Today was the first of the training bike rides for the 100 mile Challenge, in typical Stevens fashion i decided on one of the toughest roads in the North West Belmont Road, the road used as part of the Commonwealth Games, Bolton Ironman and Horwich Triathlon.
There were 6 hardy victims (Gary S, Craig B, Sean Spillane, Peter Clegg, Craig Little and Brenda) at the train station and Steve Coleman? We all know that Steve is the master of the spinning bikes but he had never been seen out on a road bike. Once Mary Anne turned up at 8.55am we realised that it was a coincidence and they were both off for a ½ marathon.
Brenda looked a bit deflated, well her tyres did and we made our way to Bob’s for the use of his pump. It wasn’t looking promising as all his curtains were still closed, Craig realised he had been out watching Asis the night before so it was off to my house for the track pump.
We finally started the route at 9.15am and travelled towards Bolton, everyone was complaining about cold hands and cold feet apart from Brenda who had borrowed Sir Ranulph Fiennes North Pole feet warmers!
After 30 minutes of a steady pace we hit the start of the Belmont Road which started off with a 1 mile Millers Lane type climb and was pretty relentless for the other 9 miles of the road. We hit the half way point at the M65 road-about and all gathered for a quick drink before setting off on the way back home.
The first hill of the 2nd part of the course was a real nasty little bugger, i was moving just behind Sean and was feeling it by now as the countless hills had started to take their toll on my legs which hadn't felt so many hills since last year's Roddlesworth Roller!
As we came down the final hill and hit the lights at Asda knowing the hard stuff was behind us there was a bit of a disaster as Craig B was seen walking on the pavement PUNCHURE. It was a good job we had a couple of spare inner-tubes and Sean’s bike mechanical experience of else i think Craig would have had a long walk home.
The ride lasted around 2.5 hours and a good time was had by all, Craig B was already planning another ride for next Sunday.
Keep posted to the blog for more details.
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