Sunday 24 June 2012

Busy, busy

Well the Mail on Sunday haven't rang perhaps next week. 40 miles again yesterday along the guided busway, I now do less stops but don't get any quicker, perhaps more stops are required. I have built in a customary banana stop now, but a bacon butty would be more satisfying. I certainly am riding within myself I could push myself a bit harder but it's all miles in the tank. There was some excitement when a weasel ran out of the undergrowth at head height on top of some gabions, it's squealed and ran back in, I'm not sure who was more shocked. The need for a sharpened stick is growing. Some muscle group at the top and back of my thighs I think my glutes cramp up at 15 miles out and tell me to go home, the only way to clear it is to cycle faster which really hurts. If you get off and stretch they get worse and the same if you slow down. I guess that's my "wall".

A mate of mine Mark Blagg reminded me how I shouldn't focus on the pain and horror but enjoy it. He's right it's 5 days biking which I love, Lucy would have loved it to. I'm going to make sure I look around, enjoy the downhills and block out the uphills and London traffic. In other news Tomos's imaginary friends Jeremy the Badger has stopped fighting with Baboon. Mugglewump the Monkey is still around but his imaginary babies: Paddle, Faddle, Baddle and Abigail (who's a boy), seem to have gone into the background a bit.

Thursday 21 June 2012

MoS may get behind 50:50:50

Got a call from the Roy Castle Lung Cancer Foundation to say that the Mail on Sunday wanted to talk to me about Lucy and the ride. Great news perhaps now Garmin, Premier Inn and Wheelies might talk to me. Sold my decks and just waiting to get them collected by the buyer, anyone fancy any early 90's vinyl?

Saturday 16 June 2012

Binki Bowen strikes out

Time for a spot more cyclage today, 40 uninteresting miles only made more interesting by my Male/Female jogger from behind game. When I can see a jogger in the distance I have to guess when they are just a speck whether they're male or female, what fun. I finished my ride late today to go up to the village hall to take part in Sport in the Community/Care in Community/Community Service. Super Pete Coleman and queen of the cupcakes Kelly Jessop were the only poor b=ggers who had turned up to supervise some kids playing quick cricket as an intro to the game. I was broken and couldn't even pick the ball up, or count, I just ended up shouting, "Keep you head up bowler, arm close to your ear!" and "Keep your eye on the ball batsman, right onto the bat." I rotated the phrases with "Good batting and bowling guys" and "Cricket's the real winner here". Either way I felt sick and was glad when it was over and we could go home, I'd missed my satanic ice bath I usually have after cycling. Extra problems have been caused as Tomos's new imaginary friend Jeremy the Badger has started arguing with Tomos's old imaginary friend and Baboon resulting in an imaginary pulled ear that required sudacreme. 

My article went into the Cambridge News and was a difficult read, a two page spread gives good coverage to the cause. Wheelies won't return my emails and Claire Haigh, Head of Comms at Whitbread owner of Premier Inn is on the same game. Time to call in the big guns that's right Roy Castle their enthusiastic, don't take no for an answer, scousers will wear them down.

Monday 11 June 2012

Thank you guys

I'd just like to thank Ian Munro, Stephen Taylor of  http://twitter.com/#!/Me_and_my_29er on the Twidder and Seavers from Single Track World forum. You are are heroes.

Saturday 9 June 2012

Wind

Plenty of wind 22mph gusting up to 40mph, just the weather for a cycle. It was too windy to go out first thing and I took Tomos to rugby tots where his enthusiasm to become the next George North was evident. By the afternoon I couldn't hold back, I rode out away from the house, into the wind for 1 hour and 40 minutes sometimes at no more that 9 mph, I completed 30 miles and flew back, absolutely flew 20 mph on the flat when the gusts where behind me. Now I am tired I've had some ice cream and I'm having beer to numb the pain, cricket tomorrow. Still no headcam or GPS or other goodies but I'm feeling like I can do it.

My decks go on ebay on Sunday, I saved for those for 3 months, then was still short £700 so just bought them on my credit card and paid for them for 9 months. They're part of me, my youth and creativity are tied up in them, but so is hard cash and we need to offset the costs of Premier Inn. Also I hardly get to play them and I have negotiated the purchase of some virtually dj kit, if the decks fetch a certain price. Time for an early night I'm knackered.

Monday 4 June 2012

We love Toni Barber

I'd also like to say how grateful I am to Toni Barber, Toni manages the Premier Inn - Reading Central. I spoke to Toni and she's been a big help, I don't know Toni well we just talked on the phone, but she's been kind enough to donate to the cause, thank you Toni.

Hot fresh donuts

We went to anything but sunny Hunstanton yesterday, I knew it would rain all day but really want to walk on the beach, eat ice cream and play in the amusements. We did all of that, but first after getting soaked walking along the promenade with Tomos crying for half of the walk, we came across a sweetshop selling hot fresh donuts. It's amazing the journey you go on when you decide that you fancy hot fresh donut. A lackluster teenage girl smiles weakly at you then throws some amorphous goo into a hopper. Then the hopper extrudes some of the goo in the shape of a ring into the boiling fat. You think to yourself, is it really is just deep fried batter, that's a bit wrong? The donut them moves along a conveyor in the boiling fat, this substance is so hot and toxic the girl can only stare and poke your donut with a very long allen key. You start to think, when did they last change that fat? Does the donut cook and go brown or just absorb the colour of the fat? Then the smell hits you and you drool a little bit, the girl smiles again and pokes more blobby rings along. Eventually your donuts ride a little conveyor and drop off  and the teenager puts them in a paper bag. The frisson increases as the donuts are hotter than the sun and the fat is slowly soaking the paper bag. Leaving you in a quandary, do you wait until they're cool or will the bag self destruct before that point. Or will Environmental Health turn up and spoil everyone's fun by saying that the hygiene levels are fine but the calorie per gram exceeds all known legal limits apart from eating raw sugar fried in goose fat. When you can eventually taste one they are divine, we sat and ate 6 in the shelter of the sweetshop, wondering should we have got 9?

Anyway did an uneventful 38 miles along the guided busway and back, aching and trying to think of more unhealthy Jubilee snacks I can have. Since my ride on Saturday I have had most of a packet of chocolate digestives, a Mister Whippy, large with a flake, 3 donuts and a cone with two scoops of Norfolk dairy ice cream, I've also handled a fistful of ecoli covered 2 pence pieces at the amusements but I've had fun and training feels on track.

Saturday 2 June 2012

Owww, that hasn't helped!

So I've been back on the bike today out at 0700 to ride along the guided busway from home to Cambridge and back, without using the bus. I haven't been on the bike for 10 days so I decided not to take it easy. My illness has cured my chocolate addiction but I am taking an alarming interest in ice cream. That aside the ride went well, a cheeky chap on a hybrid jumped on the path ahead of me at about 15 miles out. I sized him up bigger wheels that me, a lighter bike, but he was carrying more timber and he had panniers. I also thought he'd got a boost from seeing me and tried to cycle off like a big man. I decided he'd be my pace setter and I turned it up a couple of mph. I thought he'd run out of steam and I'd either out pace him or draw level and throw a stick in his spokes. I didn't get the chance to use the stick, and all I achieved was riding faster for a mile, feeling very tired as the chap disappeared off. Worse still, as I was moving to Olympian pace a road biker absolutely blazed past, I didn't have time to deploy the stick. It's like Mad Max out on isolated parts of that cycle route. I also took a detour to follow a caravaern who'd cut me so close he nearly knocked me off, I followed him into the Cambridgeshire Christian Campers Fellowship "In God's country" event, when I caught up with him he did apologise, he'll repent at his leisure. 40 miles achieved, ass chaffed, quads shot.

In other news Premier Inn will not discount rooms unless the Manager's of each hotel pay themselves! Lovely Toni, at Premier Reading Central was prepared to put in £10 from her own pocket, I told her to give it to the charity but good hussle.  Their PR dept has ignored me so I go on, I booked the rooms and have to carry the full cost. I still need a new saddle, tyres, helmet and ass. I might try my long suffering former employer Howes Cycles of Cambridge, long suffering as I was a rubbish and lazy mechanic. Wheelies in Swansea I'm still watching you, I expect big things. I'm off to find some beer after lunch and something hot to hot to put on my leg, like a burger.