I finished the Tour of Wetex, I mean Tour of Wessex for 2008!

Prelude

Mal and I took Friday off and caught a late afternoon train to Castle Cary from Paddington. When we arrived a random guy from the train mentioned the ride and we got talking. We ended up walking to the registration tent together and his mate gave Mal a lift to the Sparkford Inn, while I rode the 10k there. So, I didn’t catch your name mate but thanks for that! You saved the hassle and cost of finding a cab.

Mum called me from Italy to wish me well. She’s not watching the Giro but she will be dragging my Aunty Lyn along to London soon. Hi Mum 🙂

Day 1

Beautiful weather greeted riders and added some real depth to my tan lines. In fact, that’s how Mal identified most of the people in the Sparkford Inn as cyclists – they all had short-sleeved jersey tan lines like mine 🙂

I cycled the 10k to the start and got there quite early so lined up in front of the electronic timing pads and was one of the first 50 riders to leave. First mistake. Actually, no. My first mistake was not eating breakfast this morning! Idiot! Second mistake was going out in the first 50 which left me little opportunity for getting into a good bunch. It wasn’t until I hit hills that riders were coming past and by then it was too late as I just couldn’t climb like these guys. Combine this lack of climbing ability with the fact that I’m worrying about Day 2 and 3 and you have one messed up rider. I’d attack the hills mid-cassette, forgetting I’d fitted a 26T cassette and could have been twiddling easily over them and then I’d panic about wasting energy and slow right down, losing any drafting benefits from other riders.

I’d also decided to use REGO (carb + protein) in one of my bottles and I think this might have hampered my rehydration as I was cramping in the heat (and I don’t usually suffer cramp). The next two days I’d use GO (carb + electrolytes) and suffer no such cramp.

On the Category 1 climb I was going nowhere, my rear wheel slipping on the steep muddy road but I quickly sat down to transfer my weight to the rear wheel and completed the climb without dismounting (unlike quite a few others, so Des tells me). I hope the pics of me groveling up there are available soon! 🙂

At one point I heard..

Are you Australian?

Yep. (The Australian Cyclones team jersey probably gave it away)

Is your name hippy?

Yep.

Hi, I’m fasteddy. And with that he disappeared up the hill, living up to his alias 🙂

I also received a few words of encouragement from fellow Aussies or at least Aussie fans, thanks to the jersey. Cheers guys!

At one point mid-ride I got into a bunch containing 3-4 Belgian riders in green “Team de Luxe” kit and some others. It was only for a few kilometres until I probably freaked about the pace and gave it up. For the whole ride I was torn between going for a gold or silver time (how I laugh at this goal now!) and saving energy for the next two days.

Descending Cheddar Gorge at speed with surely the only smooth road surface in England and a truck on my wheel was a brilliant interlude to all the climbing bollocks.

Cheddar Gorge, picture by M.J.S.

The last 50k was flattish and I did finally get into a good bunch for a good portion of this. Myself, a Team de Luxe guy, a St Ives CC guy and a guy in a white Assos jersey all fought against a strong (40kph?) wind through the skinny gravelly lanes. This worked well until myself and the Team de Luxe guy missed a turn while talking about our Powertaps!

The guy was from Rochefort in Belgium so I of course told him my story about touring there and the teachers at a youth hostel buying me ‘local’ Rochefort beers and how I now order them online and have some in my fridge but I could only get the 8’s as they were out of the 10’s now… I’m sure he thinks I’m a mental!

It turns out, if you pardon the pun, as well as adding extra distance and having to consult the map to get home we’d also missed the final food station. No more fluids for hippy. It was by then a very real struggle for me to make it. I was angry at missing the turn and adding 10k to the day’s distance, luckily I didn’t even realise there was another feed station until I’d finished! At least there was someone else lost with me. I’d slow down on the hills and he’d tell me not to wait but to be honest I’d rather be a lost duo than a lost solo.

That’ll teach us to compare notes on Powertaps instead of watching the road! I know it’s only 10k but when you are spent.. it may as well be a million miles..

In the end I think I’d hammered too many climbs, not eaten or drunk enough and lost too many bunches not wanting to ‘waste energy’. The hills and wind just combined to make Day 1 very tough. It might have been the shortest day (without our extra bit) but excluding day 3’s conditions, this was the hardest ride for me. Pacing needs work. Fueling needs work. Diet needs… screw that! 🙂

Day 2

The forecast was ominous and the day started out quite wet but conditions improved until I finally removed my jacket and was actually sunburned again!

My legs were stuffed from Day 1. Mal had done her best to massage some life back into them but they weren’t interested. I’d stretched and rested them as much as I could but I’d done some damage to the tendons under my knees – probably straining them on the climbs and just generally didn’t want to go out again, especially not into crap weather. Sense or insanity prevailed. I didn’t enter this event just to wuss out because it was raining – it’s England, it’s always raining! HTFU! 🙂

Due to this inner turmoil I was a bit later starting and ventured into the HQ. They were serving breakfast! Toast and a coffee and who’s now a happy camper?! Out I go, push my way into the line and roll out, suddenly much happier than when I woke up.

There was obviously no chance of fast times today so I decided to sit on a low 200W no matter what and just watch the streams of riders go past me. Usually this behaviour would kill me but I was sore enough and tired enough that I didn’t care if people passed me. No, really, I didn’t chase.. much. This action paid dividends in the end as I rocketed past people that had passed me on the run home. 🙂

Somewhere in the early hills I punctured and watched bloody hundreds of riders go past. I takes me a good 10mins to change a tube (8mins of swearing, 2mins swapping) so plenty of people got to watch.

At the next (first?) food stop I used their track pump to get back full pressure on the rear tyre. Blackburn mini pumps are good but only a steroid-fueled body builder would bother inflating to 100psi+. Only 5k after this feed stop I puncture again! Arrgh! This time it was the front tyre. I must say a big “thank you” to the woman who stopped and gave me her spare tube (I was only carrying 2, so had no more spares at this point). I didn’t use it so if you read this I can return your spare. Thanks! If not, I’m going to find a suitable recipient for it – some poor soul in dire need of a tube.

There was some guy on the side of the road talking to a moto rider. I later found out that he’d hit a car and snapped his carbon Dolan in half!

Long climb over this awesome army firing range. Fantastic views over the various tanks scattered over the land. I stopped here and got out the phone to take pics and left the guy I was swapping turns with carry on.

Great fun descending from here.

I do remember getting into a bunch at some point and just sitting on while this one guy did a load of work. I did finally have go on the front and then we arrived at a food stop where I could top up the low front tyre and scoff two tuna mayo rolls. Very odd food combo at these stops but it did the job.

From here I stormed home. It was like every road was a downhill. Had a blast!

Day 3

Truly horrible conditions today as evidenced by the low starting numbers – only 122 riders finished today, compared to 800 for Day 1! The rain was belting down, well, not so much down as sideways into your face, thanks to the high winds. It made last year’s Dunwich Dynamo seem like a spring commute in London.

Due to the ‘king ‘orrid conditions the organisers shortened the ride from the original 210k to 150k, removing the “Hors” categorised Dunkery Beacon and some of the other “Exmoor” section. I was chatting to a guy on the ride and he said it would have been far too dangerous with the crazy winds and the steep descents. Pity, as I quite wanted to see what a Hors category climb was like. 🙂

At the 25k mark my Powertap gave up the ghost. I finished the ride without power data or any idea of distance to go (probably a good thing!) The unit just continued to cycle through power reading and the setup screen. I think it must have taken in some water? I’ve swapped the batteries and it now says “APIdr” (A P I d r) before turning off. According to this mudandcowbells blog, my Powertap CPU is stuffed. I might be able to rescue it with a firmware update but we’ll see… no power data?!?!? what do I do?!?!?!

Rode with the young bloke from Tor2000 for a few kilometres but he was setting a cracking pace with about four others and at the first hill I shut it down and let them go. The food station at the top of the hill had a shorter bail out option or you turned right for a longer loop. It had to be the full loop! The guy I’d been riding with from the start also picked the long option although he did stop for a cuppa at a pub whereas I flew down a nice wet descent and carried on, not wanting to seize up in a warm pub.

Streams of water flowed across and down the roads. Where there was no water there was debris! Rocks and branches and even fallen trees!!

I have to ride through this?

Glad I wasn’t riding under this! Told you the winds were high!

The safety motorbikes were stalling mid “stream” during some of these “river” crossings. The horrendous winds (and I’m not talking about my high-carb diet here!) meant you really did NOT want to take your hands off your bars for any stretching.

I pushed it really hard towards the end, knowing I was close to finishing the biggest three days of riding I’ve ever done. It was annoying that I had to ride past the Sparkford Inn where we were staying to get to the finish and then ride the 10k back again but I was pretty damn happy to have finished such a big ride. Had a quick chat to fasteddy and some other guys, rolled back to the pub, cleaned up and started drinking! 🙂

Mal and I traveled back the next day (Tuesday) and I took the day off to clean the bike and chill out. I’ve been resting my self-diagnosed achillies tendonitis since. Don’t know why it only got my left foot? Will see if I’m good to ride Chiltern 100 tomorrow (Sunday).

cliveo’s report

Wessex Results:

Day 1: 156th from 792 finishers (5:42:08)

Day 2: 214th from 426 finishers (7:00:37)

Day 3: 58th from 121 finishers (6:19:19)

Overall: 46th from 97 finishers (19:02:04)