Where Was I ?

Tags

bedfordshire, bike ride, biking, colnago, CYCLE RACING, menu, national trust, photographs, tour de france, tour of britain, vuelta

Its catch up time again here so I have combined some of this weeks bloggable activities, such as they are, into one post.  Whenever any of the cycle racing ‘grand tours’ are on TV my external activities are limited to those that can fit into a morning slot.  I therefore had to scratch my head to remember what i did and then combine them all here.

Cycling’s ‘grand tours’ are the Giro d’Italia in the spring, The Tour de France in the summer and the Vuelta d’Espagna in the autumn.  All of these are three weeks long and due to the increased popularity of cycling here in the UK they are now live on TV for many more hours.  This week the Tour of Britain was also thrown into the mix with live transmissions of that and the ‘Vuelta’ on at a similar time on different channels.  Both races were on different Eurosport channels and the Tour of Britain was also on ITV4.  Fortunately I have Sky Plus so I was able to record one whilst watching the other.  There was also the advantage of advertisement break dodging by switching channels to avoid them so I was juggling between three channels at times.  However I think there might have been some collaboration between the TV companies as just recently I have noticed they do seem to go to adverts at more or less the same time.  I think the red hot TV remote control and the sofa might appreciate a well deserved rest next week.

On Monday morning the weather was favourable for a bike ride so I dusted down the Colnago and took it for a short Ouse Valley ride of about twenty miles to re-acquaint my legs with the rotating motion of pedalling.  It wasn’t too bad actually and the weather was great, which helps in motivating me to get out.

On Thursday we went to the National Trust property, Ascott House near Wing in Bedfordshire.  Its somewhere we have never been before despite it being just a half hour drive from home.  I think the main reason for not visiting before is because of its restricted opening hours.  Its only open from 2pm until 6pm on weekdays, and only in Summer.  This was almost our last opportunity of this year as Friday was the last day of opening before the winter closure.

Front of the house

This part of garden seemed to feature some ‘mounds’ within its landscaping

More mounds in the background

A nice relaxing spot

View of the back of the house

View from the back of the house

Not sure what this topiary is supposed to rep[resent but I had some ideas !!

Topiary sundial

Sundial detail, these words went all the way round but I can’t remember the phrase

More sundial detail

It is a beautiful Jacobean house with paintings by the likes of Stubbs, Gainsborough and Reynolds and extensive and spectacular gardens. It is another property donated by the Rothschild family to the National Trust and is still lived in by part of the Rothschild family, hence the visiting limitations.    After some research I found there are nine other residences in and around the chilterns and home counties that are or were part of the Rothschild property holding.  They are all very substantial and spectacular properties to say the least and parts of a lot of them will be familiar to filmgoers as filming locations for some very popular films.  (I will put the above and some more photos from the outing in my photo blog later)

On Friday I spontaneously phoned my friend Cyril in Wellingborough to see if he was either home and available for a visit or on a bike ride and we could maybe rendezvous somewhere or at home and fancied a bike ride.  When I spoke to him he said how spooky it was because he was just thinking about calling me for similar reasons.  So the upshot was that we organised a rendezvous at Earls Barton then rode to Emmaus at Carlton for a bottomless cup of coffee and a slice of their splendid carrot cake.  We didn’t take advantage of the free coffee refills though.  This ride totalled about thirty miles for me.

All the current cycling tours finish this weekend to allow for the travel and preparation of the cyclists for the World Championships in and around Richmond in the USA next weekend.  This will mean that I will be back to having full days available for external activities, this could involve some longer bike rides (Except next weekend!!).  It will in turn hopefully also mean I will have more to write about and more pictures instead of just boring route maps to break up the text.

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Blessings In Disguise..

Tags

AUDAX, bike ride, biking, CYCLE RACING, menu, weather

I am writing this on Sunday morning, the morning I should have been up early and pedalling around a 200km Audax down into the Cotswolds. I was prevented from doing so by the events of last weekend that were documented in my previous post. I am thinking in some ways it was a kind of a blessing in disguise as its pouring with rain here as I type this.  Not the best day for pedalling 200km+.

I was pleased to see this morning that the road rash on my thigh had grown some new skin over it when I removed the dressing,  I was wondering what I might find there after a few days of being covered up.  I went to hospital on Thursday to get my shoulder x-rayed and there were no broken bones but I have torn the ligaments and they will take about six weeks to heal by all accounts.  I don’t think that will stop me cycling though as when I am riding the bike I have no pain from my shoulder at all.  I didn’t know how it would stand up to 200km ride though so thats why I opted out of todays ride.  Now my road rash has healed over I will try some steadily increasing rides and check my shoulder out as I go.

I have been passing my time this morning checking the future Audax calendar and my next scheduled ride would be the Kidderminster Killer if all goes well, a 200km loop from near Kidderminster and heading west.  To quote the site details :- ….

“THE KIDDERMINSTER KILLER is an audax with a long history. Worcestershire to Montgomery and back via plenty of scenic but challenging hills including The Long Mynd. It is a ride to be beholden and fondly remembered.”

While browsing the ride details further I found this YouTube video made in the 2013 version that I posted on my Facebook Page ‘Bricycling’ earlier.  I will share it here as it might be of interest to those who have no idea of how an Audax works or what it ‘looks lik’.  It features the home clubs riders quite heavily (Beacon RCC) but is quite typical of how an Audax is.  You might just be tempted to give one a try sometime..

Have to go now, Its now time for me to settle down and watch somebody else suffer in the National Road Race championships, men and women live on TV all afternoon.

Weather, The Will And The Wherewithal…

Tags

AUDAX, bike building, bike maintenance, bike ride, biking, club ride, colnago, CYCLE RACING, felt, menu, ribble, specialized, team mk, weather

Hello.. remember me ?  I am the person that used to write regular blog posts on here.

Those posts have been somewhat missing for the last few weeks and I got out of the habit.  The rides I was doing a month ago were not much to much write about.  I was feeling quite depressed about my stats.  Since my mid winter lay off I couldn’t seem to get back up to a decent average speed.  I wasn’t even feeling fit enough to go on the club rides.  I vowed I would get up to at least a consistent 24kph/15mph average speed before I ventured out with them again as 15/16mph is the recommended average speed for the Team MK C Group.  Albeit that I would probably ride faster with a  group than solo, targets are targets.

The weather around here was a major contributor to my lack of miles.  Very strong winds with even stronger gusts of up to 50kph  and the cold weather didn’t fill me with much enthusiasm to get out.  Because I am pretty much free to go out any day I like I think I was getting too picky about the conditions, always thinking tomorrow would be a better day than the present one and it wasn’t.  Those better days didn’t come along and one blank day led to more and more.  If I had only had weekends available I probably would have made more of an effort.  As I mentioned in a previous post I did however manage to ride the Kennet Valley 100km Audax earlier in the month at a fairly sedate pace, but thats all thats required of them.

Eventually I got my average speed up for a couple rides on my winter bikes.  Normally my rule is not to get the ‘best’ bikes out until the clocks change but at the start of last week I ventured out on the Colnago.  I had been doing some work on it and it needed a test ride.  When I bought it I originally re-equipped it with a Shimano 105 groupset but In my accumulated ‘spare’ parts I recently found I had a Shimano Ultegra front and rear deraillieur mech doing nothing.  I managed to find some Ultegra shifters online and kitted the Colnago out with all the Ultegra parts to match the Felt bike set up.  All the 105 equipment that came off the Colnago then went onto my Specialized winter bike to match the Ribble bike set up.  Much re-cabling and handlebar taping followed as a result.

That accounted for two or three days of my non biking time.  So I now have two ‘winter/audax’ bikes for different occasions and two lightweight ‘best’ bikes.  The Felt carbon fibre bike being slightly lighter than the aluminium Colnago but the Colnago feels just as good and lively when I am riding it.  The Felt hasn’t been out yet this year. I have a few jobs to do on that before it ventures out.

The ensuing necessary test ride on the Colnago before its official scheduled first outing really lifted my spirits and the average speed.  So now I am back up and riding a bit more regularly again.  The strong winds persist and its always a factor when choosing my route but at least its getting a bit warmer and the days are getting longer.  Now we have changed the clocks it makes afternoon rides an option again.  Thats always providing there is no bike racing on TV though.

There has been a steady dribble of televised bike races since February actually, starting with the “Tour Down Under’ then moving to the middle east for some pretty boring racing in the deserts.  Now the european season is well underway and just moved in the northern France/Belgium/Holland area for the Spring Classics.  They are always exciting races to watch with the weather, cobbles, short sharp climbs and enthusiastic crowds and the odd crash or two making for some exciting racing.  There is no complaining about the weather and strong winds from these guys they just get out there and race through it all for 200km or more.  Hard men all of them, competing two or three times a week some of them for five or six hours at a time.  If they crash they just get back on their bikes and carry on.  I won’t mention the highly paid footballers that are always moaning they need a rest if they play two ninety minute games a week or a month out of action if they scratch their leg. Oh dear, I seem to have mentioned them!!!

So, the improving weather, my improving fitness and the inspirational bike racers are rebuilding my enthusiasm again and hopefully I will have more to write about in the future.  Well, I know I will and maybe some nice spring cycling pictures as well.

Last Weeks Rides Update…

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bike, bike ride, biking, club ride, CYCLE RACING, menu, stony stratford, team mk, weather

It turned out to be quite a prolific ride week for me, unusually so by recent standards.  With the previously reported ride on Tuesday I notched up just over 300km last week

Thursday: 80km bike ride

I went for a ride on Thursday last week as it was forecast to be a nice day.  Up until then it hadn’t been good weather at all.  The day started off very misty though as I headed off east towards KImbolton on a northerly loop and swung round at Great Staughton on a southerly loop back. The ride was about 80km. It’s a fairly undulating route with no major climbing involved so I managed to up my recent average ride speeds to a couple of kph higher.

I took this picture just as I started to head back towards home at Gt Staughton, as you can see the mist is still hanging around, the picture isn’t out of focus and I did try some editing to make it look a little less misty than it actually was.

By the time I got home the sun had burned the mist off but it was still pretty cold.

Saturday: Team MK ride to  Winslow 110km

The Team MK ride last Saturday was scheduled to be to Upper Stowe near Daventry but there was no leader allocated for the ride and Clive volunteered to to do the lead but opted to go to Winslow instead.  Slightly preferable given my condition because the Upper Stowe route is quite a hilly one with some nasty little climbs in it.  However it was no easy ride because quite a high pace was set.

We stopped at Jenny Wrens cafe in Winslow as Clive had the foresight to book one of the rooms for us there.  So finding a seat would be no problem and they were ready for us.  Sometimes I don’t bother to stop there on this route because of the hassle but I actually needed the break this week so I was ready for the refuelling stop to get me home.

The ride back soon split the group up but I wasn’t dragged into any fast stuff as I had done 20km more then them at that stage because of my ride to the start, I was also facing another 20km to get back home from Stony Stratford.  I just kept at my own steady and comfortable pace, picking up some stragglers from the front group on the way that had overstretched themselves.  Once I reached Stony my average speed was showing almost 26kph but by the time I got home it had dropped to 25.4 😦

Its my turn to lead the group ride this week and we are going to Carlton.  I might need to abbreviate the route a bit as there is a round of the Cyclo Cross World Cup taking place at Milton Keynes Bowl in the afternoon. I will check before the start if anybody is going and what time they need to be back.  Personally I will find the race on the computer somewhere and watch in comfort indoors.

Team Milton Keynes C1 Group Ride to Castle Ashby

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bike, bike building, bike maintenance, bike ride, biking, castle ashby, club ride, CYCLE RACING, garmin, menu, olney, ribble, stony stratford

And Other Business….

I rounded off a week of messing about with bikes by joining the Team MK C1 group ride to Castle Ashby yesterday and using one of them.   The chosen steed for the day was the Ribble Audax bike..

http://connect.garmin.com/activity/610161060

It was fairly good weather for the start of the ride and progressed to pretty good during the ride and then culminating in very good by the time we reached our destination, the cafe at Castle Ashby again.  Unlike last weeks ride which started as fairly good and then went downhill from there on fairly rapidly.

We managed to enjoy our chosen refreshments outside in the sunshine, nor bad for October.  The ride itself was very good and everybody was well behaved so far as I know and it was all well supervised by our leader for the day, Neil.  We also met up with the D group who had come there via a shorter route, thats why there might look like a lot of people on the picture..

I did my customary trick when riding out in this direction of dropping off from the group in Olney on the way back.  But I didn’t cheat on any miles because I had ridden over to Stony Stratford, where they were heading, for the start of the ride earlier in the day.

I think I have pretty much finished with re-organising my bike ‘stable’ and have the set-ups I require for all the various functions I could ever need and I probably don’t need any more bikes!.. hmmm we’ll see how that works out !

My next project is to find a more satisfactory storage method for them than leaning them all against each other in a big pile.  That is apart from my ‘best’ bikes which are hanging from the ceiling.  I have some ideas but its probably going to need a few more ‘garage days’ to accomplish the task.

I only managed one other ride during the week, on Thursday, just to keep my legs turning.  I have already written about in the previous post but I did myself down a bit.. I said it was 53km.. it wasn’t it was the best part of 75km.

http://connect.garmin.com/activity/608764977

In an effort to break my jinx for bad weather on club rides led by ‘yours truly’ I have volunteered myself for the vacant ride leadership slot on November 29th to Carlton.  Fellow members be warned.. !!  But for someone wishing to break a growing reputation for bad weather rides the end of November, a month before Christmas should be no problem, right ??  Oh and I have in mind a different route to the normal TMK ones, of which there are two that I know of.  More about that later though…

Devon, Bike Ride And Tour Of Britain…

Tags

bike, bike ride, biking, CYCLE RACING, devon, menu, tour of britain

After travelling to Devon on Sunday and a days relaxation and family visiting on Monday it was back on the bike on Tuesday.  In the morning we went for an easy, relaxing ride along ‘The Exe Trail’ to Exmouth.

Exe Trail Cycle Path

Late in the afternoon I took a ride to Bovey Tracey and then up to the summit of Haytor.  I have never ridden up it before but its a ride I wanted to do, I missed out on it the last few times I have been down here and I wanted to know what the Tour of Britain riders were going to experience on Thursday.

The climb is much steeper than it looks when driving up it was my first and lasting reaction.  The climbing starts as soon as you leave Bovey Tracey with a gradient that varies between 6% and 14-15%, the 6% bits in between the steep bits allowed a little relaxation of sorts.  Most of the ride was under the cover of trees until about the last kilometre which is on open moorland. and winds up again to the summit gradually getting steeper from the National Trust shop and the final 200metres is about 12%.

Click Image For Ride Details

I made it to the top in 39 minutes for the 10km from ‘home’ just outside Chudleigh Knighton via Bovey Tracey.  Thirty minutes of it was actually  climbing Haytor.

Haytor Summit

Haytor

After a few minutes recovery and a couple of photos I was on my way back down again and the actual descent took me 9 minutes.  There was a ‘dodgy’ moment on the way down when three wild Dartmoor ponies decided to cross the road at a leisurely pace just as I was approaching them at about 60kph.  Some heavy braking brought me to a virtual standstill within stroking distance of them.  The whole 20km trip took just under an hour.

On Wednesday it was a trip to Budleigh Salterton, a quaint old fashioned seaside town.  A very un-commercialised town. I took quite a few photos there but I will publish those in a gallery when I get home along with Tewkesbury photos.

Budleigh Salterton

Today, Thursday it was Tour of Britain day locally.  For the third year in succession the Tour was coming to Devon.  It passed within a mile but we biked into Bovey Tracey and found a nice vantage point about a kilometre up the climb.  It had a good view down the hill so plenty of time to see the riders approaching and maybe they would be going slow enough to get a good view of them.  A slow climb for them is equal to about my speed on a flat road but they are more than a few years younger than me. I am afraid I didnt take any pictures because my previous experience tells me that you see more of the race and riders and who is who if you don’t see it through a camera lens.  I did pick out Bradley Wiggins and Mark Cavendish riding up side by side right in front of me.

Its Not Easy You Know..

Tags

bike, bike ride, CYCLE RACING, france, menu, tour de france

Sorry Folks.. I have had a busy couple of weeks and a bit so far.. you might think I’ve been idle but actually I have been very busy with the Tour de France..

How come you might say?  Well let me tell you its no easy job being stuck on the sofa every afternoon in front of the TV.. Its a long haul for up to 4 or 5 hours or more at a time.  I need to keep myself fed and watered all the way through these long sessions.  We all know the importance of feeding and hydration in cycling.  I don’t want to be dropping off the sofa for lack of the right nutrients, mind you I might have dropped off a couple of times in the sleeping sense.

Also there are the dreaded advertisement breaks.  You need a very nimble finger to to keep swapping channels between ITV and Eurosport every time a commercial break occurs, I hope advertisers don’t find out whats going on and how they are losing viewers because I am sure its not only me that does it, in fact I know I am not.

I did manage to get a few pictures on my ‘journey’.. This is the scene of a theme park in honour of ‘The Little Prince’  (Le Petit Prince) a classic children’s book I was once persuaded to read by a friend.  Its by a French aristocrat, Antoine de Saint Exupery and was written in 1943, as it happens thats the year of my birth, also as it transpires, the year before he died.  Although basically a children’s book it does contain insights into the strangeness of the adult world.  Anyway, they built this theme park in honour of the book.

Here are a couple of pictures of the Col’d’Izoard, a 19.6 mile (31.5km) climb when the tour reached the Alps for only a brief stay this year.  It was the middle mountain climb of three on that day in a stage of 176.8 km.

On the way up..

And a view of the final few hairpins in the distance and the summit, which they went over and on to the next mountain.

Here is a picture of the ‘Chalkboard Girl’, she sits on the back of a motorbike all day and goes back and forth between the break and the peloton to let them know the time gap[s between them.  She did take time though to chalk out this message Kate and Will’s baby George on his birthday..

 

Only a few more stages to go now, tomorrow is the last stage in the Pyrenees.  Then its a flattish stage and a time trial on Saturday before the big finish in paris on Sunday..  That three weeks seems to have gone by very quickly but they do say time flies when you are busy.

So, as you can see I have indeed been very busy and not much time for riding myself, apart from the odd morning ride.

Marco Pantani 1970 – 2004

Tags

alpe d'huez, biking, CYCLE RACING, marco pantani, menu, tour de france

Today marks the tenth anniversary of the death of Marco Pantani.  The little bald headed Italian cyclist with the sticky out ears.  One of my personal favourite racing cyclists.  He did use performance enhancing drugs I know now but so did everybody else at that time.  Even though back then nobody knew for sure or to what extent.  He died from an overdose of a recreational drug as his cycling career was coming to an end.  The two guys behind him after the break where also later found to be drug users, Jan Ulrich and Richard Virenque, so it was kind of an equal match.

I just loved his aggressive style of climbing, always exciting to watch when he attacked on a climb.  This is a video of his record breaking climb of Alpe d’Huez in the 1997 Tour de France of 37 minutes, 35 seconds and it still stands until this day.  By comparison you could add nearly an hour on to that time to equal my time for the climb in 2010 ( Without drugs !!)

Moving Up..

Tags

bedfordshire, bike ride, CYCLE RACING, grafham, menu, metric

Yesterdays ride was a familiar one for me so no need of Garmin navigation systems for this ride.  I rode my ‘Grafham Loop’ without actually going to Grafham.  I side-stepped it as I didn’t intend stopping for a coffee.

I made the ride slightly harder for myself by engaging the big chain ring (50 teeth) after a couple of miles and staying there for the entire ride.  Up until now this year I have always stayed on the smaller one (34 teeth) preferring to concentrate on cadence as I regained some fitness.  I was feeling like pushing myself a bit yesterday as I am beginning to feel my fitness coming back.  It did result in a higher average speed for the distance than I might have done before although not as high as I thought I was doing at the time.

I will explain that previous remark.  I have switched my Garmin to record rides and data using the metric system and I keep trying to do mental arithmetic as I ride to convert kph to mph.  I did this because more and more people are talking in kilometres for distance and speed, namely TV commentators, the cycling media and fellow cyclists at the club.  I felt I should try and get more familiar with what the actual kph is in my head so that it becomes second nature to me in time.  I have a few landmarks in my head, for example 32kph = 20mph and 24kph = 15mph.  It also makes it easier to relate to the speeds the peloton gets up to in the races on TV.  Not that I can actually relate to those sort of speeds and over those distances personally other than to be in awe of them.  It does make for a reality check though.

A Little 'Psychle' Therapy

Tags

bike ride, biking, colnago, corsica, CYCLE RACING, france, menu, northamptonshire, tour de france, towcester

Today didn’t get off to a good start.  Two things didn’t turn out as I had hoped they might.  I say ‘hoped they might’ instead of ‘expected they might’ as I never really expect things to turn out for the best but I do always hope they will.

I had been looking forward to a nice bike ride this morning and they almost put me off it.  I just felt disappointed and didn’t feel like making the effort and getting out.  But, when I weighed it up the options were either to stay around home and mope around and be miserable or get over it, get ready and get out and take out my frustrations on the Colnago.  I fortunately opted for the latter and once I was a few miles into the ride I was thinking of other things.  This is what usually happens.  The bike is a good place for thinking and getting your head around things.  Sometimes miles pass and I suddenly find myself somewhere without having noticed how I got there.

Click Image For Ride Stats

I did the western leaf of my clover leaf pattern of rides from home.  It was an old favourite ride that I adapted and extended a little to make it up to the required 45’ish miles of the other three directions.  I headed out in a north westerly direction into Northamptonshire towards Blisworth and then on to Towcester, near to the racecourse.  It was around here that I encountered some of the traffic still leaving from yesterdays Grand Prix at Silverstone, which is just up the road.

It was mainly big white vans and camper vans which I assumed were probably traders and had stayed overnight.  It was about five or six miles to the circuit from there and although I was going along very rural roads there were police ‘No Parking’ cones placed about every hundred yards or so by the roadside.  It would have been some walk for spectators.

It was here that I changed direction and lost the generally north westerly head wind and found a generally cycling friendly tail wind.  This will be evident from the stats if you look at average speeds for the five mile segments.  It was then down to Stony Stratford on the northern perimeter of Milton Keynes, after that there were just twelve miles home across country.

I managed to get home just in time to start viewing todays stage of the Tour de France live on TV.  The first three stages have been based on the French Island of Corsica in the Mediterranean sea.  What a beautiful place it is.  Magnificent mountain scenery surrounded by a wonderful coastline of crystal clear waters and the helicopter shots were spectacular and breathtaking sometimes.  I would think there might be a big increase in the tourist trade there as a result of all the TV exposure all over the world.  I heard on the programme yesterday that the TV helicopter pilots are all Alpine rescue helicopter pilots in the winter taking a break from the ‘day job’.  What a great and exciting year they must have!!

So there we have it, if somethings getting you down take it out on the bike, it wont mind, its what it was made for and you’ll feel better for it all round.