What better way to spend a Friday, than to get on your bike, and take to the roads and head off for a weekend with your best friend by bicycle.
Sounds great....however when you consider the following, it becomes less appetising;
Worcester to Cardiff
1. 5 hours broken sleep due to an unwell daughter
2. Underestimating the distance to be covered - 92 miles in total, not 75...duh!
3. An accompanying groinal saddle sore (and it definitely was)
4. The hardest and longest climbs I have yet cycled up
5. A nagging crosswind
6. A 10kg backpack
7. 42 year old legs
8. The prospect of riding the same way back
Le Grand Depart
I left Worcester full of optimism for a fast and smooth ride to Wales and within the first 10 miles I was brought back to reality with an imposing 10% gradient climb on the A4103 Worcester to Hereford road. Noone had told me that on some maps, Storridge is awarded its own personal > denoting lung bursting, leg breaking steepness.
....and so it continued, mile after mile of short, steep climbs, a breakneck descent over Fromes Hill and I arrived in Hereford, hungry, already knackered and questioning my sanity. I could have been safely tucked up at home with a hot cuppa and Holly Willoughby for company (very interesting cookery slots on This Morning).
Ou est Abergavenny?
Halfway between Hereford and Abergavenny I found an Oasis of Fried Loveliness, Reggies Roadside Cafe. Reggie was a friendly and chatty chap who rustled up a delicious hot double egg and cheese roll and a fine cup of rosie lee. We whiled away a good half hour until I shifted my backside off the chair and picked up my bike with Reggies portents loud in my ear;
'When you leave Abergavenny there is a bloody great big hill all the way up to Ebbw Vale...even the lorries have trouble going up it....oh, and the Head of the Valleys road is bloody dangerous too....have a good ride'.
By this time I had sat still off the bike for long enough to have forgotten that my saddle sore (let's call it Boris, after the Mayor of London who can be a bit of an annoying pain in the arse at times and never seems to go away) was still present and painful.
Sitting back on the saddle my pain sensors reawakened with a shriek of agony. Still, only about 55 miles to go.
And so I arrived on the dual carriageway outside of Abergavenny, pointing my bike in the direction of 'Up' and began my effortless and immensely enjoyable 8 mile climb up the Head of The Valleys Road, to triumphantly crest the summit at Ebbw Vale and then glide majestically all the way down the Rhymney Valley to Cardiff.
En Haut Montagne
The truth is that the climb was as long and painful as any I've ever done. The road climbed ever upwards, seemingly without end. I refuelled on isotonic energy drinks, veggie jelly beans and Mars Bars and took advantage of the many and unvaried bus shelters up the climb, each with their own unique graffiti and smell of wee.
Mercifully, I was able to ride up the whole way without getting off to push and felt a sense of relief when the road began to flatten out and offer the faintest glimmer of a down hill slope. I had by now given up saying 'ooh' and 'ahh' every 5 seconds...not at the magnificent Welsh scenery around me, but at every rub of my groin against the saddle. Pain from Nuts Central was being overtaken by Tiredness Express. I feared I was about to bonk.
Que Est Bonk?
to bonk (verb): to run out of energy due to a calorie deficit, especially during intense physical activity.
I've not bonked before, but I was close this time. The sight of Mars Bar number three, a stack of dextrose tablets and a final jelly bean gave me the energy boost I was looking for and after the umpteenth extended arm self portrait photo, I headed for the coast of South Wales down the Rhymney Valley.
It was a lovely fast descent off the Heads of The Valleys Road and I thought of the agony I'd have to endure on the return leg....at which point I decided that I would let the train take the strain...I couldn't face the return leg with the exhaustion and pain I was feeling.
My best mate Simon Whitton had been tickling fish and counting grains of sediment in Monmouth for the afternoon and he kindly agreed to divert his route home to catch up with me and lighten the load I had been carrying all the way from Worcester. Why wait till I'm nearly there? So inconsiderate.
We eventually met up in Bargoed, a one horse town with a shiny new railway line, restored on the lines previously closed by the infamous Dr Beeching in the '60s. I had almost come to grief when a local dimwit thought that standing in the middle of a road playing 'chicken' as I approached would be 'a bit of a laff'. The fact it was a 20% descent and I was touching 40mph didn't deter him. I think my shouted 'Don't be a tw*t all your life' was delivered with the slight lilting sing song of the South Welsh accent. I pick up accents fast me... tidy, innit boyo?
Le Montagne au Fromage
Pack lightened, contents deposited in Simon's car, I negotiated a particularly unnerving stretch of the A469 dual carriageway outside of Caerphilly...the last town before Cardiff. We actually drove along it the next day and to my surprise there was a sign with a red circle and a bicycle in it....erm, doesn't that mean no cycling along here? Oops.
Caerphilly now came into view, with it's castle - the second largest in Britain (after Windsor Castle) and famed for its cheese. I wasn't thinking about castles or cheese, there was only one thing on my mind....the climb up Caerphilly Mountain, the last and steepest object on the route before Cardiff.
It is not very long, but it is steep. The climb starts innocuously just as you leave the town, attractive detached houses giving way to forested slopes.....then in the words of Mr T...
'You pathetic, get some nuts.....or you gonna meet my friend PAIN'.
Steep, climb, push, pedal. pant, sweat, strain, heave, huff, puff and.....stop, climb off, catch breath, remount, lowest gear, start again, few more metres and...stop, climb off, curse under breath, curse out loud, sweat, condsider sitting down, remount, get off and.....cross the road and push the damn bike up the remaining half of the climb.
I made it half way up before my legs, brain and every other muscle told me to walk. Not a good feeling, but accepting you limitations is something you have to learn to do - especially as you get older. I'm 42, not 22, I kept thinking.
Not that it made me feel any better when, as I wheeled the bike round the final bend, I saw a guy 'dancing on the pedals' - cyc;ing and climbing fluidly up the road. He was on a nice, light racing bike, and carrying a small daypack. I will go back for another day to have a crack at going over it...but then again, I have nothing to prove, so I might just leave that and go on to other climbs.
Arrivee en Cardiff
I am here at last, I am here. Lots of stops, lots of climbing, a body drained of energy and testicles on fire and I arrived in the hallowed district of Splott 9.5 hours after starting. I beat the sunset too (Simon had my lights in his car) and was in good time for a deserved bath, a couple of cuppas and then off for a reviving curry at the Welsh Curry House of the Year 2010 - The Mirchi.
So, in summary, what would I say about this 'day trip fun ride'?
- it was TOUGH
- it was LONG
- it was HARD
- it was STEEP
- it was EXHAUSTING
- it was SWEATY
- it was ENJOYABLE (sort of)
- it was WORTH IT...for that cup of tea and a cracking curry and a great weekend with my brilliant ffrind gorau, Simon Kendall Mint Cake Whitton.
This one was for fun, but the real serious stuff is happening in June 2011. A 410 mile ride to Dublin and back....lots more climbs, lots more aches and pains, but hopefully lots more money for Scope and lots more help for people living with cerebral palsy.
Tony.
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