Your rides this year: 2014 Review of the year.

[TeeShot]

I've enjoyed every opportunity to ride a bicycle this year. Time on a bike is never a chore for me

A potter around my local lanes in Cheshire

Newlands pass, a beautiful ribbon of tarmac going ever upwards

The President's Tea

A ride organised by The Cheshire & North Wales CTC Fifty miles around the Peckforten Hills and Beeston Castle

if Carlsberg did feed stations...........................

My trip to the TDF

A week in Peebles for a family holiday saw several visits to Glentress, a pleasant 50 mile road ride and two rides around the red at Innerleithen with my two sons

More next year with any luck

 

[drummerbod]

Just got cycling again a few months ago but my favourite rides are below...


View: http://youtu.be/Sv_puMxlNIo?list=UU1Tw6hgIKP1nZNo6npT_7Xw



View: http://youtu.be/YHetXRvghVg?list=UU1Tw6hgIKP1nZNo6npT_7Xw

 

[solitaire]

Well pretty rubbish year, less than 50 miles compared to the usual 5,000+
for reasons I've already gone into so won't bore you anymore with that,
back out there today, so here's to 2015

 

[Sea of vapours]

2014 was an excellent cycling year for me as it's the year when, after watching the Tour de France for the first time (I had to really; I live in the Dales, near Settle, and it seemed compulsory!) I remembered how much I used to enjoy cycling as a teenager and decided to buy my first bike since then. Aged nearly 51 at the time, that was painfully long ago, but in late July I went out and bought a bike anyway, with the basic objective of having fun and the secondary objective of cycling, rather than driving, to see my girlfriend, who's just under 100 miles away, over the Pennines, in Newcastle.

I was pretty pleased the first time I did 100Km in a single ride, but probably my absolute highlight was my first circuit of over 100 miles in mid-September: Ingleton, Hawes, over Buttertubs and up to Tan Hill, then Reeth, Leyburn and up Coverdale to Kettlewell, then home over my lowlight of the year, which was a steep little hill up from Arncilffe, heading for Malham Tarn and then Settle. All the other hills, I knew about and I'd psychologically factored them in; that last one, I didn't and it was ...... unwelcome is fair I think, though more restrained than my thoughts when I 'came across it'! I would thoroughly recommend that loop for anyone looking for a hilly (3,000+m ascent) 100 mile circuit, and I'll be doing it again in a few months, when the ice and snow have gone and the days have become a sensible length again.

Second highlight was meeting my second objective: cycling to Newcastle and back. 194 miles with 5,000m ascent over a long weekend in late September, just in time before the day length and weather made repeating that trip more than a little unrealistic, for me, 'til Spring.

Overall, I'm really delighted to have got back into cycling after 30 years off a bike and I'm very much looking forward to being able to do some long, warm rides next year :-) I also hope, next year, to become a lot more confident on descents; definite room for improvement there. Distance-wise, I hope to manage 200Km on a single ride, which is more than a little challenging for me around here, what with the notable lack of flat ground in any direction!

 

[Bollo]

A big year for me. I'd had a few lingering health issues that needed killing or curing, so I dropped from 110kg to 80kg and got organised with my number 10 knee by watching the mileage and increasing the intensity. I'm enjoying the riding like never before.

In July I rode to stages 4 (Le Touquet) and 5 (the cobbles!) of the TdF. We covered 350km in 3 days, about 200kms of which was in solid rain and final leg from from Douai to Dunkirk into a driving headwind. The plus sides - I'm no great visitor to France and was genuinely surprised at the warmth and hospitality of the locals, including our B&B host Mme M who welcomed two wrecked and dirty cyclists into her home, plied us with Champers and resurrected my grade C 'O' level French from a very deep oubliette (see!).








Later on in the year I took a ride to the Camberley-Brighton stage of the ToB. This was a little disappointing. I've managed to pick up a stage or two of the ToB for a few years now, usually either Guildford or London. Anyway, the depart from Camberley was crap - the start line was too cramped and the riders were dispatched in double-quick time, so a little underwhelming in all. Also, Surrey drivers live up to their reputation as cyclist-hating sociopaths. I was glad to cross the border back into civilisation aka Hampshire. I did get close enough to Michael Gove to punch him, but wimped out - sorry one and all.







My final cycling treat of the year was a visit tot he Olympic velodrome last week for the track world cup. I've watched a fair bit of cycling over the years, but this was my first visit to a track event. If you get the chance, go! It's a great day out. I've already posted quite a few photos of this in the track cycling sub-forum, but I'll risk the wrath of the mods by repeating a few.....

Anna Meares beaten to the line by Kristina Vogel


Laura Trott in the Omnium individual pursuit.


The Japanese coach passes timing information to a rider during the individual pursuit. Each coach had their own 'technique' and mannerisms for doing this; he was my favourite.


Sprint to the line in the mens' keirin.


Fame at last! Mrs Dr Bollo, yourself and my chief cycling crony Jim enjoy our 15 seconds on the velodrome big screen.


Here's to 2015!

 

[Rickshaw Phil]

A few firsts for me:
First ride around the Wrekin.
First forum ride: @ColinJ's Back From The Dead ride.
First ride to Ludlow and back.
First ride over the Stiperstones (including crossing the Longmynd in the same ride)
First ride to Montgomery and Bishop's Castle.
First ride to Lake Vyrnwy and back.
First ride in the north of the Lake District - a loop from Keswick circling Blencathra and Skiddaw.
First two sportives (BHF Worcester ride and Billcar 60).
Completed the Metric Century a Month challenge.
Most miles I've done in a year (4229 at the time of writing with time for a few more yet).

 

[Cavalol]

Hmm, tricky. I keep saying 'best ride ever' after a nice run out, then it gets eclipsed by the next one! My highlights would probably be riding to Ellesmere in Shropshire (about 60 miles return) as it just seemed impossible for someone of my age, weight and (un)fitness.
Riding up The Yeld hill (Kelsall, nr Chester) without stopping was a massive achievement for me, I'm last out of something like 1,780 on Strava for my 'efforts' but I don't care!
A ride to Nantwich and back a different way (62 miles) was another good one, as was 44 miles on my Raleigh Banana, though falling off marred that one somewhat!

Mountain biking: discovering some ace bridleways locally has been a blast. The worse the weather gets, the harder they are to ride, and some bits are just impossible, to me at least but it's been such a laugh. I've found all the ones I could in one area and can do about 22 miles (including roads) and yet never be more than about 6 miles from the house. I've got a new bike now (Trek X-Calibre 29er) to try out now too, and the first impressions are great due to wheel size.

Lowlight of the year was absolutely definitely the theft of my beloved Trek 4500 Disc. It eat away at me for weeks and weeks, to the point of me losing sleep over it and driving myself mad driving round local areas for days and nights on end trying to find it. It never turned up and it still makes me so mad I often can't even look at all the pictures I took of the bike when I was out riding it. It probably sounds like I'm a right sad case, but I loved every bit of that bike, it was the first one I'd bought new and I'd done countless miles on it and enjoyed every minute of it. I've got a carbon road bike here that cost 5 times what the Trek did but I still preferred the mountain bike

 

[Dibs]

I started this year looking to finally lose some weight and get some of the old fitness back. So my initial goal was to ride the Pedal for Scotland ride in September.

I initially rode once a week (20 mile round trip) on my commute to work. This eventually upped to 3 times a week.

By July I had rode 50 miles on my MTB, by August I had rode 70 miles.

Due to my progress, I decided in
August to sign up for the MacMillan London to Paris Cycle in July next year.

So my yearly stats are about:

Miles cycled: 1350
Actual rides: 116
Longest ride: 70 miles
Weight lost: 3st

I have a new bike on order (2014 Giant Defy 1) so hope to pick that up by March.

My aims for 2015 are simple. Up the mileage. Lose more weight and successfully complete the L2P cycle and raise cash for MacMillan Cancer Support!

If any of you want to help... My fundraising link is in my signature!

 

[Smurfy]

Several thousand miles of commuting.

Some fairly hilly rides of between 30 and 120 miles.

 

[Andy Jeffery]

Highlight was cycling some of the tour of California route. Most memorable Mt Diablo 3500ft in 11 miles and Colman valley rd off route one.
Also joining a club still trying to keep up!
Lows were falling off my bike this weekend on the ice and not losing as much weight as I hoped.

Looking forward to 2015 my second year as a cyclist!

 

[albal]

~ Feb in Gran Canaria on a rental di2 cannondale - fabulous.
~ Apr - Train to Winchester then ride the south downs way & ride home from Eastbourne on day 3.
~ May to Jul- rode the Eurovelo 6. Great tour well worth doing.
~ Sept - Rode the Tommy Godwin 205 challenge to Brighton and back.
numerous day rides and commutes. around 7500 mile.

 

[i hate hills]

I'm afraid 2014 was a bit of a write off for me and cycling. Been really busy at work and never really found the time to get out and build up the trips.With the result i find myself feeling not so fit as i once felt. I'm making a vow to do more and get out regularly in 2015. The one bright spot for me was dragging myself out for a piddling 7 miler only to stop for a "find my lungs break" and received a text message telling me that i'd become a grandad for the first time . That ride back home i was cycling on air. #bestjobintheworld

 

[Saluki]

I now have only 82.8 miles to hit my target. 2 weeks and 1 day so I'm hoping for a bit of reasonable weather.

 

[maltloaf]

I've just realised I only need 73 miles for 3000 this year. Going to have to have a couple of decent rides this weekend !

 

[NorvernRob]

I started riding a road bike for the first time in January this year (on the turbo! my first actual ride was Feb 2nd), after not riding a bike of any description for 15 years.

I've managed 2200 miles with 144,000ft of climbing, around 70ft per mile average. It's been a hard learning curve, the first time I tried Holme Moss (on my first ever ride) I had to stop multiple times, the first time I tried Winnats I was so tired I fell off sideways into the grass! Since then I've done both climbs several times and many others, often being in the top 15% of strava times. I haven't had a single climb beat me since then.

Riding up Holme Moss on the day of TdF stage 2 was amazing. Thousands of people cheering, clapping, shouting, ringing bells, all of it bathed in sunshine, something I'll probably never see again and such a complete contrast to how that climb normally is (lonely and often pretty bleak weather wise). Then onto the Midhopestones climb to get this view of the peloton:




My weight has dropped from 75 to 68kg, I've spent nearly as much on bikes and kit as I paid for my car, and am loving it.

I'm looking forward to next year, as my son starts doing some full days at nursery from January which gives me the opportunity to get a ride in after work a couple of times midweek. Hopefully I'll rack up around 4,000 miles next year.

A few of my pics from this year:

Top of a climb overlooking Great Longstone:



Monsal Head



And the bikes that get me there, the spare room is looking more and more like a bike shop.....