Back with a vengeance/ bang/ whimper (delete as appropriate)

 After returning from an ultimately unsuccessful trip to Scotland I was determined to keep banging out the miles in training. I had a vague notion to do a couple of long weekends in the North of England and after writing my last blog post I decided not to sit around feeling sorry for myself but to try and get back on top of the situation. The thing is my body really wasn’t too keen on that idea. My legs were feeling increasingly stiff and tired after training rides and whilst the motivation has been there the body has been distinctly lacking. I think after such a busy and at times stressful year something in the back of my mind decided it was time to go into shut down mode and have a break. I must admit I’ve been going flat out with studying and writing job applications since being made redundant and it feels like my body has decided a change of pace is needed.

To further complicate things I’ve been feeling a under the weather which has knocked my form back even further. It all started with a tooth breaking and needing to be removed. Having a tooth pulled is unpleasant enough (trust me, having a burly Australian elbow deep in your mouth apparently removing a tooth with the same sort of force I normally reserve for removing car wheel nuts is not something I would recommend) but what followed afterwards really knocked me back. Once the anaesthetic wore off I was in agony for a couple of days. I was sort of expecting that but what I wasn’t expecting was that three nights of badly disturbed sleep because of the pain would combine with the fatigue I was already suffering from and leave me open to a viral infection. I guess it left my body’s defences run too low to fight off infection and the virus found itself pushing at a open door. This wasn’t a normal ‘feel bad for two days and then get back into the swing of things’ virus but a ‘niggle away in the background and sap your strength for more than a week’ sort of virus. Riding with any kind of purpose was out of the question.

 

Feeling unwell has meant I've had to train on relatively flat routes. Using the worlds heaviest bike (AKA the Thorn Sherpa) has compensated for the lack of steep stuff.

After about a week of feeling under the weather I managed to get out for a few training rides thinking that I was over the worst of it but the going was tough with my legs reluctant to turn the pedals; even a short ride left me feeling totally wiped out and the hills were pure, slow speed, agony. Cue a further week off the bike and, despite having lost of whatever meagre form I had, I‘m now feeling back to full health and back to riding with some form of purpose.
　


Time to stop moping about…

Its just as well I’m finally back on the bike because at the start of November I’m going to be getting back into the 100 climbs frame of mind. I’m attending an exhibition in the Midlands and I intend to use the opportunity of being just over an hour away to finally ride up Jiggers Bank in Ironbridge the correct way. It has always bugged me that a road closure last year forced me to ride an alternative, albeit steeper, route. I intend to put that situation right. If my legs are turning the pedals more smoothly I may even do it on my fixie but I’ll wait and see nearer the time if that is a sensible idea. In fact I know now it isn’t a sensible idea but something just makes me want to try it on at least one of the climbs. And yes, I will be checking the Highways Agency website before attempting it this time. Not making that mistake again.

This book, like me, is looking and feeling a bit battered but I'm not finished with it yet

Before the year is out I also want to ride the Cat and Fiddle and Shibden Wall. For some reason I have the urge to tick those two climbs off the list before the end of the year and so, weather and potential work commitments permitting, I’ve roughly planned out the mother of all overnight hill bagging raids. It is a stupid idea for many reasons, not least because of the mileage involved for just two climbs and I suspect a steep cobbled climb in winter conditions will be difficult to drive up, let alone ride up. In fact the Cat and Fiddle in bad weather won’t be much fun either. The thing is they could be the last two climbs I have the time and energy to complete in 2013 and as I was hoping to have finished all of the remaining climbs by the end of November I feel I need to see the year out with a last big stupid road trip style hurrah before restarting again in January. My plans for the Autumn have gone completely off the rails and I stand no chance of completing the 100 climbs within the timescale I was originally aiming for but that doesn’t mean I can’t be stubborn and keep chipping away a the climbs that remain. I may even break my rule of not riding through December. Watch this space…

Scotland - Well that didn't quite go as planned...

I’d been really looking forward to taking on the Scottish climbs. I’d booked up the accommodation back in June and spent more time that usual on some proper training rides over the summer. I like Scotland and as it is about five years since I was last there I was keen to get back. It is a shame then that things didn’t work out as planned.

The week got off to a bad start with the first storm of the Autumn rolling in across Scotland and the North of England. The weather was OK on the Saturday as I drove up but the weather was set to take a dramatic turn the next day and sure enough it was very wet and very windy on Sunday morning.

I travelled up with my Dad and the dog on the Saturday and the overnight stop was at Dumfries Travelodge. Like a lot of Travelodges these days the front of the site was dominated by the ruin of an old Little Chef. The Travelodge itself had recently been ‘upgraded’. This upgrade means that the sofa bed in each room has been replaced by two small chairs and a double bed with slide out additional mattresses underneath it. It didn’t ensure a decent nights sleep.
 

 

Travelodge...a crap nights sleep guaranteed

 
 

There were some interesting vehicles parked up outside the Travelodge that night as the Tour of Britain was due to start in Scotland the next day. Some of the peripheral staff and a few people working for the sponsors were staying the night which at least meant mine wasn’t the only bicycle to be wheeled through reception that night.

The weather was biblical on the first day of planned riding. The target for the day was meant to be the Mennock Pass but with gale force winds, torrential rain and lack of visible road surface thanks to the water pouring down the hillsides it just wasn’t meant to be. The road through the pass looks brilliant and the length of the climb and the gradients look just right for me. Sadly I’d left my canoe and aqualung at home as that was the sort of kit I’d have needed to navigate it safely. Riding from the top the bottom and then back up again would have ruined me for the rest of the week and would likely have done more harm than good so I decided to re-plan the return journey at the end of the week and hope for better weather in a few days time. Seriously, Noah would have been stumped over what to do so bad was the weather.

After visiting some family the overnight stop on the Sunday was in the Dumbarton Travelodge, yet another tired and faded old building with the rotting hulk of a former Little Chef in front of it. At least this place had a decent second bed in the room as another night camping wasn’t something I relished the idea of . The next day would see me ride the Rest and Be Thankful climb although I wasn’t too hopeful about the weather.

Rest and be Thankful

According to the weather forecast the Monday would see an improvement in the weather conditions. I’m not entirely sure it did as I was pretty sure that the stuff coming sideways out of the sky was rain, and cold rain at that.

 

Individual rain drops just out of shot

After the usual sat nav confusion and trying to match up the tiny map in the 100 climbs book with the road atlas I had found the car park that marked the end of the climb and had to start the unenviable task of setting up my bike in the pouring rain. That alone was enough to leave me chilled to the bone so it was with a fair bit of reluctance that I descended to the start of the climb.

Having already postponing the Mennock Pass climb I couldn’t afford to pass up on this one whatever the weather so I just had to grit my teeth and get on with it. I was feeling pretty cold and wet and miserable before I’d even covered a quarter of the distance of the descent and my mood was darkened further by a pair of rude drivers. I made the effort to pull over and slow down to let a couple of cars pass near the top of the climb and was disappointed to see that I didn’t get the customary thank you wave from them. Its only a small thing but in bad weather a bit of courtesy for the wet cyclist who has just let you pass on a narrow bit of road isn’t too much to ask. I guess because I was already feeling so lousy this wound me up more than it should do and I decided to retaliate by attempting to pass them back. Not the smartest move in the book but buzzing the back bumper of a Volvo as the driver tries to safely navigate a series of steep and waterlogged down hill bends did cheer me up a bit, especially the way they sped off as soon as the road straightened out a bit in an attempt to get shot of the idiot on the bike who kept trying to pass them. 

Of course as soon as I got to the bottom and I was faced with having to ride back up my good mood started to fade. Put simply I was frozen and my legs were having trouble just turning the pedals. The majority of the climb isn’t really that steep but I very quickly found myself clattering down through the gears as I didn’t have the power to push a decent gear with cold legs. I’m quite sure I was cycling through some stunning scenery but all I could focus on was the road and the front tyre of the bike. I found the climb a real slog although the 16% bends near the top didn’t seem to be too much hassle. I think by the time I reached them I viewed it as a good chance to up my cadence and warm up a bit. The whole climb is a bit of a rain soaked blur with no real stand out points which is a bit of a shame given the surroundings.

 

The cold and wet view from the Rest and be Thankful carpark

After getting changed in a windswept and still very wet car park it was time to give the dog a quick walk before driving to Perth for the third Travelodge in as many days. The Travelodge in Perth is the old Isle of Skye Hotel which has obviously been bought up and, er, downgraded into a typical Travelodge. One standout feature though is the size of the rooms. The room we were shown to had a large bay window that formed a bit of a sun trap and was ideal for drying my damp cycling kit in.

It was however a bit of a disappointment then to find that the room didn’t have a sofa bed, or even a bed that slid out from underneath the double bed. I had to go to reception and ask for a solution which took the form of a folding camp style bed. This was actually a fairly comfortable option, well it was right up until the moment it decided to collapse at one end at about 6am. I got up, reassembled it and managed another hours sleep before the bed decided it really was time I got up by collapsing again.

The Cairnwell

Leaving Perth on the 17^th I had about an hours drive to the top of the climb. The weather was still pretty cold and although the rain had largely cleared there was the chance of the odd heavy shower. Sure enough, as I drove along the valley from the Spittal of Glenshee I could see dark clouds looming over the mountains ahead.


The weather at the top of the Glenshee ski centre was freezing and less than inviting. After struggling into all of the warmest cycling gear that I had with me it was time to descend to the Spittal of Glenshee to begin my customary grind back up to the top. The descent began with a wide open downhill corner with a 12% gradient. A long straight’sh 12% descent is usually an excuse to ignore the brakes, switch off my brain and go for a personal land speed record. On the Cairnwell however I hadn’t long left the car park before I was being buffeted by a squally shower and I was very quickly being blown all over the road and chilled to the core. It was a relief to get to the valley and out of the wind to try and warm up before heading back up to the top.

As soon as I started climbing back up through the valley I knew I was going to suffer. The early part of this ride is actually relatively flat as the road tracks along the valley but I had absolutely no power. No matter what I tried I just couldn’t seem to get my legs turning with any real purpose and after forcing my pace up for a short while I just started to drift towards a lower speed and gear. I didn’t seem to have anything in the tank. What was more off putting was the fact that I hadn’t even reached the main steep section of the climb that was slowly looming out of the grey conditions before me; the 12% final ramp up to the top. I think it is fair to say I wasn’t havening a good day on the bike.

It was halfway up this 12% ramp that I had a sort of depressing epiphany; I was not going to start going any better on the climbs anytime soon. My form had disappeared completely and after creeping up to the top of this climb and swearing at various bits of cycling kit as I tried to get changed with numb hands I had another hour and a half drive to the next climb ahead of me where I would, almost certainly, make a pigs ear out of trying to ride uphill for the second time in one day. This would be followed by a miserable drive to Inverness and yet another bloody Travelhovel and another day failing to ride well and wasting the opportunity to enjoy the Scottish climbs. Bugger it I thought, time to bail out, figure out what went wrong and go home, which is exactly what I did. For whatever reason I had become locked into a cycle of increasing crapness after a poor start to the trip and the only way to break it was step away from the situation, regroup and come back stronger.

As soon as I reached the car at the top I informed my dad we would be going home. Whatever was affecting me wasn’t going to be helped by another night of rushed food and disturbed sleep in a Travelshack and the weather forecast for the rest of the week wasn’t looking too peachy either. There then followed a ten and a half hour drive back to Devon with frequent stops for the ever miserable dog to empty his increasingly upset bowels over various service station forecourts.

 

 

  

This is my happy face

Little Freddie is getting too old to like travelling and I’ve honestly never seen a dog look as happy as he did when we rolled up to the front door at midnight. He rushed into the back garden, peed all over it, ate everything we gave him and then promptly went to sleep. I kind of knew then I’d made the right decision.

Next steps

As I write this my legs still feel a bit rubbish and even though I’ve been out for a few training rides I still feel a bit below par. I’m still not sure if it was fatigue or even some sort of bug that sapped all of my strength and energy in Scotland but I think it may be my last big road trip of the year. What with travelling for work and the various trips away to try and complete the 100 climbs I’ve just had enough of slogging up and down the motorways this year. As I drove up to Scotland on the Saturday I noted the road signs for the Lake District on the M6 and instead of feeling enthusiastic about driving up to tackle the remaining climbs in the North of England I just felt sort of weary. Just to complicate things further I was also made redundant a couple of weeks ago and my main focus right now needs to be on sorting out some form of work. I have a few things in the mix but getting myself sorted is undoubtedly going to take up a lot of time and energy over the next couple of weeks. Quite simply I seem to be running out of steam and options for completing the 100 climbs this year which is disappointing and frustrating. Hopefully I will have the chance to tick off another couple of climbs before the year is done.

My initial plan when I started out last year was to complete all 100 climbs in one and a half years. Whilst I may get a chance to tackle one or two more hills before the end of the year I think it is only sensible to extend my timescale by another six months. I certainly think that when I return to Scotland I’ll be taking a different approach to the travelling and accommodation arrangements. Having to repack the car every morning, change accommodation every night and drive hundreds of miles in between all of this AND having to cycle up steep bits of countryside just isn’t sensible, not for me at any rate.

Bit of an update

After my bruising experience finishing off the Welsh climbs I decided it was time to take a break for a few weeks. The school summer holidays are always a very busy time of year and travelling to various parts of the country can be time consuming and accommodation is always difficult and expensive to get hold of. The way I see it the best thing to do is to spend July and August training and preparing for the autumn.

I now have only 33 of the 100 climbs still to complete and my autumn campaign will be starting very soon with a trip to Scotland. I’m looking forward to taking on the Scottish climbs and a summer of decent training rides will hopefully have whipped me into the sort of shape needed to do them justice. We’ll see. I’ll need to be in good shape as I’ll be heading to the Lake District at some point in October to take on the climbs up there and there are some pretty scary bits of road to ride up. I’ve certainly been feeling a bit stronger on the bike lately but the real test of my fitness will, as ever, come when I get out of the car after several hours of driving at the top of some wind blasted hill top and attempt cycle up a famous hill climb. I very much doubt I’ll be noticeably faster but I will hopefully be a little fresher at the end of the longer climbs.

A few technical changes

I’ve also used the time since my trip to Wales to get the bike set up for the challenges ahead. One of the most significant changes to the bike has seen me re-enter the 21^st century and have STI shifter and brake levers fitted as a replacement for the bar end shifters I have been using up until now. The reason behind this change is quite simple; bar end shifters are nice and light, reliable and simple to repair when away from home. They do however restrict my ability to climb up steep bits of road out of the saddle as they stick out of the end of the handle bars. Changing gear with my knee is painful and very inconvenient and I’ve noticed recently that I’m now tending to attack the steeper sections on some of the climbs with a bit more force and want to get out of the saddle more. STI shifters leave the ends of the handle bars uncluttered and arguably look better. The ever helpful chaps at Cycles Scuderia fitted the shifters and also installed some Problem Solvers Travel Agents for me. These are beautifully machined pulleys that enable STI brake levers with a very low amount of cable pull to operate V-brakes. I’ve never been a fan of cantilever bakes and have always preferred V brakes as I find them easier to fiddle with.

 

These work astonishingly well and they are very nicely made.

The Travel Agents work brilliantly and I’ve suffered no loss of braking following the change of brake levers. Eagle eyed viewers of my videos will notice that I had the new levers fitted before my recent trips to Wales and apart from the odd messed up gear changes I’m getting on well with them (user error and lack of practice). Having the new levers fitted was also a good excuse to finally cut the steerer tube down to a more aesthetically pleasing length, and thanks to the guys at the bike shop the Uncle John now has properly fitted bar tape, not stuff that looks like it was fitted by a drunk monkey.

No your eyes aren't deceiving you; That is a cut down steerer and properly applied bar tape (I didn't do the bar tape)

In other news my faithful Surly Cross Check, the bike I first used when starting out on the 100 climbs, has finally been stripped down and re-sprayed ahead of a complete rebuild. It was starting to look pretty tatty so I took it to Argos Cycles in Bristol who did an excellent job of turning it from a dull scuffed black to a bright metallic green. Argos Cycles is a fascinating place and there was a fantastic array of old steel frames hanging from the wall, all of them with recently applied and flawless paintwork.

The Cross Check starts its transformation from battered old hack to bling gentlemans cruiser

I’m very much looking forward to rebuilding it with lots of shiny bits and, after 6 years of abuse and hard work, allowing it to have a gentler next few years as a bike for use on summer day trips.

Something to keep you interested

I have never been happy about the fact that my last video of the summer was of me suffering badly on the climb up Bwlch-y-Groes. It isn’t a particularly great watch so ahead of the videos from Scotland I thought I’d post something a little faster. I really enjoyed the Black Mountain climb in Mid Wales and the descent from the top down to the start was even better. The video doesn’t show me riding at my fastest ( I was still getting used to the new brake set up and slightly changed riding position) but hopefully it will whet your appetite for the Scottish footage that I hope to be editing very soon. 

 

Right that's all for now. Scotland awaits.

Wales - turns out it is quite steep

After riding the Road to Hell on Thursday the 11th July I overnighter just outside Mold with the plan of driving to Harlech the next day. Mold wasn’t an ideal location but as it was the middle of July I was having trouble finding anywhere that was convenient and not stupidly expensive. The heat didn’t really drop overnight by all that much and when I got going at 6.30am on the 12th the temperature was already into the low twenties. After having a hard time in the heat at the start of the week when I finished off the South Eastern climbs I had kept an eye on the weather forecasts and was rather depressed to see that my time in Wales was to coincide with a heat wave. The Road to Hell had been a struggle and the fact I was due to be climbing Bwlch-y-Groes just as the high temperatures were really kicking in did make me a bit nervous. Still, at least the first climb of the day would be the relatively short Ffordd Penllech in Harlech; its only just over 300 metres long how hard could it be?

Ffordd Penllech

My drive from Mold to Harlech was fantastic. I had the roads largely to myself and the views from the car as I travelled across North Wales were amazing. It would have been nice to stop and take a few photos but I wanted to get on the climb in Harlech out of the way and be back on the road by 8.30. I wanted to be on the Bwlch-y-Groes climb before the temperatures got too high. That did mean that I had to make one attempt at Ffordd Penllech and then get straight back on the road. I also had a long journey back to Devon to factor into the equation. Harlech is a fairly small place and it was easy enough to find the climb.

As you wheeze up the steep stuff don't forget to look at the pretty castle

After parking up in a public car park it was time for my date with destiny to see if I could tackle a 40% gradient. Yep, you read that right, a 40% gradient. Its actually less of a road and more like a waterfall that has been covered with asphalt. I managed to get to Harlech before 8am and this gave me a bit of a dilemma. You see when I rode the Devil’s Staircase a few weeks previously the heavy braking on the steep descent back to the car left my brakes pretty much fried and the front brake has developed an awful howling noise when its applied. It isn’t a big deal and I’ve probably just glazed the pads. The thing is I could see myself waking up the whole of Harlech with my howling brakes and so I decided to walk down the climb to the start to avoid making too much noise. This turned out to be a less than bright idea as walking down a 40% gradient in stiff soled cycling shoes whilst holding onto a bike turned out to be a bit slippery. When I reached the steepest part of the climb I needed to use the aforementioned howling brakes to slow the bike, and myself, down. Walking down it seems wasn’t the best course of action after all and the good people of Harlech were woken up by a loud braking noise despite my best efforts! Never before has walking down a hill involved so much fuss.

 Not a sign you see everyday. Thankfully

 

The worst part of the Ffordd Penllech climb is the tight right hand hairpin. You reach it early on in the climb and the 40% gradient has to be seen to be believed. I had a chance to have a good look at is as despite monstering bottom gear up the first part of the slope I ran into a small problem called gravity. I’m not exactly a lightweight chap and whilst I can crank out a fair bit of power it turns out my power to weight ratio is pretty appalling. As I reached the hairpin my momentum started to fade and I got the distinct impression I would soon be rolling backwards down the hill I had just winched my way up unless I hurriedly got off the bike. This lead to my second problem, namely trying to get going again on a stupidly steep piece of road from a standing start. The hairpin bend is so steep at its apex that I was more worried about falling down it than not being able to get the pedals turning. Once I finally started inching my way back up the hill I ran into problem number three; Ffordd Penllech is a one way street and to ride it you need to go against the flow of traffic. It is also a very narrow piece of road so I was less than happy when a 4X4 appeared just before another steep uphill right hand bend. This meant another stop and restart but thankfully I was able to complete the rest of the climb with no further hold-ups. The gradient does back off from 40% but it remains steep all the way to the top and I was at walking pace and gasping for breath before the top.



 I think Ffordd Penllech is a climb that would reward multiple attempts as you would be able to figure out the right points to put the hammer down and how to pace yourself up what is a tricky climb to ride well. Unfortunately I had a schedule to keep to and it was back to the car and back on the road. Bwlch-y-Groes awaited.

Bwlch-y-Groes

The drive to this climb from Harlech took in yet more fantastic scenery and I took a route which involved driving over the brilliant little toll bridge at Penmaenpool.

 

Not my photo but it really is a lovely old bridge and it only costs 60p to drive across

The Bwlch-y-Groes pass is in the middle of what feels like nowhere and it was 10am when I finally saw the thin sliver of road clinging to the side of a mountain appear through the trees. Bwlch-y-Groes is narrow and steep and my little Fiat didn’t get out of 2nd gear the whole way up the climb. Its actually a brilliant bit of road with a real sense of exposure the further up you travel. That sense of exposure was highlighted on the descent down to the start of the climb by bike. I wasn’t worried about the front brake making a howling noise on this bit of road; it gave me the reassurance I needed that it was working. This is one bit of road that needs to be treated with respect, whichever direction you are travelling on it.

It was once I got to the bottom of the climb things started to unravel for me. Despite getting to it as early as I could the heat was intense and there was no shelter from the sun once on the main part of the climb. My roll along the valley to the hairpin bend was hampered by an appalling road surface. Across the UK the different regional branches of the Highways Agency seem to think a decent road repair can be achieved simply by splashing a layer of tar over the existing pock marker road surface and then throwing a layer of loose chippings over the top. I noticed on the drive from Harlech that the Welsh Highways Agency workers seem to be fond of applying as thick a layer of chippings as possible. I drove through one town that had a road surface that wouldn’t have been out of place on a rally stage. Sadly, the idiots had been let loose on the lower valley road leading to Bwlch-y-Groes and the warm up ride I was hoping for was a bit of a slog. You can hear my wheels crunching along on this surface on the video footage of the climb. Somebody had even thought it was a good idea to take the loose chippings all the way up to the apex of the steep hairpin bend leading onto the climb. It was more through luck than judgement that I was able to survive the descent and I had to take cautious line through this bend on the way back up.

Once past the stupid road surface I was on the climb proper and already starting to suffer in the heat. There was no shelter from the intense sunlight and with the temperature already at least in the high twenties I knew this was going to be a hard ride made harder by the conditions. I really don’t go well in hot weather and the further up I went the harder I found it to keep cool. By the time I reached the halfway point I was feeling totally done in and just had to stop and pour some water over my head in an attempt to regulate my temperature. It was at this point that I noticed the entire mountainside seemed to be buzzing with horseflies.

Every time my pace dropped or I dared to stop and pour water over my head great clouds of the damn things would descend and start biting lumps out of me. The nearer I got to the top of the climb the more unwell I started to feel in the heat and the last thing I needed to be doing was expending energy and making myself hotter by flapping my arms around in a vain attempt to get rid of the horseflies. I ended up being bitten 17 times. Watch carefully on the video and you’ll even see the bloody things buzzing around the camera. I know it sounds like I’m making a big deal about the heat but I was starting to realise that when the Met Office starts issuing heat wave warning fat chaps like me should probably try to avoid riding up steep mountain roads in Wales.

 .

I started to get quite worried about how overheated I was starting to feel and once I was eventually past the steepest part of the climb I found a small wall to sit on to and poured the last of my water over my head before attempting the final short ramp up to the car park. This inevitably involved more swearing at horseflies

 

The view from the top of Bwlch-y-Groes. Millions of horseflies just out of shot

The ride up Bwlch-y-Groes was probably the worst I have ever suffered on a bike. When I did finally inch my way up the final slope into the car park I felt totally ruined and it was a couple of hours before I was able to properly cool down. The following day, which was even hotter, would see heatstroke claim the lives of three soldiers on a training exercise in the Brecon Beacons and highlighted just how stupid I had been taking on such a fearsome climb in such hot conditions. I’m not some super fit light weight hill climbing genius; I’m an overweight bloke on a bike who should know better. I bumped into another 100 climbs rider at the top of the climb. I was too wasted to catch his name but if he ever reads this good luck with the rest of the climbs.

With the school summer holidays now in full swing I have been able to spend the last few weeks since my trip to North Wales resting up and training for the final 33 climbs. I don’t see the attraction in trying to travel and bag climbs at the height of the school summer holiday season as everywhere will be too busy and the roads will be too clogged. Next stop will be Scotland. Lets hope it’s a bit cooler when I get there.

The Road To Hell

It has taken me a bit of a while to get around to editing the footage for the Welsh climbs I completed in July. I've been busy with work and stuff at home but one of the main reasons for the delay is that I just needed a break from the 100 climbs stuff after getting back from Wales. I took on the remaining three Welsh climbs at the start of heat wave which really left me suffering and in truth I haven't been in a hurry to edit the footage.

Still, I've started the editing process now and the stuff I filmed doesn't look too bad so maybe I should look back on my time in Wales a bit more favourably. On the 11th July I drove up to Denbigh to ride the worryingly named Road to Hell. I originally intended to take on this climb a month or so earlier but a pulled calf muscle that left me struggling on the Horseshoe Pass meant that I felt it was more sensible to wait until I was back in decent shape before finishing off the Welsh climbs. Driving up to Denbigh seemed to take forever in the increasingly hot weather and after about 5 1/2 hours in a sweltering car I rolled into the car park at the nature reserve at the top of the climb.

 

This is a long climb and the descent was a decent ride in itself. In the 100 climbs book Simon Warren mentions that halfway up the climb there is a longish and fast descent. This of course translated into a short sharp little climb half way down to the start so I was able to get a warm up before starting my climb back up to the top. Not that I needed a warm up. Even though I didn't get to the climb until early evening the heat of the day hadn't abated. Working up a sweat on a descent was a first for me.

The first part of the climb is a pleasant enough meander along the lanes out of Denbigh and it isn't until you reach a couple of hairpin bends that the climb proper begins. The first mile or so of the following section is gentle enough with the gradient only ramping up slightly. After a significant period of gently climbing narrow lanes however the real challenge of the climb rears up in front of you; a long 17% gradient section that starts with some vicious bends. I was already feeling rubbish before I reached this point in the climb and it ended up being a painful slow speed crawl to the top of this section of the climb. A long drive in the car followed by a hot and long uphill bike ride are a less than ideal combination and it was a relief to have a nice downhill to coast down after suffering on the toughest part of the climb. It helped me to cool off a little.

 

It may be called the Road to Hell but the nature reserve at the top is very pretty

 

After negotiating the toughest part of the climb I had to try and keep my momentum up on the undulating upper slopes. The gradient isn't severe but I was fading badly in the heat and managed to get through all of the water I had by the time the more open uphill sweep of road to the summit finally appeared. The last couple of hundred metres was an excruciatingly slow crawl to the top and I was extremely glad to finally roll back into the car park. It was a sign that I would be able to very shortly drive along at high speed with all of the windows open as I drove to my overnight stop. The following day I had the joy of taking on Ffordd Penllech and Bwlch-y-Groes and cooling down before taking on those two climbs was going to be crucial...

Whiteleaf - Thats the South East finished

Whiteleaf was the second climb I tackled on the 8^th July. After riding up Mott Street I took about 2 hours getting to Whiteleaf. I got held up on the M25 and by the time I cleared that the school run traffic held me up some more.

Whiteleaf is a strange little climb. It is steep but isn’t too long and there isn’t anything particularly distinctive about it. I felt I could have been cycling uphill anywhere in the country. Even the car park at the top didn’t have any views. There is meant to be a chalk hill carving close to the hill but I couldn’t see the damn thing despite trying.

 

Another climb and another car park that could be anywhere in the UK

Anyway, back to the climb. It starts off with a fairly easy gradient and the steep stuff doesn’t really kick in for real until you tackle a steep right hand bend. I had been lulled into a false sense of security by the easier lower part of the slope and attempted to carry too high a gear onto the steep section. That’s the reason why the video footage of this climb suddenly gets very slow and the breathing very laboured!
 

 

Once I’d managed to clatter down into a lower gear it was just a case of spinning my way up to the junction that marks the top of the climb and that’s kind of all I have to say about Whiteleaf. It was the final climb I had to ride in the South East and I guess I was hoping for something more dramatic or exciting to close off the region. Instead I got a low speed ride up a fairly dull piece of road.

Still, the positive thing is I was back on the road and heading home nice and early and got back to glorious Devon by mid afternoon. I would then have 2 days off before heading back to North Wales to finish off the climbs I had to postpone because of a pulled calf muscle. I’ve started editing the footage for the three Welsh climbs and they are certainly more…interesting but sadly for all of the wrong reasons. Watch this space.

Mott Street

Monday the 8^th July started early; it was 6.30am when I pulled out of the car park in fact as I wanted to get Mott Street and Whiteleaf ridden and be back on the road heading home before lunchtime. This was partly because I was keen to escape the South East (I used to live there and now greatly prefer the less crowded and generally more chilled out South West) and partly to avoid cooking in the hot weather which had been forecast for later in the day. After suffering in the heat on the relatively short climb of Swains Lane (and an admittedly very long drive in a hot car) I had spent most of the night that followed trying to cool down.

 

None of the South Eastern climbs are too far from signs of urban sprawl

My early start meant that the short drive to Mott Street from my overnight stop was nice and cool and by 7.15, after parking up and setting up the bike, I was rolling along to the start of the climb in the sort of conditions I like. Getting out of bed at a stupid time in the morning had been worth it. The only real problem I faced was that the sun was still quite low in the sky and I had trouble seeing where I was going on a couple of the corners.

 

 

 

 

Mott Street is an odd little climb. It never gets too steep and the steepest section is actually quite short. The road to start with is pretty flat and it is only after it has been gradually ramping up in gradient that the steepest section of the road homes into view. Even then the road never hits more than a 12% gradient and because of the gentle ramp up in steepness I was able to keep the bike in a fairly high gear (well for me anyway) for most of the climb. I only changed down once I was on the 12% section and by the time I had finished clattering about with my gears it was time to change back up again for the final, less steep, section of the climb. In fact, I was a bit surprised to have the climb over and done with so quickly. It all seemed to be a bit of an anti climax but then it did give me plenty of time to get across to the climb at Whiteleaf.