Rapha Festive 500 #10, Part II

Team Brevet Bird rides for Harrison’s Fund

To catch up with the story so far click HERE

Day 5

The Evil Coldness

The view out of all windows at Chez Hirondelle confirmed cold.  Cars were thickly covered with frost, as were roof tops.  The birds huddled in big, fat leylandii trees rather than venture out to the bird feeding station to feast on fat blocks, dried mealworm and other delicacies.  There was only one sensible option; to watch the world change from white back to technicolour.

Slowly the frost cleared and the temperature on the weather station rose.  The coming together of these two things was such that I could schedule a post-lunch ride.  Road conditions improved sufficiently to choose Beryl the Kinesis with her almost-skinny fat tyres over Scotti the MTB with fat Big Apple tyres.

I alighted onto one of my regular home office commute circuits.  New Year’s Green lane was surprisingly OK (no slush-puppy corner) but with the ford in full spate.    Keeping to the main road passing through West Hyde and Maples Cross saved sloshing through the streams in the lanes.  I didn’t need to cross the Great Lake of Deadhearn Lane which I feared may have exceeded bottom bracket height, courtesy of Storm Bella.  Then a needless climb to immediately descend into Rickmansworth and back home.

For the whole ride I was in tier 4, with a significant amount of traffic passing me.  The opposite could be said of walkers and cyclists.  As I exited Rickmansworth to Moor Park and home, the number of lycra-clad males on road bikes increased.  More Festive 500-kilometre chasers?

Arriving at Chez Hirondelle, we were so cold that three of the team jumped onto the full-blast radiator to warm up.  Alas, I am not a suitable size for the radiator so a superhot shower for me.

58km for the day, running total 351km

Day 6

Time to go and visit the vampires

My vasculitis check-up was going to be a New Year’s Eve treat.  Therefore, time to visit the Charing Cross Hospital vampires and get a blood test.  The morning was stupidly cold but without frost.  As Charing Cross Hospital is one of the sites I work at, it was auto pilot and alight onto my commuting tramlines at stupid o’clock.   From home to Hammersmith, the temperature didn’t get to 1c.  Tier 4 all the way and traffic was rare as hens teeth.

The next part mainly follows the river to West Middlesex Hospital, the other site.  The highlights of this 12km are the Capability Brown statue, Hammersmith Bridge and a rather good coffee shop, The Coffee Traveller.  From there, I took the roughstuff lane alongside Osterley House and the M4.  It was packed with walkers, dogs and kids on bicycles, but is a moment of escape from grey suburbia.  After this it was the Uxbridge Road, accompanied by motorised traffic with the occasional utility cyclist.

With Uxbridge behind me, I was at a critical decision point – 100km or 80km?  Beryl pointed in the direction of the longer route, so up the lanes to slosh through the streams I went.  There was no alternative to the Great Lake of Deadhearn Lane and it seemed to be peak hour with cars and cyclists in both directions.

The last choice near Chorleywood – straight on at the crossroads to go into Rickmansworth or turn left for bonus kms and extra hills?  The cold plus the call of the teapot were the deciding factors.  Rickmansworth then almost directly home as I couldn’t resist rounding the day up a bit more.

102km for the day, running total 453km

Day 7

Arrivee

The riding window is always pre-defined by necessary things, then reshaped by the weather.  Today, more frost and silly low temperatures but by 10am, I was good to go.  Keeping onto known ice-free roads, I headed for the Ickenham Pump, then over to Uxbridge and Denham again.  Another section of main road and into the lanes for a bit as the temperatures rose.  Again, lots of traffic, not many walkers or utility cyclists but quite a number of MAMILs who looked like Festive 500 folk.

Rolled up to my front door, pressed the Garmin button which whizzed the kilometres to Strava.  A virtual reality patch popped up on my phone and Festive 500 number ten in the bag.

48km for the day, running total 502km

Day 8

Into the freezer

A late start was a double guarantee, thick frost over night plus a telephone consultation.  The pedals didn’t start turning to almost three o’clock, what with lunch and the neurologist running late.

Given the conditions, I decided to trundle round one of my small standard loops from home as I was quite sure it was ice-safe.  Leaving suburbia’s relative warmth i.e. almost 2c and out into the lanes where the temperature rapidly dropped.  It settled under zero, so a touch chilly.  The pond in Harefield confirmed the Garmin’s temperature – covered in ice.

With 42km on the Garmin when I was nearly back, it was way too tempting to go the long way home.  50km is such an attractive number.  The reward was lots of beautifully Christmasly-lit houses.  The reindeer with his mask on was rather good.

53km for the day, running total 555km

Round up

I’m very happy to have bagged Festive 500 number ten.  This was certainly one of the more difficult overall.  Trapped in a reduced playground due to COVID and no coffee shops to warm up in with a good mocha and accompanying GF cake.  Also, my vasculitis currently causes a lot of pain and generally unwell and tired. It increases sensitivity to cold, particularly my feet.  I had to manage my riding time carefully to ensure that I didn’t get too cold.  If I got too cold, the result would be increasingly greater pain.

The challenge of telling the rides’ stories in photos in an area that I know so well was something I really enjoyed.  It makes you look more carefully at scenery you normally take for granted.  Some of the ride routes were based on visiting something that I wished to photograph, such as Ickenham Village Pump on day 7.

The thing I have not been particularly successful with is the fundraising.  Many people believe that this sort of thing is a pushover for me, so the riding lacks the ‘challenge’ that is generally required for fundraising.  The unseen disability is always problematic.  Do you keep quiet and just get on with it or bore the pants off people about it?  For the last three years, I have taken the approach of ‘just get on with it’, which has bitten me on the bum for this fundraising challenge.

Raising funds for a rare disease such as Duchenne, doesn’t resonate with people as say breast cancer.  From a research perspective, it is fantastic that technology such as genome sequencing is readily available and that the cohort for this disease is big enough for meaningful outcomes.  Hopefully finding out how it can be treated isn’t far off.  I understand why sponsorship is low but I take my hat off to Harrison’s Fund for their persistence in such a difficult task.

If you would like to contribute to Harrison’s Fund click HERE

Rapha Festive 500 #10

Team Brevet Bird rides for Harrison’s Fund

The Rapha Festive 500 has been a big part of my Christmas celebrations for the last nine years.  The nominal goal is to ride 500km between Christmas Eve and the close of play on New Year’s Eve.  The real part of the challenge is to document your journey in photos, words or both.  If you reached 500km, a rather wonderful patch was yours.

Every one of the last nine years the ride has been totally different, so the story line for the 500km is never the same.  The first Festive 500, with 200km brevets to Ledbury and then back, was made more memorable for the days being filled with endless rain.  Defeating icy roads with the trike was another memorable year.  This year, the dominant themes are the COVID restrictions and my ongoing struggle with neuropathic vasculitis which makes riding my bike a bit more challenging, due to the amount of pain the nerve damage causes.

Another twist has been added to the journey, a challenge set by the Westerly CC to raise funds for research into Duchenne’s Disease.  It is a disease that affects only male children and most, if not all, do not make it to adulthood.  A tough gig for both the parents and the affected children. Harrison’s Fund has been set up to raise funds for research.  The Harrison’s Fund remit is to find a cure for the disease, rather than provide palliative support and treatment.

As a bike rider who works in NHS cancer research, this was a challenge I could not turn down.

Each day will have a ride diary. There will be photos on my Instagram account.  Plus there the Twitter account run by Team Brevet Bird: Digby, Jock and Timpsie.

To sponsor us in this quest click HERE

Day 1

Crimbo parcel delivery service & a spot of errandonneuring

Twas the day before Christmas.  Due to the everchanging COVID tier system and the restrictions these changes bring, my mother had a Christmas parcel to be delivered almost locally and now needed a courier.  As it wasn’t too far between home and the recipient (as the crow flies(, Mum asked if I could deliver it.  Delivery charge = 2 bags of M&S large chocolate button.

The day was bright and sunny.  Beryl the Kinesis was ready to go.  The parcel fitted into my saddle bag along with two members of Team Brevet Bird, Digby and Jock.  We were all set.  Little did we know that we were carrying a stuffie owl.

After a small urban loop, we headed out into the lanes which were still like riding through shallow riverbeds with the quantity of water and gravel that had accumulated.  Luckily Beryl was shod with was seems to be the perfect tubeless touring tyre, Schwalbe Almotion TLE, which seems to keep the puncture fairy mostly away.  The big flood near Chalfont St Giles (The Great Lake of DeadHern Lane) was now so big and deep, it almost requires a ferry service.  Luckily, with a see-sawing pedal motion, Beryl made it across the lake.  Strangely runners and cyclists were pretty thin on the ground through this section, although family groups of walkers could be spied in the villages.

Thus, I continued pedalling and resisted the best mocha in town as I whizzed past KoHo in Little Chalfont and then a few roller coasters before I grovelled up Ley Hill.  Stopped off briefly at Venus Hill, where I had spent a good hour with my Dad as a teenager trundling around the lanes to find what isn’t really a hill at all.  Then it was mainly downhill to our parcel drop – successfully made. Retrace up, belt down the big hill into Rickmansworth, then home.  We arrived at Chez Hirondelle with 84km on the GPS.

But there were some other errands that needed running.  By doing this by bicicle this would be an errandonnee .  Scotti the MTB was the machine of choice as, with a pair of big Karrimor panniers, all the errands could be done in one hit.  Into Pinner to pick up the M&S order, then to Tesco’s at Pinner Green for the pharmacy and home.  Another 16km on the GPS.

100km for the day, running total 100km

Day 2

Christmas Day and the great coldness

Christmas day was bright but cold.  Frost-covered cars and rooftops.  The weather station confirmed cold.  The planned early start was binned in exchange for a later 10am start.  Dave our bike butler was along for this ride.  With the knowledge that the lanes were so wet that they would have turned into ice rinks, they were immediately no-go areas.  Scotti the MTB was deployed as he has both fat Big Apple tyres and SPD pedals letting me don alpaca socks, Shimano SPD boots plus overshoes. With such foot coverings, my feet stood some chance of not becoming ice blocks. Dave used his anti-ice machine, a trike.

A brisk main road ride ensued, including climbing up to the giddy hights of Chorleywood to immediately descend to Rickmansworth and then home by Moor Park.  Just to round things up, as Dave headed directly for home, I squeezed a small loop in to nudge the ride to the 40km mark.  I still made it home by the auspicious hour in time to be home for Christmas Day’s low key COVID festivities.

43km for the day, running total 142km

Day 3

Boxing Day

Due to excessive faffing, plus weather that wasn’t exactly enticing, a ride kicked off after lunch.  I wasn’t entirely on my own as Digby and Jock were ensconced in the Carradice.  The weather was now warm, i.e., 6c but came with inbuilt dampness.  After a tour of the delights of Uxbridge, a former coaching town when coaches were pulled by horses, I headed for the Oxford Road and passed ‘The Crown & Treaty’ where Oliver Cromwell and King Charles held a meeting to stop the Civil War.  This was a fail. 

Into Denham where Cromwell’s New Model Army tramped through on several occasion and up the riverbed lanes.  Another crossing of the Great Lake of DeadHern Lane.  Easy-peasy with Scotti and his high bottom bracket. Darkness started to descend as I took a dogleg into Little Chalfont and back.  The houses on the outward-bound section had some amazing Christmas lights, making riding in the dark a pleasure.  Then home via the squiggly descent off Chorleywood, through Rickmansworth and home.  During the run into Chez Hirondelle, as I reach suburbia, I passed a number of road cyclists.  Were they too chasing the Festive 500?

65km for the day, running total 209km

Day 4

The day of many lakes

The weather was set fine; sun, blue skies and relatively warm, 6c.  The lanes of Hertfordshire, Dacorum and Buckinghamshire called.  We set off, me on Beryl the Kinesis and Dave on the trike again.  Within 5km of leaving home, the first flood appeared but by using a service road, this one was avoided.  The same couldn’t be said for the 20 or so floods that followed, installed by storm Bella overnight  Deep, long, wide, skinny, all combinations existed.  Some lanes even had floods separated by small sections of road.  Keeping feet dry simply became mission impossible, despite overshoes.

We passed plenty of walkers, but cyclists were very thin on the ground.  Perhaps they didn’t want to get their feet wet and give their bikes the Paris-Roubaix look?  To add to the fun and games, one of Dave’s trike’s rear axles started to make funny and quite disconcerting noises.  Running up to 70ish km, it was time to swing for home.  The lure of lunch, a hot shower and central heating was too much to resist.

84km for the day, running total 293km

Kilometers Rich; Time Poor

 After last years trials and tribulations caused by a combination of getting sick and unknowingly wearing out my very essential orthotics, it’s been good to feel fit and healthy again. It wasn’t until a month or so ago, that I realised what an impact my soggy and ride weary carbon fibre orthotics had been making. They were the main reason for the back issues that I had suffered in Portugal and Australia. The new springy carbon fibre orthotics that were installed in November, had by May worked their magic. Riding up big hills now didn’t involve extended conversations with granny and the big ring on Casper again became the ring of preference for riding on flat and undulating ground. Riding became a joy again and resulted in lots of kilometres accumulating, but leaving me time poor for activities outside of turning the pedals and going to work. Hence the miles eater diary has been regularly fed but the blog has been on a rather low word diet.

Thus far the planned big rides have all worked out, even if the Israeli 1,000km brevet involved a nail biting finish with only 10 minutes to spare at the arrivee. The campaign to complete the Aigle d’Or has also been successful, with the final 1,900 audax kilometres being bagged in France and an autumn pizza party to look forward to with the Alsace 67 audax group. To keep things balanced, there is a second ACF R5000 award to claim. I’ve also taken Casper to meet the joys of the Welsh mountains on the Bryan Chapman 600 rando (my 9^th edition). It was a splendid weekend a-wheel and I’m quite sure we’ll be back.

Next on the menu is London Edinburgh London, which starts Sunday 28^th July from Loughton, nr London. This will be my 3^rd edition. Through no particular planning each edition has been ridden on a different bike, a Robert’s steel frame then an Enigma titanium frame. For this edition it will be Casper the Little White Moulton. There is no pre-planned schedule for this ride. Like all of my long brevets, I’m using the turn up and see how it goes approach. Riding like this has so far always produced a memorable and unexpected adventure within the structure of a randonnee. Hopefully the one thing missing from this LEL will be ‘weather’, particularly rain or cold, which have graced both previous LELs in unprecedented quantities.

As we speak, Casper the Little White Moulton and the Co-Pilot are poised to commence the next brevet adventure.

Mile Eater Diary – February 2012

As January quietly slipped into February the weather gods kept to their commitment to provide temperatures that where akin to those found in a freezer. Not daunted I continued to pedal; hermetically sealed in my club mega windblocker jacket along with plenty of merino wool and windblocker cycle longs. Just as I was approaching the weekly minimum 400km target the weather gods did the dastardly deed and spent a whole Sunday depositing loads of nasty cold white stuff on the ground. I was left looking out of the window admiring the fine whiteness of the outside world for the next 7 days. The only respite came when I was able to sneak 12km down to Sainsbugs and back on the Brompton in between top up snow fall.

Thankfully, the weather gods got fed up with their little game and allowed the weather to fine up and purposeful cycling to recommence. The improvement in the weather was so good that a near perfect day was provided for the Reading Kennett Valley Run 200km randonnee. The peloton contained many of the ‘usual suspects’, including YACF’s Lyrca Man and RideHard in search of their February Randonneur Round the Year award ride. The controls at Hungerford and Bratton were as usual excellent, both cafes happily coping with a mega influx of hungry cyclists. Mick Simmons and his team did a fantastic job at the arrivee providing a warm welcome and a great post ride feast.

The Bike Hub app is great, particularly for navigating around central London. The best bit being that it knows all the cycle paths and cut-troughs that only a local rider would know. However, when it decides to have one of its bad bike Sat Nav days, things get not only interesting but very, very frustrating. Riding the Brompton to my new place of work with the Bike Hub navigating (as and when it felt like it) provided some unexpected but interesting urban adventures. The route is now safely logged in my brain’s navigation SIM card, so no more suffering from the vagaries of Mr Bike Hub. Although, having tried other bike Sat Nav Apps, this is the best one by far and keeps improving all the time.

The Bike Butler sourced and installed the most fantastic pair of pedals onto the Brompton. The Wellgo plug-in pedals allow you the luxury to choose either SPDs or flat pedals but when folding the Brompton, the pedals aren’t in the way as they simply pull out and then plug in when you are ready to ride again. Having thoroughly tested them in and around town, including on Gypsy Bugs Utilitaire challenge, they get big ‘thumbs up’.

In ’ things to look forward to’, the spoke elves finally visited Chez Brevet Bird as February faded into March with the necessary spokes for the Alfine 11 speed hub and it’s rim. So once the bike butler has knitted the spokes with the hub and rim, the first spin on Scotti avec Alfine isn’t too far way. Also, I still need to check out if the ‘Remede du Randonneur’ works that I was recently given!

Mile Eater Diary – January 2012

After January 2010, it was like getting an extended Christmas present with the perfect winter cycling weather that January 2011 presented. Knowing that the weather gods can give with one hand and then take back as quickly with the other, utilizing the good weather a-wheel was a must.

A first was scored, by riding the calendar version of the Poor Student 200km randonnee event from Oxford. It is a ride that is usually cursed with cold and icy conditions. This edition was positively balmy. The route is simple but effective with intermediate controls at Malmesbury and Chipping Campden. It was a chance to meet up with numerous friends, many chasing the AUK Randonneur Round the Year award. This included from the YACF forum Lycraman, having successfully completed his first in 2010 and RideHard who is aiming to obtain his first.

Unbelievably, the good weather continued and made the Willy Warmer 200km another fine day a-wheel. This is an excellent winter ride mainly on good A and B roads, with not too many secret squirrel info controls, so even in bad years it is usually rideable. The organisation as always was excellent, so a big thumbs up to Paul Stewart from the Willesden.

The weather gods were of course bound to change their minds and retract the good weather. The super freezy elves were let loose on just about the last week in January. A good day meant that its zenith at high noon reached a heady 4C. The only upside to the cold spell was little or no humidity. This translated as little or no risk of ice, so grumbling about the Sahara like conditions created by the spread but unused road salt seemed a little out of order. I closed the month with over double the mileage tally of January 2010, keeping quest to reach 200,000 recorded miles by the close of play this year on target.

In ‘things to look forward to’, my new Alfine 11 speed hub arrived. This is to re-new the rear wheel that I wore out on my Scott MTB in December after many years of faithful service over countless miles. I’m now just waiting on spokes, rims and my tame bike butler to put it all together and I can go out for a test ride.