Up north..100 mile ride to the coast and back

Hi all,

potsy and i reckon it's time he did another 100 miler and he enjoyed going to the coast so much, he wants to do it again.


the date:- 27/03/2011 @ 9:30am. (don't forget clock changes!!)

meeting place: spring wood car park, on the a671 near whalley, clitheroe.

possible to do 50 miles by catching train back.



the list so far:-

skudupnorth (fixie nut)
colinj
potsy
callum
bromptonfb
ajay
pennine-paul (another fixie nut )
Alun
tubbycyclist
oldnslow

possibly moxey

meeting up with italiafirenze

anyone else?


here's the route (cheers colinj).......

http://www.bikely.co...od-flat-century




Cheers

shaun

You mean I,m lowering my gearing to mountain goat level and you organise a flat ride?
I will be there, hopefully Colin won,t tinker too much and we can have a nice easy paced run.
Looks like I better revise my target for the year or I,ll be done by august!

I might be, I'll have to check the trains and things later

And whats this about country bumpkins

Just a little dig at colin'no a roads' j......

i'm interested in this but not a definate at this stage.

Oh you tease Shaun ! Will proberly be up for this one,beginning to like the 100+ club

I like the way he's pretending I had anything to do with this idea
Has Colinj seen it yet? He's certainly staying quiet, or is he busy working on a 'flat route'

I think I'll pass on this one lads!

You're absolutely right about my dislike of A-roads. I don't mind ones like the A6033 (Keighley Road) from Hebden Bridge over to Oxenhope because most of the time it is more like a quiet B-road. I try and avoid it busy during commuter times though.

The time on A-roads on our Waddington ride is stretching my personal limits, hence the scenic diversion from Padiham to Whalley, and also why I want to go via Widdop next time.

The other thing - because I feel under motorised assault on busy roads, the last thing I want to do on them is to ride at a sociable pace. I'd want to be riding as fast as I possibly could to minimise the speed differential between me and the traffic, and to get the things over with as soon as I could!

On top of which - I don't like large towns!

You're also right that if I was going to do it, I'd be fiddling about with the route, taking the big towns and A-roads out, and putting the minor roads, villages and hills back in. It would end up being just another one of my routes!

I don't blame you for wanting a change so I wish you well and hope you have a great ride! And I look forward to seeing the photographs and reading the ride reports.

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Other matters:

A century ride by you guys on the 19th presumably rules out Waddington for the 20th though, so that would either have to be the 27th when the Cheshire Cat is on, or April 3rd.

I've just designed a route called The Goose Eye Grovel which is one of my hilly mainly minor road specials. I'm going to offer that up for this coming Sunday in another thread.

Oh, and as I mentioned last Sunday - I've been looking at doing a flattish century ride in Cheshire some time fairly soon. I've done the Manchester 100 (100 miles) lots of times and A Mere 200 (200 km) audax out there so I have the basic elements of a route in mind. I'll let you know when I've finalised the details. I might even go and do a recce of that route while you are doing your seaside ride.

Don't forget to reserve Sunday, 17th April for Spring Into The Dales from Hebden Bridge.

Heck, this is getting spooky - you guys are reading my mind while I'm typing!

Have you got an outline of the Cheshire ride? I'll make sure I'm free for that one, you could get a decent turn out.
Plenty of cc'ers from South Manchester will be interested.

I'm sure a Colinj route to the coast would be even better, as long as it's not a killer hilly one, like you've mentioned before it's early in the year and some of us are not quite at our peak of fitness

I quite fancied the 20th for the Waddington ride, in Shaun's PM he mentioned the coast ride being on the 13th so he must have changed his mind on the date.

I'm still working on that. The choice of route will partly depend on how I get to the start. I don't want to ride there and back because I'd end up doing 160+ miles! It's possible that tubbycyclist might offer me a lift. If not, I'd take my bike on the train, but that would mean making it a Saturday because the trains don't start early enough from here on Sundays.

Yes, I thought that might be the case.

Aargh, you've got me thinking now! I've just noticed that you can cycle up the promenade from Blackpool to Fleetwood and I've cycled to Blackpool avoiding big hills, and back from Fleetwood avoiding big hills too in the past. Okay, you are drawing me in! I don't want to step on Shaun's toes or yours, but I'll make my suggestion once I've worked out a few details!

Perhaps he just typed the wrong date? The 19th is a Saturday so it is quite possible he meant Sunday 13th. I fancy the 20th for the hillier Waddington too.

Actually, thinking about it - if we did end up going on my suggested coast route, the first part of it would be the Waddington route as far as Great Mitton, so why not do it instead of Waddington?

Damn - I've been up up half the night plotting a route and it comes in over-distance!

At 187 km, it is sufficiently over-distance that perhaps it is worth adding a bit more to make it an easyish 200 km? If I did that, I think it should be kept in reserve but used before Fiona N's hilly summer 200 to get us used to the longer distance.

I've been thinking about the timing of your 100 mile ride. Unless you particularly want to have an early start, or finish the ride in darkness, I'd suggest leaving it until Sun 27th and make it the Summer Time Century Ride To The Coast. That would give you about 1.5 hours more daylight to ride in (an hour from the clocks going forward, and half an hour because daylight hours are longer as we get further into the year).

It would be getting dark at about 20:00 on the 27th, so if you set off at 10:00, you'd have 10 hours to complete the ride in daylight at your sociable pace and having long leisurely stops. To have the same amount of daylight riding time on the 13th, you'd have to set off at 08:30.

I knew I should have kept quiet, an easy 100 has now turned into a 200k
The 27th makes sense with the extra daylight, plus I prefer Sunday rides.

As long as the Cheshire ride is not too soon you'll get to meet 'Old Man Fossy' Col

Right, time to crack on with the diet before Shaun comes up with sommat else

Hi guys,

i'm up for any ride i can fit in. can't do 13th due to doing first 200km audax.i'm on an organized brompton ride in the yorkshire dales on the 12th (bonkonon are you up for a large group ride of bromptoneers starting from skipton?)

colin,
organize what you like, i was thinking of potsy's jelly legs. He says bring on the hills, so bring em on. But others have shown an interest on a flat ride, it would be a bit unfair. Let me see if i can get a flattish scenic route, but it may have to start more towards manchester or preston way. i'm too busy till sunday to look tho.

Cheers

shaun

+1 for Waddinton on the 20th. Also fancy the Cheshire 100 some time, but probably would need to get a bit stronger, fitter, lighter etc first.

I've taken Shaun's original concept and am working on it. It's looking good!

It has very few A-roads, but it has very little climbing. It goes along the coast and it is bang on 100 miles!

Watch this space ...

I'll keep an eye out.

My preference would be for a Saturday as transport is easier (and I'm busy on Sundays but it would be interesting to see what comes up.

Looking at dates more generally, the CC Ecosse rides have a way of people voting for the days they are availible. Would that be useful in the future to either of you?

Starting where Colin?
Sounds interesting already.

Sounds good colin, cheers, with it being flat keeps it fair for those who expressed an interest in a flat route.
Shall we set the next waddy outing for the 20th then. It needs a new thread starting colin. If it carries on being popular we should ask admin for a sticky thread.

On the 200km ride to the coast, set a date 5 or 6 weeks before fiona's hilly 200km.

Ok, this route is my suggestion! It starts and finishes at Spring Wood picnic centre car park, Whalley. There is a station at Whalley, with trains running from Manchester Victoria via Blackburn (destination Clitheroe).

It is as near as can be exactly 100 miles (161 kms). It has a slightly lumpy beginning, and a less lumpy finish with a really long easy middle section. Here's the profile ...



I've marked the highest point on the route, just 12 miles into the ride. It is at 523 ft. To put that into perspective, the highest point on our recent Waddington rides was at 787 ft. This is about as flat as you'll get without going through the local cities. It is an easier route than the Manchester 100 which many riders think of as flat.

The route takies in the coast roads and promenade from Lytham St Anne's through Blackpool and Cleveleys to Fleetwood. Parts of the central Blackpool promenade are currently closed for restoration work and there are diversions in place so we'd have to find our way through them.

A short ferry trip would get us to Knott End for £2 per rider & bike.

There is a good cyclists' cafe at Scorton at the 73 mile point but obviously we could get something to eat and drink as we rode along the promenade.

That's as good as I can come up with chaps! If you don't fancy it, I'll certainly have a go at it by myself when I'm fit enough to add another 42 miles to Spring Wood and back from Hebden Bridge.

I'm okay for Saturdays or Sundays. Trains are definitely better on Saturdays.

I tried the voting system before and ended up doing the ride twice, once on a Saturday, and repeated on a Sunday for those who couldn't make Saturdays! Generally, I'd rather do each ride once!