In the last instalment I suggested I might get some weather in the final three rides of my Randonneur Round the Year attempt (a 200km ride every month for 12 months in a row) but now I’m one closer and still dry and reasonably warm. This was a fairly easy one, to be honest.
The Levels, Lumps and Lions had about 40 riders setting off from the Bakehouse in Bristol, and I had to ride there because I couldn’t steal the car for the day and the trains didn’t start until too late, so I was an hour in by the time I rocked up to grab a coffee and my brevet card.
When I was clearing my dad’s house a way back I found a couple of gold sovereigns, and I was reminded of their unnatural weightiness in the hand when the nice lady at the Bakehouse passed me the almond croissant I’d also bought. A croissant has no business being that heavy. I stowed it in my frame bag where I felt its bulk like an anchor on the climb up to the suspension bridge and the slog over the Mendips. Or maybe it was just the pre-Christmas eating. I’d finally found Matt, who I was supposed to be riding with – we’d somehow missed each other at the start – and it was pretty easy progress over the levels past Glastonbury, before things got a bit lumpy for a while.
Matt was riding fixed, so cruising together on the flat was fine, but anyone who’s ridden fixed knows that your speed up a hill – and down the other side – just is what it is, really. He’d jump ahead on the climbs, I’d reel him in on the descents, and some of the time we’d be near each other. Then he wasn’t jumping ahead any more, and I lost him again on the rolling roads down to Stalbridge and the most southerly control.
I’d eaten my croissant at the first stop on the levels, and that was pretty much me for the day, really. Goodness only knows how many calories were packed into it. At the lunch stop I had an espresso and half a flapjack and I was ready to go, while Matt was waiting to tuck into a full meal, so I decided to just push on and see how it went. I didn’t feel like I was pushing especially hard, and the third leg wasn’t difficult: up a long false flat onto Cranmore Chase, down to Longleat past the big house and some strange London-themed Winter Wonderland (complete with model cyclists) and then a happy hour fully lost in the lanes between Longleat and the A36, which isn’t far from home at all but is a bit of a blind spot for me.
A packet of crisps and a glass of coke was all I really wanted at Rudge, and as I was leaving the quick group that had towed me to the levels at the start pulled in to get their stamps, and I realised that for them, on this day I was that guy: the old chap who’s not riding particularly fast but somehow always seems to be in front of you on the Audax, just by dint of not stopping as much. It felt good to be that guy. There were no surprises on the last leg: a couple of lumps to Midford but then once you’re on the old railway it’s flat and traffic-free all the way back. Well, one surprise: I’d forgotten what an awfully long way it is along the Bath-Bristol path if you actually stay on it, instead of cutting the corner at Warmley and heading in on the road. Easy riding though. My time for the audax minus the ride to the start was ten and a quarter hours, easily the quickest of the series so far.
Two more to go: Matt and I have hatched a plan to DIY in January on a nice flat route so we can ride together more easily and he can hoover up some fixed gear challenge points. And after that: only one more and I’m done!
223km / 2,100m / 11h37
1 thought on “Easy miles in the winter sun! Can I ride a 200km Audax 12 months in a row? Ride #10”
My friend and I have a
My friend and I have a nickname for that older chap who always manages to be ahead at an audax by not stopping – Dr Relentless.