history, UK

Blenheim Palace

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With another gorgeous day present & me not participating in the rest of the weekend’s cycling events (a sportive on the road – pffft) – I had a whole day to get home in no hurry at all.  With family & friends absent from the obvious stopping point on the way home (Bristol) I started scratching around for something to go & see as I drove home.  Somehow I remembered that Blenheim Palace was not far off my route home (ten miles extra as it turned out) & I’d been meaning to see it one day as it was the birthplace of Winston Churchill and conceived to honour the first Duke of Marlborough, John Churchill, after his famous victory at the Battle of Blenheim.

The grounds are extensive & well worth walking around on such a pleasant summer’s day.  I of course enjoyed the history throughout the house and just moseying around.  My little photos may be better than me rambling on…

The smell of all of the roses reminded me of my grandparents, but Colin St wasn’t quite the same sort of palace

bikes, combe raiders, event, GPS, MTB

Just riding mostly

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It’s been a bit quiet on here for a while – mostly because the weather, somewhat unbelievably, has been really good for a while here in the south of England & I’ve been riding my bikes a lot.  However, I’ve stayed relatively close to home (within a couple of hundred miles anyway) and have been riding at places I’ve been to before, so there haven’t really been many stories to share or any new photos.

Consecutive weekends riding in Wales (a bit wet, with disappointingly short rides), Somerset (another short ride – but my biggest crash in years, nothing on a dislocated shoulder though) and the Isle of Wight (a small group from the local MTB club & actual heat) were leading nicely up to last weekend.  For some reason, I thought it would be a good idea to enter a so-called MTB Marathon in Shropshire in the middle of summer – back on Long Mynd, where I rode at the end of May.  Mainly I think it was because I’ve been riding increasingly long distances to keep my riding interesting & challenging on the local terrain – but I find that I know few people around here with the free time or inclination to go out for long rides.  So signing up for a 75 km event seemed like a good idea – a ready made route & people to ride with/near.

Not being a bank holiday weekend, it only took four hours to get to Shropshire & I was setting up camp in the late afternoon – with twenty or so groups of campers.  By the time I got back from the dinner at the pub at the bottom of the hill, I was astounded by how much the field had filled with tents.  This event was clearly a lot more popular than I was expecting.  By half-seven Saturday morning, I was baking in the tent (I was pleased I’d impulse-bought a super thin & small sleeping bag for the summer) – but I managed to drag myself back down the hill for a Full English to fuel the first few hours’ riding.

Ten o’clock seemed to be a bit late to start such a long ride (there were shorter options – 25 & 45 km – that started at the same time) as it was already a scorcher.  Having ridden here recently, I knew the first climb was a long drag up a bit of seal & then forestry roads – so I was happy to start near the back & just spin.  That was a mistake, as I forgot I “just spin” on a 1×9 quite a bit faster than most.  The first descent was a little unnerving as I still don’t trust my bike completely after the crash two weeks ago – no sooner was that over, the second climb started with a real kicker & just kept going in the sun.  There’s always a lot of satisfaction to be had riding past most of the field walking up a hill.

On the long course there were three feed stations & they were fantastic.  Plenty of bananas, biscuits, energy drink, water & home-baking (mmmmm – Welsh cakes, & flapjacks).  The second was just past the halfway point after a really sweet few kilometres of forested singletrack that was off of Long Mynd & a joy to discover.  It was quite tiring, but nice to be out of the sun.  Things got a little easier through the third quarter & the climb back up on to Long Mynd & the highest point of the day was only about half of the gradient earlier in the day.  By now, I was just trying to get to the end & drink plenty of water.  Sunburn wasn’t really a problem as the sunscreen I applied beforehand was now covered in dust & I actually looked tanned – I say tanned, in the cold light of day I probably just looked dirty.

As we’d lost all the shorter distance riders, things were a bit more spread out & I got talking to a couple from just down the road in Poole – mostly because Rachel was wearing a New Zealand riding top & both she & Andy seem to get up to plenty of adventures.  Andy managed a puncture on the last descent off the mynd – I thought that was one of the best downhill sections of the day.  With a couple of kilometres to go, my leg tried to cramp – but not so much that I couldn’t ride through it.  I was pleased to ride off the camping-hill down to the finish line through some technical switchbacks in one piece & get home in less than five & a half hours with no signs of heatstroke.

So much for a post that said: “I went for a long ride up some hills & it was very hot”.

bikes, event, GPS, MTB, UK

Bristol Bikefest – Sunday

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When Andy posted on the Combe Raiders page some time ago, I thought doing my first MTB relay solo was a good idea. That was mainly because it was only six hours (on the Sunday, twelve on the Saturday) – not the much more ambitious twelve or twenty-four hours that I’m used to such events being. Saturday was a cracking day – even on Andy’s patio on (almost in) the Avon at dinner time it was 30ºC; thankfully it was a little cooler on race-day.

I really wasn’t all that prepared for such an event – treating it as a normal ride really; at six hours that is about normal now – although this time with almost continuous riding.  But with Andy’s help I managed to ditch my camelbak for the ride and with faith in tubeless, I rode the whole day just carrying a water bottle & hoping no mechanicals would appear – riding so light was quite nice for a change.  The event started with all the first riders (there were also teams & pairs in the six & three hour events) about two kilometres from the start-finish and a few hundred metres down a hill for a chaotic Le Mans start (where you run to your steed & then race from there). Mindful that I had six hours in the saddle ahead & with my general aversion to running – I took it pretty easy & ended up near the back of the field, but there was hill to a start so I could pass people up there easily.

The course turned out to be the most fun course I’ve ever done in such a relay event – with some really nice singletrack, four hills that weren’t killers but enabled passing, and plenty of shade.  So as I’m completely uncompetitive it turned out to be a very fun ride and there wasn’t anything too draining.  There were some nice technical drop-offs that I rode most of the time, but tended to avoid later on when I was trying not to do anything stupid as I tired. With the extra distance at the start I thought I was doing close to forty-minute laps & would comfortably fit in nine laps, but after my first pit stop for a Clif Bar & water top-up I realised I was lapping a lot quicker than that & would probably be able to fit in ten laps if I didn’t blow out.  So that’s what I did; with a bonus third pit stop I finished with about five minutes to spare without any really pain – although a little tired as I paced myself to make sure I finished.  I had some aches in places I wasn’t expecting – upper arms & just below my neck at the top of my back, I’ve never had any biking induced discomfort there before.  Incidentally, I was decidedly mid-field finishing seventeenth out of thirty-one (the winner did twelve) – but mostly pleased with riding ninety-six kilometres/sixty miles offroad with only about ten minutes of stopping.

So a very nice day out on the bike on some well designed singletrack – Andy & Chris also did ten laps between them, finishing a quarter an hour or so before me.  They had done the twelve hour last year, but got a bit bored.  I tend to concur, as fun as the trail was – after about eight consecutive laps it was getting a little boring.  So while it’d be nice to challenge myself & do a twelve or even twenty-four hour solo – I think I’d get too bored going around & around the same course  for such a long time (not too mention I’d actually have to think about preparation, nutrition & other such things in more detail, when all I really want to do is ride).  One of the things I love about riding is exploring places – something a lap-based race doesn’t really encourage.

Unfortunately this post is even more verbose & picture light than normal – this is the only one I have from the day, I didn’t even carry a camera.  The day was topped off nicely by visiting my cousins five minutes down the road, lying on their new lawn (the lawn’s not new, they have recently moved there & didn’t have a lawn before) stretched out in the sun with a beer. I shunned the longer, but quicker, motorway route home & went cross-country home on the A-roads – just stunning in the evening light across the pretty countryside.

bikes, GPS, MTB, UK

en route to Bristol

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Even though I’d entered a six-hour event solo, my first, the following day in Bristol there was no way I was letting a sunny weekend day go to waste. Asked the question, John recommended I go for a ride on the Mendips – I duly found a route to follow and set out early Saturday morning for Somerset.

The wonderfully clear day was once again plagued by a brisk wind, but that was at my back as I immediately hit a 1:10 climb to get up on top of the hills. The bluebells had already started to fade at home in the New Forest, so it was nice to see fields still in bloom. After some pleasant riding in the sun across the ridge top (which was wonderfully dry, but looked like it would be horrible if slightly muddy) there was flattish road and then from a quarry I was hurtled down a rockfest of a descent to Cheddar. It kept going & going and was the best downhill I’d done since Moab.

I pootled up Cheddar Gorge (the only other time I have visited was eighteen-odd months ago with Mum) a little way to see what it was like & decided it was time for tea & cakes – because apparently eleven in the morning is too early to open a kitchen and provide hungry cyclists with an early lunch.

Straight out of Cheddar it was another very steep climb up above the southern edge of the gorge. While there was no one to be seen on the route I took down into Cheddar, this path was very popular with walkers – who all seemed convinced I was mad. After another sublime descent through woods (unfortunately, a bit too much traffic here too) there was rather too much road to link to the last bridleway section. So that was a great introduction to the Mendips – I hope I make it back to ride with the Combe Raiders. Perhaps 840 metres of climbing was a bit more than I should have done – but the following day would let me know.

With a few hours to kill before Andy was home (the one I have to thank for the whole Bikefest idea & whose house I was staying at that night), I thought there were worse things I could do than go into Bath. So I continued the drive in the sun, parked up at the same Park & Ride where I also went with Mum & rode the bus into yet another UNESCO World Heritage Site. As Mum & I had already visited the Roman Baths, I had a very nice afternoon wandering around in the sun looking at the old buildings, lounging in parks & eating delicious Italian cake.

Biking to go places, going places to bike.