The final 220 miles and a pair of Donkeys

Sadly my phone died on the way home and for some reason that I have yet to fathom, I was unable to charge it from the hub dynamo. The one picture that I took in transit, therefore, whilst fun to have taken, is not the most dynamic. There would have been plenty better along the way.

I woke before my alarm at about 04:45. Took in the view from my bivi-bag and set to sorting out my kit.

Polishing off an iced latte and some chocolate I scrambled out from my hiding place and hit the road.

After a couple of roundabouts, I discovered that the A5 was shut. Oh dear. what a shame....for cars! But not for me. 15 miles of this! Now that's what I call a cycle lane. I wasn't joined by another car, until I was ushered off the dual carriageway by the approach of the M54, by which time they must have re-opened it and it had served it's purpose for me.

Since the road had been so straight forward, I had not at this point bothered to turn on the navigation, other than to record my distance. I was somewhat perturbed therefore, to discover that I could not find a way to reverse my previous routing and began instead the slightly tedious task of navigating to the next waypoint in turn. Whilst this might not seem to be such an issue, it involved stopping frequently to decipher the route and chewed up the best part of an hour in total before I reached home.

In Leicestershire again, I stopped after 105 miles for a sandwich on this tiny country lane. sitting in a grassy meadow with just the songbirds as company, I was approached by a couple leading two donkeys and accompanied by their dog.

It turns out, they walk their animals for about 10-15 miles and the donkeys carry the tent and food for the owners, whilst they themselves are content to snack on the grass as the mooch along.

I had suddenly hit upon a new way to travel and like Toad of Toad Hall, I determined to give this ago myself. At least the family might agree to join me.

To cut a long story short. That was half way. At 21:45 I hauled into Hethersett.

521 miles later I was wiser and more prepared for waht now begins in less than a calendar month.

Istanbul here we come.

Total mileage since 31st dec 2014, now 4082 miles.

Saturday evening. Over the hedge.

At 8 in the evening I headed out of Aber with my brother, Andy for the first couple of miles after catching a couple for photos for the work newsletter down on the seafront.

The climb up to Nant Yr Arian is steady and no too steep. Aided by a decent tail wind now, I was at the carpark with 40 minutes. If you have never been here and you are either into wildlife or mountain biking, then this is well worth a visit. There is a red kite feeding station here and at its peak can see upwards of 40 kites in the air at the same time.

The mountain bike trail, built by Andy and his team is a mecca for mountian bikers and is one of a number of really good trails in North Wales.

www.ibikeride.com/wales/1686-nant-yr-arian-mountain-bike-trail-centre

The climb from here to the A44s summit across the Cambrian Mountains en route to Llangurig and then Welshpool is steady. At times I was averaging over 15 mph going up hill. When it comes to wind, I guess it is as true as anything else. You reap what you sew. Friday's hard work was being repaid in spadefulls. From the top it was even more the case, since the decent from there felt as though it continued all the way into Netwon, about 25 miles to the east.

I finally reached the outskirts of Shrewsbury at 1 in the morning. Under the glow of a roundabout lamp, I stole into the hedge beside the road and made myself a home.

The paler boarder at the base of the trees to the right of my feet is the A5. After 72 miles, Iwasn't going to notice the traffic and I set my alarm for 4 hours later.

Good night.

230/500 Friday the rest of the day. Invaluable lessons.

Certainly the discomfort of sitting in a saddle for hours on end has faded into numb memory, but the second 100 miles of the 230 mile total that I completed on Friday were a lot harder than the first.

Grinding out big miles is essential at some pint before the TCR if you are to prepare yourself mentally for the rigors of a race that demand that you do this day in, day out for two weeks. It is impossible to imagine the feeling of physical exhaustion and therefore begin to recognise where your limits are, unless you've been there. These are invaluable lessons.

There is some stunning countryside in the heart of Leicestershire. There are also lots and lots of short, rolling hills. Lots of them. Hills make for exhilarating descents, but they also make for thigh burning climbs. Good training as it happens for what lies ahead.

The fact that I stopped, stopping to take photos is indicative of my deteriorating energy levels and determination to plough on. But there were still landmarks to be admired. (I hadn't appreciated that these cooling towers are actually on stilts and not embedded in the ground!)

All I do recall is that by the time I had completed 170 miles and was somewhere like Stafford, I felt physically sick and more depleted than I had expected. The toil of wind and hills had drained me of energy and I needed to eat...BIG.

There was not a great choice in the high street, it has to be said. If I recall correctly there was a choice of almost every kind of fatty fast food you could think of, and thankfully a kebab shop that advertised that it also made spag bol. I opted for a double portion of that. Paid a King's ransom for the pleasure and then forced myself to eat what my body was determined to expel. The joys of searching your limits.

Within half an hour I felt like a new man. The mileage crept slowly upwards toward my longest ever distance in a day and by the time I was within reach of Shrewsbury, I had passed 208 miles and counting.

The old Roman road of Watling Street, the A5, straight as an arrow drew me into Wales, a landmark in itself and having negotiated a couple of roundabouts on Shrewsbury's southern bypass, I headed into the Shropshire countryside and the hills of my birth.

The scenery here, like that of parts of Leicestershire, is beautiful. The hills were never long, but they became relentless and I realised that I would have been much better to have stuck to the main road into Welshpool.

I called ahead to speak to my brother, towards whose house in Aberystwyth I was headed and at 231 miles, completely spent and with a forecast of overnight rain, I gladly accepted his invitation to pick me up and cart me the reamining 55 miles over the Welsh mountains.

More to come...

PLease continue to show your support for my fund-raising efforts via the justgiving address hown on the card above. Thank you. John

Big ride, big lessons. The first 100/520

I am in recovery, that tells a story in itself.

On Friday morning at 03:00, I set off from home, just south of Norwich, Norfolk heading for Aberystwyth, Wales. Total distance about 280 miles give or take.

I had been watching the forecast for a week or more. Rain never seemed to feature significantly until after 22:00 on the Friday night, so I figured that one way or another I would either be exhausted and asleep by then or have chosen to break my journey into three sections each of about 180 miles. The biggest headache was going to be the 10-15 mph headwind and so it proved to be.

It was an even 10 deg C when I left home. Cool enough to warrant a warmer jacket over the cycle top without overheating. It was barely dark and certainly light enough to have ridden without lights had it been safe to do so. By 4 it was almost broad daylight.

 I crossed the overflow cut of the Great Ouse in Downham Market as warmth was just about beginning to seep through from the early morning sunshine. The evidence form this picture suggests that there was no wind at all, but trust me, it was there. A constant reminder of the benefits of aero-bars in this flattest of flat landscapes.

The roads were getting a little busy as I approached Peterborough on the Wisbech Road. (An option that I avoided on the way home and would not recommend on a busy day.) Certainly I was glad to be off it, swapping road for cycle path, coming into the Environment City of Britain, though for which year, I can't remember. I'll say one thing though, Peterborough has a myriad of cycle paths that allow safe passage from one side to the other. Trust your satnav. It will spit you out the other end, even if on the way, you are certain you're going to end up in an industrial wasteland.

Rutland Water was my first 100 mile mark and considering the wind, I felt that these figures were reasonable. It is interesting how easily you can fritter away an hour of stopped time. In this case largely taken up enjoying a coffee and cake after about 80 miles. it seems that there is little doubt though, the hare and the tortoise are as relevant as they ever were. Minimising stopped time is critical if you want to cover big miles in a day.

For cruisers, please note the presence of a good cycle path around Rutland, seen here in the picture. It was so full of bicycles though, that I stuck to the road for want of having to avoid getting stuck 'in traffic'. Another day, when I head back there to watch the Ospreys at their nest site maybe, I'll take the slow lane with the boys and enjoy the view.

The night before.

I'm waiting on the kids going to bed and finishing off a talk to be given to Mulbarton Junior School, first thing Monday morning. The forecast has gone from dry and slightly windy to a more North Westerly flow with rain and rain showers at intervals. With travelling west, I look to avoid the rain in the most part, but it will catch me up at some point, so that as well as pedalling into the wind, I'm also going to get wet. With a bit of luck the worst of the frontal weather, forecast for Saturday night might well pass as I'm sleeping off the first 300. One can only hope.

This will make for a good test and provide the impetus to get to Aberystwyth in one hit. A tall order but worth a go.

Since the only way that I can keep in touch with you all is via twitter, please follow me at @johnnymbakewell

Forget the inches, fractions of millimetres are everything

As I come to the end of my fourth night shift working for the GP Out of Hours service in Norfolk, I am less than 24 hours away from starting my testing ground 600 mile return trip to Aberystwyth.

I have gone through the contents of the various bags on the bike, in my head and will pack and repack those later today, trying to cut down on the weight at each re-load. Ultimately it will be a compromise and more than 50% of what I carry will never get touched. It has to be there just in case. I could probably get away with leaving 90% of it behind on a short duration ride like this one, but this is really about reminding myself what the TCR is really about and building up psychological reserves. Big long days, followed by big long days.

Yesterday I cruised for 25 miles and made one absolutely crucial adjustment to my bike. For weeks I had been riding with discomfort in the right side of my pelvic seat. I had resisted changing anything. The seat looked straight and I was happy with the height. It can't have been perfect however, I was too uncomfortable. I stopped half way round, undid the seat post and eyeing up the line between saddle and stem, I adjusted the lateral position of the seat by a fraction of a mm.

I honestly could not have expected it to make so much difference. The lesson? Don't sit on little changes that can make a huge difference. Little amounts of discomfort on a 10 mile ride, become unbearable after 100 and ride limiting beyond that.

So tomorrow morning at 03:00 when I aim to set out, the weather in Norwich will be lightly overcast, 12 deg C and with 9mph of slightly off centre headwind. During the early morning it looks sunny with the wind backing to the NW the clouds are thickening, but no rain. Fingers crossed.

I shall tweet my progress via @johnnymbakewell, so please feel free to send messages of encouragement, or abuse if you must.

Mulbarton Junior School, I shall see you all in assembly on Monday morning, bright and bushy-tailed.

Evening rides and preparation. 3500 miles in.

With Aberystwyth in my sights for next weekend I'm slowing down a little and will not cycle any long miles this weekend. The planned route for the weekend of the Summer solstice is about 600 miles in total. About as long as the first leg of the TCR planned from midnight, July 24th and the first few days of the race.

Since last Saturday's 157, I have clocked about another 90 miles, and am just approaching the 3500 miles of training mark. My average for the 163 days since I started now up and over 21 miles a day. By the time I return from Wales...all things going my way, this will have jumped to 25 miles every day since 31st December 2014. That had better be enough, because I'm not sure where I'm going to find the time to do lots more than that.

I have the bike set-up exactly as I want it and am looking forward to testing out the bivi-bag and light weight summer sleeping bag somewhere amongst the Welsh borders. I apologise in advance Mr Farmer, but I shall be in a hedge near you. Please don't mistake me for a badger or worse still a fox, since my shelter is red!

I would like to take this opportunity to thank the 8 contributors to my justgiving page. In total rasing £210 so far, which says a lot for their generosity. Please do join them in supporting this very worthwhile cause and don't forget to get the kids geared up to follow my little dot. Dot number 35 in 42 days time.

A good training ride in every way. (Don't count your chickens, especially not in Norfolk.)

What starts out as a straight forward, straight line, tail wind driven 160 miles doesn't at first seem too

demanding. By now, I'm confident that I can do the miles, and reasonably quickly, but the whole point of the TCR, is that longevity when it comes to riding a bike makes for plenty of time for things to go wrong.

I had travelled to Amersham in Buckinghamshire, to see my Aunt. (An unbelievably courageous woman in the face of serious illness and an inspiration to anyone facing adversity.)

For some reason I chose to switch on my GPS when I first arrived. I knew that there appeared to be a problem with the mapping of my route and hoped that it was just geographical, i.e it would resolve on arrival at the start of the route. How naive! The minute I pressed GO on the navigation screen for the first leg, it was evident that it wasn't going to work and it became apparent that for one reason or another I had not managed to download the road map overlays from Basecamp. The route was there, but nothing for it to sit on!

As I will do when I'm away in July, I did have a paper map as back up, but this would have been tortuous, if not unworkable over this kind of distance. OK for touring, far from ideal when racing hard.

I set too after lunch, downloading basecamp on my aunt's laptop and ordering the necessary maps through openstreetmap.nl and waited for them to arrive. Thankful for a short wait, I succeeded in acquiring what I needed and still managed to hit the road by 14:05. Phew.

The lanes through Buckinghamshire towards Hemel Hemstead are seriously lumpy and as it happens bumpy. The downhills were hair-raising and juddering, the uphills...well, up. In the cool sunshine though it was all pleasure. I was having fun as I crossed the Thames near Bourne End.


I chose not to look at my distance until I was very close to home, deciding that 160 miles would only feel all the longer for being reminded that you I still had over 100 miles to go. So instead I revelled in everyone else's summer pass-times, stopping briefly to enjoy the sights and sounds of carnivals and village cricket.

I was surprised by how soon I found myself in Cambridgshire and thereafter in amongst it's colleges and famous buildings. The town is of course a delight to cycle through, with cycle lanes circumnavigating traffic lights and queues of cars. Kings College was suitably lit in the bright afternoon sunshine.

My next stop would by Ely, another Cathedral city that I had passed through but never visited, so I was glad to stop for 10 minutes and a sandwich in front of this incredible building. I will certainly come back out to take a look around the inside.

The road from Ely follows Ten Mile Road for about...ten miles funnily enough. Travelling below the level of the dyke and probably at times the water level, I cruised along this empty road with miles and miles of Cambridgshire fen to laid out like a carpet to the West. The soil, a rich dark-chocolate brown, a patchwork of neatly laid out rows of onions, sugar beet and carrots. Oh to be a rabbit!

I did eventually pop up above the level of the wall and could make out Wissington sugar factory in the far distance. From a cycling perspective, this was as close to Holland as it seemed to be possible to get. Still with a stern wind, it could not be better.

As I passed through West Dereham, the sun was just beginning to set. The lack of cloud robbed me of much of a sunset, but it was still light heading toward 10 pm. It had been a peach of a day.

From Swaffham I was in familiar territory, crossing the ford at West Acre and then negotiating the off-road section prior to Litcham. It was considerably harder to miss the largest of the stones in the dark and I made a mental note not to crossing the Strada del Assietta in the dark. (This 40km off road section awaits us after crossing the French Italian border.) If the next 2 hours or so teaches me anything, it must be this.

I hit a rut coming into Litcham and it was too hard for it not to have done any damage. I was not surprised therefore when I felt the front rim bounce on the road and I ground to a halt.

The clear skies made for a cold evening, but with a spare inner-tube to hand, I was back on the road in 10 minutes confident of reaching home between midnight and 1 in the morning. I was surprised then, about thirty minutes later when this new tyre went down without the slightest provocation and I found myself again, sat in the road, this time mending a puncture with glue and patches.

The tyres I knew were getting thin. I have bought new ones for the race, but had hoped to stretch these to race day. It is not to be. My task for the morning will be to fit the new ones.

So 11 hours 40 minutes after setting off and 157 miles later, I collapsed into bed. A wiser and slightly weary cyclist.

3000 miles and counting

The weekend 100 through the Brecks took just under 6 hours. The weather was challenging with stiff winds and persistent rain for most of the ride. I was reminded by my 7 year old, however, that I would have to ride in the rain in the summer, so I had to go out now.

As one of my fellow riders commented, 'excuses are weakness'.  It's a good motivator if nothing else.

With the 55 I did yesterday morning, that takes me through 3235 for the year.

The bike has now been thoroughly cleaned and prepared for Saturday, when I travel to Amersham by car and cycle home. I've planned a 160 mile route that I hope to complete by midnight. Should be fun. New countryside, new scenery. Always a good thing.

New business cards gone to print. Thank you Linda for sorting these.