Interlude

Why I am doing this blog?

I had thought to enter the Prudential Ride London this year and had contacted the MS Society to see if they wanted riders. Unfortunately for me they said yes ;) , so here I am trying to hit a minimum of £750 for the charity (See the button at the bottom).  £750...That's 75 people donating £10, 150, £5. So please spread the word, enjoy the blog and hopefully you will donate for this great charity. 

Why MS Society?

Although there are loads of charities out there, a dear friend of the family suffers from multiple sclerosis – a condition of the central nervous system -  to the extent that she accepted a job in Australia because the climate made her a lot more comfortable than this dank island.

In addition, I was honoured to be acquainted with John Hicklenton, an amazing artist for whom the term visceral could have been created with his work in mind.

Suffering from MS, John decided to make a decision and died 19 March 2010 in Switzerland.

I am riding to that people like my friend can hope for a better future and that hopefully people like John won’t feel they need to make that decision.

I am riding for MS Society because others can’t. 

What is the route?

The route takes in London, Surrey and a few hills with a total climb of 1,700m in 100 miles.

I am not designed for hills, I am a fairly big bloke and very much a bear on a trike but if I can surpass he target amount (hit the button below) then any pain that may happen on the road will be far less than that of MS sufferers.

Looking the part

Now, I’m going to be frank here. I live on the Ride 100/Olympic route and every single damn weekend, you see hoards of Mamils (Middle-Aged-Men-In-Lycra) on their two-grand bikes and eight-man pelotons, clad in Rafa grimacing their way to and from the Surrey Hills.

Despite being in my forties, I was determined not to be like ‘that lot’. So at first, cotton t-shirts, cargo shorts and adventure sandals were my kit. I was wearing a second-hand helmet  from the bike seller and had bought a second-hand rack to bungee my rucksack to.

I was off.

But here’s the thing – there’s a reason why people riding more than 10 miles generally wear lycra – it’s very good at regulating heat.

And with lycra came a term that in my cotton rugby jersey playing days we had never heard off – wicking.

No it’s not about making baskets, wicking takes moisture, or sweat as we used to say in the day, away from the body so you don’t sit there in your own damp like I was doing with a cotton T.

To be honest, I hadn’t got round to buying a top but Aldi had a cycling special – I’ll talk about these in another post – so my mother in law got me some lycra shorts and a top.

Now wicking works when it is close to the body so I levered my way into the gear.

Now, those of you that cycle – be honest. We all hope that after we put on the lycra, we all look like superheroes, racing gods, kings of the track and rulers of the road…

The reality is somewhat different.

All your bulges and bumps, bear bellies and chins are all to see…

There is no hiding place at all…

EBAY GUM

For a bear avoiding a tricycle, the most depressing thing is the price of these damn things.

Seriously. You ever looked at the price? I swear you can get a small car for the price of some of these – granted Korean or Chinese with a 3 n-cap but still…

So you go online for some advice. Well that’s the Tesco and Asda bikes out of the equation immediately and Halfords…well, let’s say they have a reputation…

Looking at how much cash I had, I thought eBay will be good.

You of course know eBay. It is one of the most frustrating systems known to man where right up to the last second you never know if you are going to be successful.

After about a dozen attempts, I spotted a Specialized hybrid that the web suggested would be a good start before the inevitable progress to drops.

Valiantly placing a bid, while setting maximum bid, I waited, and waited and…I won.

Bloody nora, I’ve got myself a bike.

So off I went to Hipster Central in East London and got the bike. It looked fine, cycled well and was cheap (ish).

In the sun, I bombed past London Fields, threaded through the City, over the Thames and into Waterloo. I was a cycling god. A Mercury on wheels...

I…

Was…

Knackered.

A five-mile ride sent rivers of sweat down my face and armpits. On the train, people backed away as I swayed like a drunk. Oh, my, God.

I hadn't felt this bad since I 'ran the world' in '86. Surely, I could do this. Five miles of relatively flat ground? Was it so long ago that I was vaguely fit? I walked everywhere, this couldn't be right. 

After copious amounts of water and fighting back the urge to be sick, my body returned to what I laughingly called normal and jumped off the train at the next major station and rode home. 

My re-introduction to cycling had begun…

To the Batcave

So I made a decision. I am going to cycle. I am going to cycle and see if I can ride to work. I am going back on a bike –but what bike?

You have had a WTF moment haven’t you? That sinking feeling as reams of information descend on your head and you think you will never get to the bottom of it? Well try looking at the range of bikes that are now available.

Road, Touring, Cyclo-Cross, MTB, Hybrid, Urban, Comfort, Dutch, Recumbents, Sit-ups, Pull-ups (OK (I think) I made that one up), wave upon wave of different styles, Oh boy things had changed since I was a kid.

You see, all those years ago it was very simple you had three types of bikes – a racer, a BMX or a cobbler – something that you cobbled together from the bits lying around in your dad’s garage.

I’d built my own bikes since I could ride, and as the youngest of four, had plenty of spares lying around.

Eventually my mum relented and I got a BMX – a cheap piece of shite that I needed to constantly carry an alum key around with for running repairs.

Eventually cars and girls took over so my biking days were over so I had no idea what a world it had become.  

I blame a friend who shall remain nameless for this change in events. It is entirely down to him that I was now looking at a vast gamut of velocipedes because it was him, yes him, that introduced the world to the Raleigh Bomber.

These simple categorisations that I grew up with (the occasional US import or chopper not withstanding) had begun to change with that bike I reckon.

Anyway, so onto the cycling sites I went to clear things up…

Or not.

What I gathered was that the mountain bike lot don’t like the road lot that don’t like the hybrid lot that don’t really care as they need to get to work on time.

Meanwhile the fixies look down their immaculately sculpted faces and salmon trousers that just show a little bit of ankle at the whole lot.

Bromptonites wobbled, ummed and aahed and decided that they should just concentrate on that bus…

For a bear avoiding a trike, it actually boiled down to the fact that I needed something that wouldn’t make me look too twattish…

Getting started...

You know that feeling, when you’ve had a night out but the hangover isn’t as bad as you expected, the lack of sleep not hitting you that badly., That was how I felt a few months ago when, after some years, I got back on the bike again. Before that moment, I had played rugby until my knees were shot, tried the gym didn’t like it and had spent far too much time lifting the elbow.

My fear was that it was bad enough that I was going to look like a bear on a bicycle let alone like a bear on a tricycle...