The final part of my training for the impending London to
Paris bike ride consisted of serious hill practise... After looking at a few
options on where to undertake this test I decided to take Rex to another
country and settled on Wales for some big peaks and beautiful Valley views.
There are actually a few very famous bike rides in Wales
but what I particularly wanted to complete was the "Dragon ride" for
no other reason than the whole ride mapped out a pretty picture of a Dragon from
the route you would carve on two wheels. Let's see how that pans out later.
However, here is what the ride should look like after completion...
This biking adventure started by taking my bike (Rex) to my daily place of work on a very lively and packed commuter train Friday morning and leaving him locked up in the
work car park until the end of play. Once the school bell hit for home time it
was a race against the clock to get to Paddington Station for the fast train to Wales.
A slightly more frantic and time pressured journey than I would have liked to
Paddington Station saw me load my bike in the lonely hollow bike carriage and
jump in my seat with just minutes to go. Having had no time to buy anything at the
station due to fear of missing the train I was very thankful to the
"roadies" I had stashed in my rucksack. A few hours and few tins of
cider later and I arrived in Bridgend, which is situated between Cardiff and
Swansea. A short pedal in the dark to the B&B from the train station, quick
bag dump and straight out to a locally recommended pub completely relaxed me from any earlier dramas. Well I was
certainly relaxed after the local tipple of Ale in the area which was called
The Rev. James, very highly recommended and brewed in Cardiff.
Having stocked up on the ribs and roast chicken combo at the boozer and
getting home for an early night it seemed I was all set for tomorrow's big
ride...
Now you can only plan for so much, as we all know. Having
done all the right things so far I thought that everything would be straight
forward in the morning. Not so. At 4.30am I was rudely awoken by one of my
teeth angrily growling and throbbing in my mouth. The pain was incredible. I was later to find out this required a Root Canal. Tossing and turning for an
hour not knowing what to do with the pain I firstly thought about going
straight home to my dentist for an emergency appointment, secondly getting a
bit of string and tying it to the door...and lastly trying to remember from
last night's ride in pitch black to the B&B if there was anywhere obvious
and close by that would sell painkillers, horse tranquillisers or maybe a gun!
It got to 6.30am and I couldn't take it anymore so I went in search of the petrol station I vaguely remembered from the journey in. Not that I noticed or
cared much at this point but it was incredibly foggy and there was an awful
drizzly type of rain soaking me. This is not what I had pictured or expected
for my first ride outside of England. Luckily I found the petrol station
quickly and more importantly for me they had a pharmacy counter. Credit card
swiped, pin entered and I was the new owner of some magic pills in the way of Aspirin and Ibuprofen. I ripped both packets open quicker than a kid on
Christmas morning opening presents and mixed up a fair few of the pills and
swirled down the pain killer cocktail.
It took about 45 mins to kick in but once it did it at least
took me back to mild pain rather than unbearable pain i had suffered the last few hours so I was thankful for
that. I managed to get a few more minutes rest in bed before fuelling up with a full Welsh
breakfast, served by the token Lithuanian hotel worker, and I was out setting
up the bike for the day. Once outside the good news was that the fog had
completely cleared, the rain had stopped and the sun was out with blue skies
behind him.
Preparation is a very important thing and something I
usually pride myself on and is an essential ethic I almost follow religiously.
Now in my old age I feel this may be slipping... In order to complete the
Dragon ride on uncharted Welsh soil a good friend gave me a gpx file to upload
to my Garmin Edge bike gps system. So in theory, everything taken care of
right? No backup plan needed, surely? The good news for me was that at least
the Garmin found the route that was loaded on to it - a start. This would be the first time I would use the Garmin
as proper navigation system with a pre-loaded course. From my start point at the guest house it
would take a couple of miles to actually get on to the course and route. Once I arrived
on the course itself the GPS picked up my positioning and suggested my route to
follow. Great, I was in business. After double and triple checking I was 100% on the course the computer started beeping and
screaming at me a lot and I kept trying to stop this by listening and looking
to routes or instructions it was telling me but I ended up almost turning around every time I
did this. This is one of those times when you think to yourself...this is why
you should always read the manual to these little electronic gizmos but where
would be the fun in that and boys never do that, do they! Ok, so plan B. I can
see on the GPS that I am on course and going around the Dragon route but the
computer is still not happy... At least I am safe in knowing that even if I don’t
get the course exactly right I can follow this big red line on the GPS system
attached to my bike and it will get me around the ride I had intended to go on.
So.............about 10 miles I had worked out that I was doing this Dragon
ride the hard way. I was going in the opposite direction to the clockwise route
that had been preloaded to the GPS. Again, being a man I saw this as a
challenge and stubbornness would not allow me to turnaround now. Road signs with town names and a map would now be my guide. Lots
and lots of lessons learned here.
Lots of beautiful scenery flashing past either side of me
passing through the Valleys on nice country B and C roads and small quaint
towns got me to the scene of another mentionable drama. The hills were starting
to come thick and fast now at about 20 miles in. With one very large climb
approaching in a small village there was a set of traffic lights half way up the climb, which was very frustrating and inconvenient for a cyclist and could be extra problematic for a cleat
wearer. Inevitably I got caught at the lights and undoubtedly I had a problem
trying to get in to my cleats whilst attempting to get started again when the lights hit Green. I did get
going with one cleat fully clipped in and the other half in. I managed to get to the
top of the hill somehow with some awful technique and lots of determination but
just as I reached the flat at the top a screw exploded out of my cleats and off
the bottom of my shoe disappearing completely out of sight. This was a huge
huge problem, if I didn’t find that screw I would have to cycle 60 miles with
one only one pedal locked in as I did not have any spares. I dismounted and
frantically started looking around in the small road I was in. I looked under
cars, on the kerb and in all other logical places but nothing. Then a confused
looking man appeared and asked me my business, he seemed to be working on a
local house as a builder. After explaining the dealio to this inquisitive chap
he shouted up two of his mates who came and immediately without question helped with
my treasure hunt. It took only a few minutes with all of us looking and one of
the builder's army-crawled under a car and grabbed the excitable screw and handed it back to
me. I was eternally grateful to all of them and couldn’t stop thanking them but
they immediately left as soon as they had appeared and were back on with their
job. I felt this was the perfect time for my first pit stop and just sat on the
kerb got the spanners out, fixed my cleats and took on fuel
Once back in the saddle it was hard to get back in to the rhythm again
and the slight incline for the next mile was fairly tough going. This was a bad
sign as I knew there was a beast of a hill approaching in about 5 miles.
With the Garmin still throwing a paddy and making weird
noises all the time until it gave one final cry and then finally gave up the ghost.
On 27 miles I was fiddling with the screen, it froze completely and then passed
out. I was gutted as this was tracking my entire ride and I thought I had just lost all of my ride. After a few anxious
minutes, a bit of a whack, TLC and some baby style talking it woke up again. It
asked me to save the ride but luckily I knew from previous experiences with
this GPS if I hit the play button it should continue to record it. I was in
luck, it did and more importantly I actually knew where I was again as the map
popped up too. I am sure my GPS was telling me....if you do this to me again I will...I think I am going to name my GPS too but just need to find the right name. I
don’t think KIT is right but maybe something along those lines.
33 miles and the biggest challenge of my biking career so
far. A mountain! The village of Maerdy at the head of the Rhondda Fach Valley
was the setting. On leaving the village I actually started by going down in to
the heart of the Valley. On the way down you could see in the distance the
challenge ahead and huge climb ahead. It didn’t look pretty but this is exactly why I came all the
way to Wales. The climb was tough, very tough but ultimately and perversely really enjoyable on reaching the summit. I used gears on my bike that I had never used
before. It was very hard work but importantly I felt ok during and after
reaching the top. I was very pleased with myself. At the top the views were
stunning on a 360 panoramic. These pictures do not do it justice really.
At the top of the hill my GPS read 33.33 miles exactly. A call of
nature and fuel break ensued before getting back to it. A few miles pedalling
across the top of this peak and then I was in for some fun. The old saying
goes...what goes up must come down. On the other side of this huge hill was a
very steep, winding and tight road down in to the lovely little town of
Aberdare. The best way I can describe the journey down was like a fast Black bendy
ski run. It was so thrilling getting up to high speeds, breaking hard, dropping
in to your next turn and repeating again and again.
A few more miles on and I think I got slightly lost. I
sort of knew I was close to the course route but also knew that I wasn’t
exactly on the right path. In my head I wondered how this was all looking
on the map as I was tracking. I knew for a fact this was not going to look like a
Dragon, more like a three legged or deformed dog!
Decision decision decision time. Daylight was running out
and my first 40 miles had been very slow due to all the hills. A lot slower
than I had planned. So I decided to take a more direct route home and burn
through the miles quickly. I headed down a very long downhill stretch of the
A465 to take me in to Port Talbot. This was a way off track but sometimes you
need to compromise in certain situations. The miles kept rolling and it got to
about 4pm with 65 miles on the clock and after seeing a ridiculous amount of golden
arches during the ride I had been brainwashed and it was time to do the Mobot and go and grab some grease.
Back in the saddle and on past Port Talbot, which is a pretty grim place if I am honest and the cycle
along the sea front near the steel works was actually quite depressing especially
in comparison to the views I had been blessed with all day.
With a burger in the belly as energy and fuel I powered through the last 15
miles to home and blasted back in to Bridgend to beat the dark setting in by a
good 30 minutes. After a nice long freshen up, a beautiful pasta dinner
followed at an excellently found restaurant in town. Then it was goodbye to
Wales until the next time.
Wales has given me some great personal achievements with
lots of hill practise, my biggest ever single ascent and over 8 hours in the
saddle in one single ride not to mention all the incredible views I had taken
in throughout the journey. Wales is a beautiful country and I will definitely be
back for more hill practise in the future and to enjoy and embrace everything I
have commented on in this post.
I feel 100% ready for Paris now with all my preparations
and training. I am so excited and it is now only 20 days away!
By the way...here is the final picture of the route I mapped out. Dragon...hmmmmmm.
