Peaslake Mountain Bike Orionteering

Niall and myself made up team SWRC in the 3hr team section of the MTBO event in Peaslake. This was my first event of 2015 and I really enjoyed it. We came 5th in category and 25th overall from 74. Niall had a cut in his tyre large enough that the sealant would not seal, so he had to put an inner tube in. I had the only map holder and took us on a tour of Coldharbour common which all cost us time. We made it back with just 3 minutes to spare after a mad dash along the A25 back to Gomshall and then up Rad lane. We somehow managed to miss the last control along here which would have given us another 50pts
Results here 

Not taking it too seriously and stopping for selfie amongst the bluebells

Niall pumping up his tyre only to find it wasn't sealing. 

I really like this mountain bike race format. There is a summer series called TrailTrax events that can be found on the Gorrick site HERE  The next event is Sunday 31st May.

Long distance cycling - In the beginning.

Let’s set the scene a little. Bicycles were the fastest things on the road 120 years ago and were at technology’s cutting edge. Firmly in the focus of entrepreneurs, high society and sportsmen, they captured society’s attention. Leisure cycling for the upper classes consisted of Sunday ‘spins’ or week-long tours between railway stations. Fit young men (‘scorchers’) hurtled through quiet villages in pursuit of bragging rights. Races on the open road and point-to-point records had paid riders supported and paced by teams of cyclists to boost their speed. The public was enraptured by feats of athleticism and races got longer and tougher, pushing riders to the limit.
Maurice Martin, cycle-tourist and writer, had helped found a weekly cycling newspaper, “Veloce-Sport”, in Bordeaux. By the mid-1880s, excessive support and press coverage of races and racers had begun to annoy him. Of an estimated 25,000 French cyclists, perhaps 500 had racing licences. In response, Martin created a new type of event, not for racers or the relaxed touring cyclists but ‘vrai tourisme rapide’ (rapid tourists). The Union Velocipedique Francaise started sanctioning the first ‘brevets’ in 1888, requiring 100+ km a day; far enough on the unsurfaced roads.
Martin helped organise the 572 km Bordeaux-Paris brevet in May 1891 with Pierre Giffard (editor of “Le Petite Journal”) and riders were expected to finish in five days. Unhappily for the French, some English riders treated it as a race, hired pacers and claimed the top four places with George Pilkington Mills finishing in 27 hours. An experienced racer, he’d won the first North Roads 24-hr race in 1886 with 227 miles on a high-wheeler (‘penny farthing’). The first British 24-hr race had been in 1882. France was agog and newspaper sales soared. Bordeaux-Paris, the ‘Derby of the Road’, lasted into the 1980s as a professional race. Racers drafted dernys (special mopeds) for the second half, a relic of the paced racing of early years.
June 1891 saw the North Road Cycling Club’s first ‘York Run’, with 25 riders starting and 10 finishing the 200 miles (320 km) from London to York within 21 hrs 30 min. The non-competitive ride continued until 1973, albeit with a two-decade gap after 1916.
Read the whole story by following this LINK

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A version of the York Run is still being organised, called the York Arrow and takes place on Good Friday each year, and which I have taken part in the last couple of years. It's a team event where 3-5 riders set off from there nominated start point, so although we did start from London, other teams started in many other locations, north and south of York. Nowadays you have to cover atleast 360km and most teams plan to ride around 400km in the 24hrs from Friday morning till Saturday morning.
Our team of 4 met on London bridge just before 9am for this photo then it was off to the ATM for a proof of start time, as close to 9am as we could manage.

Captain Rimas, Parky, Mike & Lee

The forecast was for showers and so we prepared accordingly. The showers arrived just as we reached our lunch stop in St Ives. Reaching Spalding at 180km and Lee had had enough of the ride. He was on a new recumbent bike that he had only ridden a few shorter rides on and was finding the new riding position made his wrists painful. He headed off to find a train home while we three pushed on.  Then we had another stop at 230km around 8pm in a pub. From then on its into the dark night section, a quick climb up onto the Lincolnshire wolds to warm up and later arriving at the Humber bridge around 2am. Then into Yorkshire for a last control where we arrived at 5:30am allowing us 1.5hrs breathing time, just incase we had a problem earlier. As it was we had just a single puncture, but that was at night in the rain, which took longer than I thought to fix.

The 22hr control at Howden (6-7am)

Our arrival in York (8:45am)

training weekend-eastbourne

the b group gets ready for the off, outside the cavendish hotel eastbourne,
our leader dave pinder, took us on a great route down via the lama park for tea,
and then on a very hilly section , from the ashdown forest to the start of the
cuckoo trail, flat and out of the wind. I am not sure what the other guests made of us
as we as we made our way to reception covered in muck from the ride. The cavendish
is a fantastic hotel with great service, and we enjoyed a good meal, wine, and chat
till bed time. after a bit of a lay in due clocks change, and a wish to miss the early
rain, we made it down for breakfast, as the gale blew outside. the route back was
almost the same apart for tea at danehill. 3 punctures and a broken chain later,we made it
back to dorking. a big thanks to dave pinder for the wayfinding and to geoff redhead for
booking the hotel.