Thanks for taking the time to visit my JustGiving page.

I have chosen Wiltshire Air Ambulance as they are Chippenham & District Wheelers chosed charity 2013.

As you know I complete JOGLE last month and today I did the challenge - a 100 mile time trial

Well I have ridden the 100 mile challenge and am not sure how to best present it to you.  Yes I finished, yes it hurt, yes it was hard but funnily enough not as hard as John O’Groats to Land’s End.

So firstly if you have already sponsored me a heartfelt thanks – there were times during the ride where it did provide that extra bit of motivation.   Secondly if you were waiting to see how I did please head off to JustGiving and get the donations past the £1,000 mark.

It is hard to describe a ride like the one I did this morning but the first thing to note is that I completed it in 4 hours 6 minutes and 59 seconds – which means I have a moving average of 24.3 mph which is faster than my best 50 mile race which is only 23.5 mph (a leisurely 2 hours 7 minutes 50 seconds).  I am still in shock at the numbers.  My 25 mile split times were:

25 miles	01:01:14
50 miles	01:02:27
75 miles	01:02:45
100 miles	01:00:17

Clearly I saved myself too much!

So having travelled to Norwich on the hottest day of the year so far it was with some trepidation I went to bed as the thought of a 100 miles in 20C or more was daunting.  The hotel fire alarm at 4 o’clock in the morning was just what I needed and getting to the start at 0545 hrs to find that the start had been delayed half an hour due to mist was disturbing as I had visions of the race being cancelled.  However, it went ahead and with the mist, the headwind and the cloud cover the temperature was only up to 22C by the finish and not for the majority of the race.  My eating and drinking strategy seemed to work but I had to forgo some gels early on as I had had too much sweet stuff early on but drinking every 15 minutes seemed to work.  At 80 miles I jettisoned all undrunk water as an unnecessary burden and wished I had done it earlier but if it had been as hot as expected it would have been needed.  After 2 hours I realised that 4 hrs 15 min was on but didn’t expect much more as I could feel the twinges of cramp, muscle strains, etc but then began to think that I could beat my best 50 mile time x 2 as for some reason I remembered it as 2 hrs 6 min.  If I had realised how well I was going it would be nice to think I could have gone under 4 hrs 5 mins but perhaps that would have been being greedy!  One think I hadn't thought of was that I might break my Club Record for my age group for a 100 miles, but I did – the previous record was 4 hrs 21 min 5 secs for 50 – 54 year olds!

I am now off to lie down having driven over 4 hours back from the event.

I am doing John O'Groats to Land's End as a chaperone on De Loitte's Ride Across Britain in June. Having done it last year, whilst it is still a challenge, I needed a different challenge. So just in case I have to miss a day for support activities I thought a 100 mile time trial sounded sufficiently difficult! My target is to go sub 4 hrs 30 min on 14 July and there are no guarantes that I can do either. So please give me that extra motivation by sponsoring me.

So the End to End element of the challenge, riding from John O’Groats to Land’s End as part of De Loitte’s Ride Across Britain 2013 is now over.  This is just a brief summary of the 9 days of hard work and please rest assured it was hard, partly due to some over enthusiasm in the first few days taking a lot out of my legs as I found out later.

 

For those of you who have already sponsored me a huge thanks and for those that were waiting to see how this went please read on.  I will do updates on the Just Giving page and send you a final e-mail after the 100 miles on 14 July.

 

http://www.justgiving.com/Paul-Winchcombe

 

Day 1
John O’Groats to Bonar Bridge
104 miles – 6 hrs 29 mins – Av speed 16.1 mph – climbing 4,755 ft
Good fast first day with an excellent group, especially along the banks of Loch Naver, till the first stop, then helped a slower rider. Scattered clouds, cool.

http://connect.garmin.com/activity/329332714

 

Day 2

Bonar Bridge to Fort William
116 miles – 7 hrs 24 mins – Av speed 15.7 mph – climbing 5,745 ft
Riding groups starting to form, still good speed. Riding along the banks of Loch Ness. Cloudy with outbreaks of sunshine.

 

http://connect.garmin.com/activity/329332620

Day 3

Fort William to Glasgow
112 miles – 7 hrs 22 mins – Av speed 15.3 mph – climbing 5,548
First serious climb up Glencoe, picked up 7 strong riders to foot of Glencoe and then attacked climb. At 45 miles suggested they might like to ride on while I found a more evenly paced set of riders who might benefit from my assistance. Hills finally bought on some pretty serious backache which was to reoccur every day after about 3 hours in the saddle. Sunny.

 

http://connect.garmin.com/activity/329332503

Day 4
Glasgow to Carlisle
104 miles – 7 hrs 2 mins – Av speed 14.9 mph – climbing 4,487 ft
Exit from Scotland and some pretty dire road surfaces and head winds

 

http://connect.garmin.com/activity/329332441

Day 5
Carlisle to Liverpool (Aintree Race Course)
122 miles – 8 hrs 26 mins – Av speed 14.5 mph – climbing 3,824 ft
The Lake District saw the start of rain, a miserable climb up Shap Fell and a new waterproof as my summer shower top was not up to the task.

 

http://connect.garmin.com/activity/329332337

Day 6
Aintree to Ludlow
104 miles – 7 hrs 9 mins – Av speed 14.7 mph – climbing 8,149 ft
Day started with 2 hours heavy rain whilst threading our way through city traffic.  Experienced severe pain in my Iliotibial band in left leg and later right leg, probably caused by overdoing it on hills.

 

http://connect.garmin.com/activity/329332241

Day 7
Ludlow to Wincanton
120 miles – 9 hrs 42 mins – Av speed 12.4 mph – climbing 8,139 ft
Now riding through Monmouth and crossing Severn Bridge, over the Clifton Suspension bridge in Bristol and up the Dundrey Hill. Forced to use the small chain ring which had an immediate impact on average speeds. Rained.

 

http://connect.garmin.com/activity/329332079

Day 8
Wincanton to Launceston
106 miles – 9 hrs 9 mins – Av speed 11.6 mph – climbing 8,230 ft
Riding through Devon into horrendous head winds and again using the small ring. Continuous showers (heavy)

 

http://connect.garmin.com/activity/329331994

Day 9
Launceston to Land’s End
94 miles – 7 hrs 41 min – Av Speed 12.2 mph – climbing 5,258 ft
The last day through Cornwall including the Newlyn 17% gradient climb, 10 miles from the end.  Had got legs back a bit, so was able to push a bigger gear on the flat and downhills. Driving rain.

 

 

http://connect.garmin.com/activity/329331941

Many thanks in anticipation.  

Paul