SPAM Winter Challenge
Tuesday, January 09, 2007 (12:30:08)
Posted by gabber
Woke with a start at 5am Sunday morning having just had a dream that Giles had sent me a text message saying 'Don't Do It!'. Sage advise as ever from Giles!!
I arrived at Matt's at the appointed (ungodly) hour of 6.30am and after a load up of the van, a quick coffee and toast, we were off. Good time was made despite some dodgy headlights - with Matt's voodoo dance miraculously solving the problem (he ran round the van twice mouthing an incantation and the lights came back on!!). As dawn broke the bleak grey skies and light
rain that greeted us were a sign of things to come. Past Stonehenge and crossing the Plain, disaster struck!!
Clutch cable went and we were stuck in 3rd gear, still at least 5 miles from the venue! Some quality driving from Matt (even if to him left means right!) and the light traffic meant we were able to weave our way along the narrow backroads to Erlestoke, then do a sharp left past some waving marshalls to a space just inside the venue away from the main car park. We shuddered to a halt, quite smug that there would be no pushing of the motor. No sooner had we got out of the van we looked back to the gates and there was a sudden convoy of cars heaving with bikes -
what luck, we'd arrived not a moment too soon. And the RAC could wait!
That luck continued as we donned wellie boots (good advice from the organisers) and made our way into the signing on shed. Straight to the front of the pre-entered and we were set - still only 8.45am. As we lined up for coffee we again looked back to see the line for the pre-entered snaking out of the door! Over 400 had pre-entered but another 500 or so were to do so by
the time registration closed. (In all 998 riders took part this year).
Ride preparation continued in light rain and blustery wind - Matt putting his turbo trainer to good use and me slapping on both Sudocrem and Deep Heat, both breakthrough moments for me - I had no discomfort (from my derriere or my hamstrings!!) for the entire ride - making it all a very enjoyable experience.
And so to the ride itself. Matt established himself up at the front - I chose a positioned tucked in at the back!
10.30 and we were off - 40+ km ahead of us (the route had been cut short the day before and at least 5km had been cut out - which ultimately was to be quite a blessing for most if not all). Now of course being pretty much at the back of 450 or so other riders all passing over the same wet, muddy, grassy trails does have it's disadvantages, and finding any kind of grip was
to become a constant dilemma/struggle over the next 4hours or so. A long grassy sweep with a couple of steep pulls set the tone of things to come - a leg burning grind straight from the off! The first of a couple of bottlenecks into the wooded singletrack allowed us to strip the bike of several extra pounds of mud and grass - the build up around all my new mech looked very worrying.
Basically what transpired for the next 4 hours was one long grassy muddy climb and descent after another. The tracks were getting wider and wider as riders sought out slightly firmer lines
- some of downhills were terrifying for me - a case of just try to keep in a straight line and hope for the best!. Before long there were long sections practically everyone was walking, and often a case of it was quicker to walk than ride
.
My total time to complete was 4hrs and 8 mins out of which 58 minutes were spent travelling slower than 5kph (below which speed my gps auto pauses)! That was through either pushing the bike or pedalling incredibly slowly. At one point I looked down and it seemed I was running 3 inch tyres such was the amount of gloop I had acquired. As my bike became more overloaded with
mud, all of mine and Matt's efforts with the new shifters and mech bore a terrible strain. But all credit to the quality of both the kit and Matt's expertise I only started losing gears towards the very end, by which time I couldn't be bothered to get off the bike and shift the 5lbs of muck around both the front and back mech. The fact it would shift at all was indeed a
minor miracle.
All in all another great day out trying riding somewhere new. Although Salisbury doesn't offer the best in off-road riding (lots of grass, very little singletrack) the overall organisation, marshalling, sheer numbers, made this event well worth participating in. As did the 900m of climbing! There were some very nice fast downhill sections towards the end leading
into the best bit of downhill wooded singletrack of the whole ride. Then followed a swooping track through the woods down to the finish, including an incredible section of gloop being manned by 2 army cadets
who didn't tell me the porridge line I was following led to what seemed like a 2 foot deep puddle. Queue another comedy dismount!! (To rival one earlier where I managed to avoid falling to the left into a very deep looking puddle only to fall to the right into a barbed wire fence which duly collapsed under my muddied bulk!).
I was cheered to the finish by Matt (all cleaned and packed up having been back 2 hours earlier!). We managed to get most of the muck off my bike before our water ran out (no water or cleaning facilites on-site!). Then we called the RAC and had soup and roll while we waited. He turned up within 30 mins and had us up and running less than 30 minutes later. Result!
There was some great camaraderie at the back of the pack with many people questioning each other's sanity! The leaden skies, strong winds, occasional rain, endless mud couldn't dampen the collective sense of achievement at completing such a challenge, whatever the length of ride entered. A great way to start 2007 - I hope to start 2008 the same way.
[posted by Hambones Brokenbones not by gabber as stated below!]