afternoon. Cue a moment of panic as I really want to ride 3 laps of the Gorrick 100 Enduro on my SS.  Charlie the Bike Monger came through again and it turned up this morning -  cheers fella.

As it’s a reasonably long ride and I’m not at my absolute fittest I wanted to gear down a touch from 16/32 to 18/32. I’m hoping this will make it a touch easier UPhill, slow me down a bit on the flats. at least til I get knackered and I’m slow anyway, and probably not affect me much going down as its fairly technical and not really pedally anyway.

At least – thats the theory. Event is tomorrow so we’ll see.  I think its going to be a wet one anyway. Its been a whole week of either bright sunshine or crashing rain, often only 5 minutes apart!