The Imperial Century A Month Challenge Chatzone

[ianrauk]

This weekends cycling shennanigans. Aprils qualifying ride done and dusted with another ride of the fabulous Man Of Kent Audax. A lovely day for it or was it?. It was bright blue sunny skies all day. However the cold easterly wind made riding much harder then it should have been. Even though the temperatures reached 17.5°, the wind made it feel much colder. But it was a great ride never the less. Feeling good and strong, especially for the second half of the ride. I told myself I wanted to be back at base for 6pm, I did it by 15 minutes. Making a conscious decision not to faff or hang around at controls. 15-20 minutes at the most and it worked out quite well.
Its always nice to see and ride with some of the regular Audax chums and to meet some new ones.
So scores on the doors,
130 miles for the Audax and 37 miles from and back to home, making a grand total of 167 miles.
Imperial century ride # 351
Imperial month in a row #173

Toot Toot at New Romney Railway

Elham Valley. The picture really doesn't do it justice and how beautiful this place is.

 

[robjh]

This weekends cycling shennanigans. Aprils qualifying ride done and dusted with another ride of the fabulous Man Of Kent Audax. A lovely day for it or was it?. It was bright blue sunny skies all day. However the cold easterly wind made riding much harder then it should have been. Even though the temperatures reached 17.5°, the wind made it feel much colder. But it was a great ride never the less. Feeling good and strong, especially for the second half of the ride. I told myself I wanted to be back at base for 6pm, I did it by 15 minutes. Making a conscious decision not to faff or hang around at controls. 15-20 minutes at the most and it worked out quite well.
Its always nice to see and ride with some of the regular Audax chums and to meet some new ones.
So scores on the doors,
130 miles for the Audax and 37 miles from and back to home, making a grand total of 167 miles.
Imperial century ride # 351
Imperial month in a row #173
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Toot Toot at New Romney Railway
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Elham Valley. The picture really doesn't do it justice and how beautiful this place is.
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Agree about the cold wind - despite the sunshine it wasn't a day for stripping off too many layers.

 

[Rickshaw Phil]

With barely enough riding done to keep the fitness up since the last one I really thought I was going to be out of the challenge this month. However, stubbornness has won out again and I got my qualifier done on Friday. 101.59 miles at 12.3 mph average on the flattest route I could come up with at the time. Ride report here for anyone who would like to see it: https://www.cyclechat.net/threads/your-ride-today.173254/post-7404174

A few snaps from the day:

 

[13 rider]

Somehow I'm still in 😁, That's my 100th consecutive month of riding an imperial ton and it very nearly didn't happen . My general early month putting off and general apathy got me too the last weekend to get it done , Friday woke up with a sore throat which became some sort of infection making eating and swallowing difficult so not ideal preparation, so I left my recovery as long as possible which resulted in a last day all or nothing thankfully the weather held . Got to the cafe at 54 miles feeling surprisingly well but the wheels came off coming home as the temperature shot up I really wilted. A road closure and a uppity workman at 91 miles meaning retracing my route back up the hill I'd just come down didn't help my mood 😤. But it's done not sure if it wasn't the 100th month I would have bothered

 

[ianrauk]

That's my 100th consecutive month of riding an imperial ton

Fabulous milestone.
Congrats dear chap and really pleased you are still in the challenge.

 

[robjh]

Somehow I'm still in 😁, That's my 100th consecutive month of riding an imperial ton and it very nearly didn't happen . My general early month putting off and general apathy got too the last weekend to get it done , Friday woke up with a sore throat which became some sort of infection making eating and swallowing difficult so not ideal preparation, so I left my recovery as long as possible which result in a last day all or nothing thankfully the weather held . Got to the cafe at 54 miles feeling surprisingly well but the wheels came off coming home as the temperature shot up I really wilted. A road closure and a uppity workman at 91 miles meaning retracing my route back up the hill I'd just come down didn't help my mood 😤. But it's done not sure if it wasn't the 100th month I would have bothered

Well done for sneaking it in at the back end of the month.

 

[footloose crow]

30 April: 164km and 2282 m

I managed this by the skin of my teeth this month on the last day of April. A very hilly ride on an unusually warm day slowed me up a lot. The hills around Bodmin Moor are the Cornwall/Devon speciality of very narrow, tree overhung, lanes with inconsistent gradients and long sections of high double figures well as a broken road surface with sharp bends. Slow going up (puff, puff) and slow going down (white fingered braking).

Traffic was very light with hours of empty lanes and gorgeous views.

I was pleased to get home, it felt the toughest ride this year or of any year. I am still a neophyte centurion though: this is only number 16.

I recorded it as a DIY audax because it gave me 2.5 altitude points! (Which demonstrates the shallowness of my point seeking mind).

 

[13 rider]

Well done @footloose crow superb effort , I badly wilted yesterday on my century ride with a measly 4500ft of of upness . As someone who rides in Cornwall once a year you have my full respect in completing monthly tons the endless short hills slowly drain your energy with very little reward on the downhills

 

[footloose crow]

Thanks @13rider. I would have dearly loved to be doing a flatter ride yesterday. I have done rides with a similar level of height gain before but this one was just one relentless hill after another and it was very warm! It felt the hardest century so far.

 

[robjh]

30 April: 164km and 2282 m

I managed this by the skin of my teeth this month on the last day of April. A very hilly ride on an unusually warm day slowed me up a lot. The hills around Bodmin Moor are the Cornwall/Devon speciality of very narrow, tree overhung, lanes with inconsistent gradients and long sections of high double figures well as a broken road surface with sharp bends. Slow going up (puff, puff) and slow going down (white fingered braking).

Traffic was very light with hours of empty lanes and gorgeous views.

I was pleased to get home, it felt the toughest ride this year or of any year. I am still a neophyte centurion though: this is only number 16.

I recorded it as a DIY audax because it gave me 2.5 altitude points! (Which demonstrates the shallowness of my point seeking mind).

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Well done for another late entry!

 

[robjh]

May's ride done yesterday, on the first of the month. I hadn't planned this, but someone from my cycling club suggested a 110-mile route on this date and so I was up for it. The route largely followed one I've done before (eg. last November) but with some changes to the first part out of Cambridge. We headed west to Ampthill in Bedfordshire, with a coffee stop at the Shuttleworth (aircraft) Collection at Old Warden, and then south over the Chiltern ridge at Lilley, to a second stop at Spokes Cycle Cafe at Codicote, before finally returning NE through Puckeridge and back to Cambridge.

It was a good day, familiar route, and nice to have some company, but I found the 28º heat oppressive and started wilting at one point so that I had to sit in the shade with a cold drink and protein bar. Got my strength back, but by 90 miles I was no longer keeping up on the hills so told the other guys to go on. I made it home then quite comfortably at my own pace, but we'd been keeping up a good speed all day and it had begun to take its toll.

110.8 miles today; my 77th consecutive month with at least one century ride, and my 163rd century ever. Eddington number has increased by 1 to 110.


Our coffee stop at the Shuttleworth Collection

 

[ianrauk]

May's qualifying ride done and dusted.
A lovely weather very warm and sunny day for it. I had to slap on the factor 50 it was so sunny. Temperatures hovered in the mid to high 20's most of the day. Even the winds on the Romney Marshes decided to play windy ball and helped make rapid progress across them.
The legs felt good and worked well, though they complained bitterly on the ascent of Birling Hill at mile 130 followed by even more complaining on White Post Hill shortly after. SHUT UP LEGS!!. They ignored me.
My plan was to limit times spend at controls to 20 minutes max and it worked quite well. Also to get back to Meopham for 6pm. I actually got back at 5.47pm. So very happy with that.
So, scores on the doors.
143.71 miles for the day.
Imperial Century #352 over all.
Imperial century month #174 in a row.
A good few Eddington numbers gathered. Need one more ride of 119 to reach that number.

Check out that blue sky.

 

[Rickshaw Phil]

Not leaving it late this time, I got my latest qualifier done yesterday. Round the north of the county again as it best suited the wind direction, but I've explored some roads I've never cycled before, including some I didn't mean to ride at all. The ride write up is here: https://www.cyclechat.net/threads/your-ride-today.173254/post-7414274

A few snaps that didn't make it into the write up:

 

[13 rider]

Mays done with 12 days to spare 😁. After last months 100th consecutive month I was considering dropping out of the challenge ,my mojo for long rides has gone missing but with this near perfect weather I found a bit of get up and go and 104 imperial miles later another month ticked off headed south to Northamptonshire to Althorp house and return . Will need to get Junes in early as I'm on holiday the last 2 weeks

 

[footloose crow]

Similarly to @13rider I have found myself finishing the challenge with just a couple of days spare. It has been a busy month and my wife and I spent some of it cycling in Mallorca, but not more than 160km unfortunately. Anyway completed today with a loop westwards into a fierce headwind down to Penzance, a long wind assisted leg eastwards along the coast and then back into the wind connecting the Clay villages with some 'interesting' lanes. I had company from friends on the first half of it which slowed me down as punctures, coffee stops, slow riding uphill and then a bent derailleur meant a lot of stopping and waiting. The second half I was 4 km/hour faster on my own! I did enjoy the company though, made the ride easier.

Now it's June coming up......must find some new rides.