Land's End to John O'Groats
The Great British Bike Ride
28th July to 18th August 2001
I do not remember when I first had the idea that I should attempt to cycle
from Land's End to John O'Groats. It has been at the back of my mind for sometime
though, just waiting for the right opportunity and sufficient time. Whilst
working it was impossible to take a three week holiday and I would not have
been fit enough to complete the ride in two weeks so it has had to wait until
I retired.I have cycled a long distance before in one day but not day after day over a period as this will be. On 22nd September 1991 Philip, Sue and I cycled the Salisbury Century Ride, the 100 mile ride from Salisbury via Devizes to Bath and back to Salisbury via Frome and Warminster. We trained for this over the previous winter and through the summer by gradually building up miles on a long ride once a week and riding a shorter distance most evenings after work. During this period we tackled the Avon Cycle Way, the circular route around Bristol passing slightly to the west of Bath through Saltford, by gradually doing a greater distance each weekend ending with the complete 90 mile circuit one momentous Sunday. We also cycled from Bath to Exeter on another Sunday, a distance of about 90 miles - and returned home by car with the bikes on the roof rack! Once the incentive of training for the "main event" was no longer there and the onset of winter meant that the cycling virtually ceased and it is only within the last four to five years that I have taken up cycling seriously again. Philip and Sue have both moved to their own houses - Sue some seven miles south of Bath and Philip about 12 miles north. It was always a challenge to cycle to Sue as it involves negotiating some of the steepest hills around Bath. Philip is easier to get to as he lives about three miles from the Bath to Bristol Cycle Track - a former railway line made into a cycle route by Sustrans - which involves a much easier ride with no steep gradients. A favourite ride now is to visit both in one day giving a mix of easy riding and steep hills - a round trip of just under 40 miles. The biggest problem - time - was solved last September when I retired. So then it was just a "simple matter" of getting fit to cycle over 1000 miles in about three weeks! So why do it? I suppose that the real answer is "because it is there"!
Planning
One of the problems with such a ride as LE JOG is accommodation and backup. Alternatives are to join an organised trip whether it be camping or B & B or hostelling and where luggage is carried for you or to go alone where everything has to be organised for yourself and luggage carried on the bike. Another alternative would be to have your own back up car - and driver - to carry the luggage and to drive ahead each day to organise accommodation. I contacted the various companies and organisations - including the CTC - arranging rides but none of them seemed to fit what I wanted. They were mostly either camping or over two weeks. I am not keen on camping and had decided that if I was going to put in the effort of cycling 60 or 70 miles a day then I would at least like comfortable accommodation at night! One trip I received information on was the one organised by Bike Adventures but this was a camping trip to be completed in two weeks with no rest days!Bike Tour's Great British Bike Ride
The most suitable was the one run by
Bike Tours of Bath who now organise many cycling holidays and also the
100 mile charity rides through an associated Company, the first of which was
the Salisbury 100 ten years ago. There were two big drawbacks to their trip
however - it is a camping trip and would cost around £1000 for three
weeks. I had however read an account of the last ride from Land's End to John O'Groats
organised by Bike Tours in 1992 written by
Delia Kennedy in which she complimented
Bike Tours on the organisation of the whole event. There were 164 participants
on this trip which seemed rather overwhelming but it all seemed to go very
well.
Delia had to provide her own tent but on this year's trip they offer to provide a tent and an inflatable mattress and to erect it and dismantle it at each stop - for a suitable additional charge! The nightly camp on the last trip was at a school or sports ground for example, presumably to accommodate so many participants and Delia had commented adversely on some of the showers and other "facilities" but this did not seem to affect her overall positive comments on the trip.
So I was left totally undecided as to what to do. I was really coming to the conclusion that perhaps I should organise myself and ask Molly to take me to the start by car and then perhaps meet up for a weekend part way through and then persuade her to collect me at the end. I would look for B & B's each night and take each day as it came for distance and to take account of adverse weather.
Then in the middle of April I received an E-mail from Bike Tours offering a discount of almost 10% off the tour price! Always one for a bargain it seemed that the decision was being made for me and as the Bike Tours office is in Bath I went to see them. There were about 40 people signed up already for the trip and Bike Tours were hoping to get up to a maximum of 60 so they had made the reduction in an attempt to increase the numbers. Anyway I made the "big decision" there and then and paid my deposit before thinking further about the drawbacks!
The next step was to build up the cycling miles in order to become used to riding a regular but steadily increasing distance day after day. I managed 18 days out in April completing a total of 325 miles and 24 days and 605 miles in May. I was quite pleased with this progress but was quickly reminded by the family that this was all very well but I would have to complete over 1000 miles in three weeks in July/August!
There was conflicting advice as to how to train for LE JOG. Simon Brown suggests that single rides of no less than two thirds of the expected daily distance be cycled twice a week for the month preceding the tour and that it is best to build up to this distance over a period leading up to the previous month. Dan Joyce states that to do a certain distance, day in day out, you should be able to comfortably ride 150% of that distance as a one off ride. This would mean being able to comfortably ride 90 miles in one ride based on the average days ride of 60 miles. My method has been more in line with the Simon Brown approach in that I have cycled five or six days out of each week in the three months leading up to the tour. There have been a couple of breaks for short holidays away from home which gave me a chance to rest from the bike and certainly seemed to help in the overall scheme of things. Time will tell if this method has been effective!
One important influence on the whole trip will be the weather. I am a bit of a fine weather cyclist in that I do not actually leave home for a ride if it is raining. I do go out if there appears to be rain due and whilst training I have been caught in some torrential downpours. It is always difficult to know when to put the waterproofs on if it is showery. Sometimes even in a medium but short shower it is better to get a bit wet and then to dry off naturally when the shower passes. There was one particular day where the sun was shining and there were a few spots of rain followed almost immediately by torrential rain. I quickly got soaked through but then dried out when the shower passed. The problem was that just as I was dry another shower soaked me again just before arriving home but at least I could shower and get warm and dry very quickly. I am dreading heavy continuous rain but over a three week period the weather in England and Scotland is bound to be wet at sometime or another!
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