I did promise you a destination ride, and I think the airport and their sumptuous breakfast buffet ticked all the boxes! Planning the ride is the easy part of course - it's the actual carrying out of it that's the unknown, due to so many variable factors.
The actual route was worked out nearly a year ago. After remembering the iconic terminal building from my flying days, it was just a question of using bikehike to sort out the least hilly yet scenic route, which Rebecca and I then test rode last July. Since then I went over a few parallel roads south, and then rejected them due to safety issues. The only change which I'd mentioned to a few of you was having to ditch going through Leigh due to a bridge replacement from this week, which is a shame as the road conditions around there are far better.
It was all rather scenic once out of London.
Even though I've led probably 100+ rides, those tend to be for no more than 25 riders, so the forward thinking about gauging how fast to go, when to stop etc increases exponentially with more riders who are on a wider range of bikes, with differing abilities.
Having done enough TEC duties myself, it really is a privilege to have noble gents like
@Tim Hall and
@TimO at the back. Between them, they can magic any machine back to life, and they excelled, especially with
@TimO giving up his ride to provide escort duties and
@Tim Hall getting
@jiberjaber mobile again. I must also thank people who helped out with the way making which makes the ride so much easier. And of course our Steward in Chief,
@mmmmartin complete with radio.
Brighton next month won't be quite the same thing though.
