May 17th

Jon comes from Holmfirth, well known as Last of the Summer Wine Country. It isn't clear whether he has been auditioning for a part on the quiet, but his last training ride would strengthen his credentials.

The morning started well with a toughish climb out of Holmfirth to Meltham and then up a long climb to Marsden. No sightings of three men rolling down hills in bath tubs and Jon managed to avoid recreating the classic ‘falling down the uncovered man-hole’ stunt. From Marsden Jon picked up theHuddersfieldNarrowCanal.

A couple of miles down the tow path Jon came to a section dug up for construction work. Jon has switched to counter-intuitively named clipless pedals which mean that you physically attached to the pedals. As he pulled up to the hole he attempted to unclip from the pedal but couldn’t get his left foot (the one he naturally puts down first) off the pedals. As the orange warning fence approached he managed to release his right foot and stop safely just short of the hole. But the left shoe was firmly stuck to the bike. Unlacing his shoe he climbed off and discovered that he had lost a bolt from the cleat which attaches to his shoe to the pedal. This meant the cleat was rotating within the pedal binding rather than releasing when twisted.

A dog-walker passed by and asked if Jon was OK. Jon explained the predicament, tightened up the remaining bolt, replaced his shoe and set off again, planning not to clip his left foot back on to the bike. The pedal mechanism had other ideas and within seconds had secured Jon’s left foot  back on to the pedal.

Jon caught up with the dog-walker who had now been joined by another walker and another two dogs. The walker asked if things were all fixed and Jon said that he was back on but couldn’t be sure he would be able to release his left foot if required. “What could possibly go wrong!” said the dog walker. “Well” said Jon “getting past those three dogs would be a good start”.

Jon picked his way past one of the dogs and was just approaching the second when it veered sideways. Jon swerved left and discovered that, somewhat inevitably, his foot had once more become firmly stuck. With no time to react Jon couldn’t get a foot down and rode straight off the bank and into the canal.

Thankfully the water was only up to Jon’s waist and the impact had released the pedal binding. The miscreant dog had jumped in to join Jon in the freezing water and the owner helpfully said “You know what, he always does that”.

Sat in the water trying to catch his breath which had been knocked out of him by the impact multiplied by the freezing cold water, Jon looked up only to see a narrow boat making its way towards him. The walkers watched on as Jon dragged himself and his bike out of the water. The skipper of the narrow boat made a somewhat ironic offer of a towel.

It is amazing just how much water a high-wicking cycling top and shorts can absorb, and the misery wasn’t over. Jon looked down at his bike computer, which was miraculously still working, and somewhat inevitably given the ride so far, realised he was exactly at the furthest point from home. Getting back on the road he also realised that the remainder of the ride was more or less directly into the wind (from the North!) and the chafing factor of wet shorts is significantly higher than that of dry ones. The wind did eventually start to dry out the clothing, only for it to start raining….heavily.

On the bright side, in a deeper section of the canal and without the binding releasing itself we could have been one party member down. And never had a hot shower felt so good.

Compo, Foggy and Clegg would have been proud.

April 5th

Gary and Jon have started to take the subject of equipment more seriously. Gary has stolen his son's Bob the Builder bell and Jon has rediscovered Sudocrem.

March 30th

In a great example of the constant theme, indeed heartbeat of encouragement taking place within the team during the build-up, Danny has consulted with a so-called expert in the field of charity cycling. The outcome is that they have told Jon that his efforts in the gym are a “total waste of time”. Jon’s view is that the so-called expert (Lee Adams) only did Lands End to John O’Groats which by Jon’s reckoning is just within one country and so counts for nothing. He also knows that Lee also seems to spend most of his time in body-armour falling down hills on bikes. This is clearly nothing like long-distance charity work and given it is downhill all the way can’t be very hard at all - so keep your opinions to yourself Mr. Adams!!!

March 26th

Jon is having a serious sense of humour failure given the theme emerging in the pledges. He is considering his escalation options against Rod's pledge of £500 if Jon shaves his head - things could get out of hand!

 Gary is considering hiring someone to repeatedly walk past him when he is on the training bike to give the illusion that he is actually moving. The rest of us know that this is just to give him someone to talk to - Gary is notoriously incapable of doing anything without some form of companionship. The team have already worked out a rota of who will cycle closest to him for the three day trip where he will inevitably never stop talking.

March 25th

Gary has finally started his training in the gym on the training bikes. As the boredom set in he was seen to almost fall off when reminding himself what it felt like to look over your shoulder for oncoming traffic while pedalling.

March 21st

Rod has reported in on his latest training ride. The rest of the team is in awe of his performance given the weight of the tracking equipment that he must have been carrying in order to be able to report on his top speed, average speed, peak heart rate, heart recovery rate, hydration state, rate of weight loss, average road friction coefficient, wind speed and direction, and red blood cell count. The most interesting statistic was the average altitude - 0m above sea level. Rod claims he did actually encounter a hill in Ormskirk but we have our doubts.

March 19th

Danny is urging all of the team to start using something called “Purple lube gel”. This has provoked wide-ranging levels of interest amongst the team. Apparently he is bringing a tube in next week for us all to have a go with. Pictures to follow (I don’t think so - ed.).

March 14th

Reality is starting to bite. Danny is now referring to the rest of the team as his Domestiques and given that Jon lives in West Yorkshire has decided that he must be good at hills and has therefore been selected to provide a 'tow' for Danny up the tricky ascents.

The team is clearly divided into those who think this is a race (Danny, Rod), those looking for divine intervention just to reach the Eiffel tower (Jon, Gary), the one who is more focussed on supplementing the meager food outlined in the itinerary (Zack) and the one who is already mentally working through the lunchtime wine list (Mark).

Following his training ride over the weekend Jon is convinced that although his 22 mile ride nearly killed him this was not a reflection on his ability to complete the event and was more down to having the wrong kind of bike, having the wrong kind of tyres, not having his tyres inflated properly, having the wrong kind of helmet, not yet working up the courage to clip his feet to the bike in the death-trap pedals the bike shop sold him, not having the relentless encouragement that the rest of the team are bound to offer, and using a kit-kat and a tap water as an isotonic alternative (both of which ran out after 30 minutes!). So he's confident once he's fixed all of that he will be well and truly on track.

Meanwhile Rod has suggested we all shave our heads. Nobody else can quite see the point of this and Gary has pointed out that a shaved head and bike helmet in the guaranteed sunshine is not recommended. Danny just made a cruel comment about Zack's receding hairline and for some reason Mark said he would have his legs waxed instead - he's on his own on that one.

In a desperate measure to raise funds Danny is thinking of selling his entire CD collection - so come on people get sponsoring!!