Your ride today....

[figbat]

First big off-road ride of the year. Up until now it’s been ~20-ish miles, 1,000-1,200 ft of climbing. In preparation for a long, multi-day ride in May I went out to ‘train’.

Out-and-back along the Ridgeway to Barbury Castle; 57 miles, 4,000 ft. Glorious day for it, not as warm as it looks and a stiff easterly wind, meaning a tailwind out and headwind back, which is 180° out from normal and made coming home quite hard. Good to have ground it out though, it shows I have a base level to work on.

Coincidentally I did this exact ride again a couple of days ago, except it was into a gale on the way out with a welcome tailwind coming home. The forecast was for a dry day, so it drizzled all the way there and most of the way back. I’ve been off the bike a bit recently with a bout of covid followed by a long-lasting cold, so it was tough.

 

[Andy in Germany]

The first "sort of Audax" with Beautiful Daughter.

Checking the route...

I'd prepared questions to be answered every few Kilometres to keep her interest, and to find out about local history...

Learning about the Jewish Cemetery in Mühlen.

I'd planned a ride of 50k, with the second half downhill and with a tailwind in case she got tired. Thankfully the Neckar valley cycleway barely touches a road...

Turning point at Glatt Castle, which normally looks like this.

I don't know why I was worried about her being tired: on the way back to my village she thundered past me shouting: "Quick, there's an Ebike coming: I don't want it to overtake us..."

 

[geocycle]

After a fortnight off the bike I was desperate to get out and the weather finally obliged today. After a cold start the forecast was to improve and the winds of the weekend storms had rescinded. I was keen to get a 100 km done for April so headed out to the Dales. First stop was Clapham for a strong coffee at the wonderful Paul’s Pedals, excellent as ever and the loyalty card is filling. I then picked up the back roads through Austwick and Warf to cross the Ribble at Stainforth. Had to wait for some numpties who followed satnav across the tiny packhorse bridge and managed to get stuck. Then the climb began up to Malham moor and I realised how much strength I’d lost in the two weeks with no cycling. The curlews kept me distracted. I enjoyed the moors for a while then dropped down the steep descent to Langcliffe and then Settle for lunch. The Naked Man was severely depleted and it looked as though he had been busy over the Easter weekend. I made my way back along Mewith lane into a headwind that was a bit uncalled for. 102 km with 1341 m of climbing.

Pictures are of Penyghent, some limestone tracks, pausing at the start of the descent to Langcliffe and some wild daffodils by a lovely bridge.

 

[Cavalol]

Not done anything of note for a few months, really, so the nice weather prompted a ride out that wasn't intended to be anything too mad. The wind was almost neutral leaving, but in my mind was the return leg along the river path. Get that right and you absolutely motor along, get it wrong and it's pretty grim at times.

The wind (as sod's law would dictate) was sort of coming from the right hand side and in my face, so it was a bit of a pig. Two or three short stops as didn't want to over do. Last leg of the river path (turning towards Sealand Road by the Landrover garage) and the wind was nicely behind me, but I wasn't going mad.

Along behind the race course, stopped to watch some crazy fella water skiing which was a laugh to watch. On to The Groves, chatted to some of my biker/scooter mates then up Dee Lane Blast on Strava and managed a PB which I'm mega happy with as I was motoring and kept it in gear (17/20) all the way up.

Strava revealed a couple of other personal tests as well as some second and third tests along the way, so as a super unfit bloke I'm happy.

 

[Donger]

My road bike has been stuck in the workshop for weeks because of parts getting lost in Royal Mail, so I'm doing all my riding on "The Beast" these days. I say "all my riding", but in reality this was only my fifth ride of 2026 so far, and if it hadn't been for the Half Century a Month Challenge making me do four 50km rides I would barely have got out at all. Being on the big heavy mountain bike means going about 3mph slower than I would have on the Ridgeback road bike on a good day. Today there were some occasional (and quite random) spells of quite strong headwinds that added to the slowing down of my ride and I arrived home tired and aching afterwards.

A slight variation on my usual 50km route around Severnside, with occasional stops by the river bank to admire the views and to watch an unending train of large, pale grey milatary aircraft shuttling back and forth between the UK and the USA. Just a few photos:
(1) Newnham on Severn, seen form Arlingham:

(2) A view upstream towards Epney from Lower Framilode:

(3) The view of the Anchor Inn as I sat on the wall enjoying the sunshine:

Glad I got out there today, but can't wait to get my road bike back to go a bit further afield. 51Km today.

 

[HLaB]

With the bank holiday Monday I was going to go on a tile bagging gravel ride but one of my mates asked me for a ride last night. He also asked a couple of other nates. So I looked at a cafe that I hadn't been to but thought would be open and settled on the Colmworth Golf Club cafe. That got me a single tile.

 

[ianrauk]

April's Imperial Century a Month qualifying ride done and dusted with today's cycling shenanigans.
I fancied a bit of hill climbing and wanted to see the sea. So plotted a lumpy old route south through the Kent lanes down to the Romney Marshes where I had a bit of respite from the hills, on to see the sea at St Mary's Bay in Dymchurch before heading back north through more rolling terrain.
A lovely day for a bike ride. Sunshine all day with highs of 18°
My legs are complaining, buggers.
So, scores on the doors.
120 miles for the day.
Imperial Century #365
Imperial month in a row #185
5 more 120+ mile rides to reach that Eddington number.