London-Edinburgh-London 2013: The thread

[rb58]

it was fascinating (still is) to follow the progress of the cyclists i shared a lot of miles with! very well done all!! @Frank, audax journalist - excellent digests.

Martin, Tim, Pete, John, Tynan - keep it going - nearly there!

all your efforts are a huge inspiration for my next challenge

Rimas! You. Are. A. Nutter.

 

[ianrauk]

Rimas! You. Are. A. Nutter.

Tell us something we don't know...

 

[mmmmartin]

In other news, I'm delighted to announce that I have been granted the honour of cleaning the loos at Loughton tomorrow. Sue says there are other jobs I can do if I behave. Pleased to be helping out.
Am also fretting about Tim, who is ever so slightly not on the time I expected at Thirsk. Although, with this caveat: in life there are many things you should worry about but Tim is not one of them.

 

[mmmmartin]

Tim is at Thirsk.

 

[StuartG]

@mmmmartin & @frank9755 - I know the start times were staggered but basically does it come down to getting to Pocklington tonight for a rest to have a good chance of completing on time?

 

[frank9755]

@mmmmartin & @frank9755 - I know the start times were staggered but basically does it come down to getting to Pocklington tonight for a rest to have a good chance of completing on time?

Not really studied the cut-off times, but there is always the option of just closing it out tonight / tomorrow morning.

It's not a bad strategy if you have the legs, particularly as the temperatures tonight are forecast to be far more comfortable than tomorrow afternoon and the headwind a lot lighter. It's often easier to keep going than it is to stop and start again, and these guys are not exactly novices at riding through the night!

 

[Mice]

Have read more of the thread. Am even more amazed at your interest.
Frank's updates on our sleeping and thinking was bang on the nail. Mcshroom lives in the Lakes so packing up there was always better than struggling and packing in Pocklington or Market Rasen which would have left a long and expensive trip home. Also he has mates helping at controls up there. He'll do it next time. We were together for many hours on the early stages and drafted each other, but he was often faster than me.
With hindsight I would not have spent a night in the Enfield Travelodge which was so hot I was dripping sweat all night and slept for three hours max. So many of us started already tired. And I would have made an effort to get over Yad Moss in the day and do the Lockerbie road in the dark, it's flat and straight and impossible to go wrong on the nav. And I would have thought much more about the implications of arriving, as I did, at Moffat as it closed, leaving me with maybe a five or six hour ride over big hills to Edinburgh to certainly arrive as it closed, so no sleep there, and be faced with 170k to the next beds. Making a day of more than 300k.
But all I did was pay my money, ride the bike a bit - sometimes with mates in the land of Johnny Foreigner - and rock up on the morning armed only with a steely determination to enjoy the ride. Which I did. i absolutely loved it. At the start Charlotte (OTP) took my photograph. I asked if I looked fit and determined. She said: "You look terrified."
But the truth is that much of the time I was a quivering wreck struggling with exhaustion. The Howardian Hills are sometimes 18% gradients and we all walked them, even the tough Finnish machine. On Yad Moss at midnight my chain came off the front cogs and - oh joy - also jammed in the back cassette. I was all wobbly and dizzy and needed to lean against the bike to stop myself falling over while I used a handful of grass to stop getting grease all over my fingers and extricate the thing. No tears were shed in the freeing of that chain but very, very nearly. And in some godforsaken tiny village at 1am somewhere I had to stop and sit on a wall and drink some water to have a rest as I simply couldn't go on. It was a real struggle and I was dwarfed by the challenge. I'm sure others will be along later with great tales of derring do, but for me it was a humbling experience, because sometimes on hard audaxes in the long night hours you get to look into your soul and you don't always like what you see.

Bl@@@@@ fantastic Mmmmartin. What a truly tremendous achievement and an incredible cycling adventure all at the same time. Three hours kip the night before cycling LEL would have had many bailing at the start. You really went for it - I hope you are chuffed to bits with how you did. Absolutely awesome. The concept of cycling towards a bed that wasn't there has given me palpitations just thinking about it - never mind the distances, conditions and time constraints. That arallsopp and his Barring Mechanical (www.amazon.com) book gave me a hint of how tough it would be. Too grim by half, for me. Complete and utter respect for you and everyone else who made it to the start line.

Frank975s updates have kept me woohooing at my keyboard. Woohoo to youuuu!

Mice

 

[Trickedem]

Tim is at Thirsk.

Just leaving now. Aiming to get 2.5 hours sleep at Pock. Raining here again

 

[Mark Grant]

Up the REME!

 

[tubbycyclist]

Heavy rain in Lincolnshire this afternoon but clearing later. Done some sums on the bike and worked out that I would probably finish pbp in time
Just idle planning to take my mind off the sore bits.

 

[mmmmartin]

@mmmmartin & @frank9755 - I know the start times were staggered but basically does it come down to getting to Pocklington tonight for a rest to have a good chance of completing on time?

Yes, sort of. Here is the maths, taking Tim as an example. (Those of faint disposition, look away now.)
Tim started at 9.15am so must finish by 05.55am on Friday morning.
He is at Thirsk now (6pm on Wednesday), exactly 1,000k. He says he'll press on to Pock (65k), I guess he might arrive about 10pm maybe. At this stage he will have just under three hours in hand. (Hence his decision to have 2.5 hours of sleep.) Pock is 1,065k and then he will have 354k to go. Leaving Pock at say 00.30 on Thursday morning means he has to stay above a total overall moving average of 12.2kph - including traffic lights, eating, etc.
So that is the bare maths.

Tim will know all this and I bet he's gone over and over all the permutations of timing, eating, sleeping, speed, time on the bike, in his head a thousand times. After Pock he'll be in the dark for a few hours on Thursday morning, then daylight (weather forecast is warm and hot which is no blessing) and then in the dark from 10pm onwards on Thursday night. There are four controls for him and all they will be concentrating on is shovelling food into exhausted, red-eyed, locust-like cyclists and getting them back on the road.
In his favour:

• after Market Rasen it is pan-flat Lincolnshire lanes
• the forecast is dry not torrential rain although a headwind is forecast
• he's Tim and he'll make it

 

[ianrauk]

• he's Tim and he'll make it

This...............

 

[Pale Rider]

Not only that he looks fresh as a daisy as well!

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Volunteering at Barnard Castle, I saw Anco on the way up and down.

We all agreed he really looked like he was feeling it on the way down.

I believe he took three hours sleep.

 

[Noodley]

I spied numerous LELers around Gorebridge - first one was mid-afternoon on Monday, then early morning on Tuesday and finally around lunchtime on Tuesday. I did not see that dishevelled wreck that belongs to @Baggy and I'd been practising my manly snog...

 

[jowwy]

gutted - my mate dropped out at a 1000km in thirsk