Hell of Ashdown report

[huw williams]

Awesome turnout - from ACC and riders in general

503 official starters but there was a group of over 20 from the Medway at the bottom of Star Hill who joined in without signing on. And our group certainly picked up a few more along the way.
Groups of 20 - 4 minute gaps.
Every intention of going steady but that went out the window up Toys Hill when half the group got dropped (including half the Medway lot). And i wasn't going to wait - t was a case of either join the group going forward or join the group going back.

How come I always get sucked in to a race on this ride? It was frantic for the next hour - group of seven, couple of riders from Vitsoe doing all the work and the pace was just about manageable. Then there were a couple of punctures and one of the hardworking Vitsoe guys dropped out knackered cos he'd had his nose in the wind all day. Up The Wall there were 4 of us left, I got dropped initially but the longer the hill went on the better I felt and I chased the others down and was first on the road at the checkpoint at the top. Screaming descent and another legbreaker over Groombridge and the others were talking about trying to stay ahead of the entire Rapha/Recycling team who'd turned up with full support wagons, spare wheels, the lot and had started 30minutes behind us intent on finishing first. "And they'll be towing a posee no doubt" suggested one guy.

So, ears pinned back through the Penshurst drags and I kept finding myself on the front as the others started to tire - then close to the top of Ide Hill one guy jumped and we couldn't respond. He hammered it and was out of sight through the lanes toward Kemsing. I was chasing so hard I dropped the other two and was solo for a good 20 minutes in TT mode into the wind. Along Pilgrims Way to Otford and up the drag to the bottom of Star Hill. Amazingly I saw the escapee like a dot in the distance near the first bend on the bottom straight of Star Hill. He looked like he was weaving a bit so I had a go at catching him. Half way up on the middle bend he was a lot closer and I thought "Hang on, I'm feeling all right here", not a sign of cramp after 62 miles in the hills. Burried myself, went past him and sure enough he was in bad shape, dribbling and not even aware I was there.

Still had enough for a sprint over the top and nailed it all the way back to Knockholt - 1st rider back - YES!!! Ok there'll be loads of faster times from people in better groups but hey, you can only race those in front of you Kicked those Rapha guys asses too cos they were well over 30 mins behind with some lame excuses about punctures - lightweights!

Superb weather
Superb course - right mix of distance and hills
Excellent signage and marshalling from where I was sitting
More needs to be done with feed stations and one toilet for 500 people was a bit of a squeeze but the organiser reckoned he was expecting 250 riders tops - so next year they'll shift to a bigger hall

Great to see Tim Harris back on a bike, Keith was flying considering he had a hard training group ride the day before, Mrs Keith (Michelle) did an exceptional 4hrs.20
Lots of other guys from ACC back safely when I left, Snoop and Mark Locke missing in action. A worried looking Snoop was a pale green colour even before he got the bike out of the car so we might not see him 'til wednesday

Anorak stuff: 3hrs 50 ride time, 3:54 with stops for card marking. 190w av normalised to 218w. 85 minutes at threshold must try that in one sitting - not)
2788calories (which I cetrainly intend to put back in one sitting)

That's my season over - I'm quitting while I'm ahead. Where's the couch?

[Sylv]

It's all about the bike

[Keith]

Pretty hellish, but I've only myself to blame having pushed pretty hard in the Training Group yesterday.

Nobody in my group seemed to want to play, so I did about 90 of the 105 kms by myself. Odd considering there was 500+ riders out there.

From The Wall onwards my legs were in pretty bad shape on the hills and by Ide Hill I was in full damage limitation mode, spinning up in a silly gear before picking up the pace after ther hill. I even had to resort to my "emergency gear" by Star Hill. I shalln't embarass myself by telling you just how bad a ratio it is.

Anyway, back with 3hr 52mins on the card, just pipping Huw.

Great weather and a good route - enough hills, but not every hill in the area.

By my heart rate monitor, I also managed to beat Huw in the calories stakes (a whisker under 3000), so not sure if I'll manage to replace it in one sitting. I'll try my best though!

[ajay khandelwal]

Superb ! Congratulations Huw. You are sportif legend !
Looking forward to hear how acc autobus got on...will provide some context for how tough the ride was

[Antloony]

Well done guys. Great write ups so far on the days events. Sounds like you really enjoyed being out there and as Huw says an awesome turnout. Makes me wish I'd have turned up and done it.

Look forward to seeing the thread fill up with everyone elses report.

ah and a great effort from Kieth and his solo breakaway then.

[Andrew G]

Huw you always get dragged in to race in these because your ego can't let someone go up the road of you on a hill , great ride though and Keith too.

As Huw said the route was fantastic, much better than last year, and the weather was kind with a pretty mild day and some sunshine even if the wind was a bit nagging in places.

Quite what some people are doing with their choice of equipment though I'm not sure. A reliability ride on country lanes in January and I saw a Parlee, a Cervelo R3 with Shamal wheels, and more than one set of deep dish carbon wheels. £700+ race wheels for one of these .

Enjoyed a good warm up ride over there having met early in West Wickham, still needing lights.
I set off with about Ed, Paul (Dewis), and Jonathan B, it should also have included Adrian and Mark Locke but they were stuck in the karzee (sp?) holding their breath. It was a bit of a canary situation due to the number of riders and some were clearly nervous. Ed went ahead early on but the rest of us just cruised along going for a steady ride.

Up Brasted and we stopped for a quick loo stop having forgone the gauntlet at the HQ. Adrian and Mark caught us here and we now had a nice ACC group .

A little while later Jonathan got a puncture so we all stopped to observe operations during a very leisurely pit stop (about 20mins but no-one was hurrying, just chatting). Michelle rode past in a good sized group with a smile on her face, and was shortly followed by Keith who was absolutely flying. Jon H and Snoop stopped to join us and swell our group for the next bit.

Unfortunately Snoop got dropped but the rest of us carried on at a good steady pace (Toks ). Jon H spent most of the time on the front and we were happy to sit in. Paul is a very good climber and whenever the road rose he spun ahead with an annoying ease. Jon pointed out that with his new more flowing locks he's a dead ringer for Robert Millar and he's spot on. His climbing style has always reminded me of someone but I've never been able to put my finger on it. Snoop, If Paul starts asking for your Jack n Jill dress you now know why .

We stuck pretty much together 'til Kidds Hill when we split a bit but regrouped at the checkpoint. It was a long and steep hill but nowhere near as bad as is made out if you take it sensibly, and also certainly not got a 25% section.

We had caught a few of the Medway Velo riders by now and it has to be said they are bloody nightmares. On the long drop down one of them was riding extremely close to everyone and practically rubbing elbows with me at one point - twat. Following that on the next small climb up I was overtaking one of them (yes me overtaking someone on a climb ) and he started moving out without looking so I had to swing right to avoid him taking me out - twat. God knows what they thought they were playing at.

Jon H obviously didn't want to be anywhere near them and accelerated away from us, none of us could hold his wheel anymore as he picked up the pace. Our remaining group also gradually pulled away from them so were fortunately saved from their dubious antics.

Just before Groombridge, which hurt as expected, we were passed by a bunch from Arctic Rochford who were obviously using the event as a training session. Call me old fashioned but I think it's a bit off for teams like them and Rapha to hijack these events, it's not really in the spirit of them and I think an odd tactic to risk their seasons flying through groups of riders of whom they have no idea of the others ability.

Anyhoo on to Penshurst we went and I was feeling much better having started with slightly heavy legs. I knew we were on the return leg so started to pick the pace up and spent long stints on the front dragging our group along. We passed a number of others, which was nice, and then the Arctic lot who'd stopped for a picnic .

Quite a lot of lumps and rolls through this bit and Paul and Adrian would always glide up the hills better than the others, but once over them I kept going to the front and doing a dig to get a good workout. Up Ide Hill and as I hadn't really looked at the map didn't realise what a circuitous route we would take back to Star Hill. I put my head down again and put in a fairly big effort pushing up the drags and rolls to keep up the speed. Adrian started to feel it a bit (not enough miles in the legs I think) and dropped off to go a bit more steadily, but Paul joined me. Adrian clearly didn't go that steadily though as he only finished a couple of minutes behind us.

We had a little three man train for the final bit with a chap in red who'd jumped on and helped me out, giving me the odd breather before his legs finally gave up on him on one of the final drags.

My legs were hurting quite a bit now and I knew Star would be horrible. As we hit Paul went ahead as expected but not that far, which is a measure of how much he must have been suffering as the speed I was going he should have flown off in to the distance.

I managed to keep him in site so that I could drag him back on the final run to HQ at the top and we finished together. We had 4h30 officially which would've been about 4h10ish without the elongated puncture stop. A very good ride with good company.

Back in the HQ and two cups of tea, two sausage rolls, a cheese roll, and a slice of cake were quickly demolished as I restocked for the ride home. I was absolutely starving.

Everybody came in and joined our little messy yellow pile of bodies stuffing their faces with Snoop turning up with a time of 5 hours, a fairly white face, and a promise never to do another one of these rides . Good effort Cap'n, if you've never ridden round those hills they are a bit of a surprise, particularly all the rolls and drags in between the official hills. Once you've recovered a bit I bet you look back on it as a good day though and a great bike ride.

Needless to say the ride home was taken fairly easily with some weary legs, Paul seemed to be fine though and sat on the front pulling us along.

Cheers,

Andrew.
Blimey just previewed this - sorry I went on for so long .

[Graham O]

Good to hear it was fun and top ride Huw....

[Ian A4size]

Well done to Huw, and a big up to Finbar.

Excellent reportage one and all, just a few typos and punctuation probs Andrew.
Don't hit Paul!
Oh and shurely sight

Well done all.

[Snoop Doug]

As Walter Sobchack says in The Big Lebowski "Snoop, you are entering a world of pain". As per Huw's advice I got off early in Group 4 (someone call security) with Michelle. We were rolling along nicely talking about racing @ Hillingdon (well I was listening you'd never catch ME racing) when the Pantcrapper hill descent came upon us like the Day of Black Sun. I don't do descents. Put another way, down big hills I get overtaken by Thora Hird riding a Stannah Stairlift. About half way down I talked myself into letting go a bit, y'know, how bad can it be. I built up the most amazing speed wobble which took me scarily into the path of the oncoming traffic. I was so sure I was going to crash but I remember someone (was it Thora?) telling me that the way to ride a wobble is to go through it. So I did , and lo, eventually my bike came back under my control.

So - I'm now well and truly on my lonesome. Huw's next piece of advice was - don't get stuck on yer own. I was.....on my own. I came across a band of ACC ne'erdowells fixing a puncture. I stopped to chat a while and then we set off together. I held their wheel for about 500 yards and I was alone.....again. I got passed by Keith going like a train, he said hi, I said hi, which was nice.

Try as I might groups either went by me too fast or I came upon folk going just a bit too slow. So - like Keith - I did almost the whole ride on my lonesome.

I enjoyed The Wall - at the top I took off my thermal skull cap to celebrate, got me route card stamped and headed off. 30 odd miles in the can, how hard can it be I thinks.

Damn there's a lot of hills in this part of the country. I began to suffer at about the 40 mile mark. Then I just kept on a sufferin'. The hills hurt, and there were too many of 'em. When I declare myself prime overlord of England I'm gonna dig up the worst ones and shove 'em in the gaps in between to make a nice long, flat TT course round these parts.

After being lied to by the feed station (ha!) marshals about the remaining distance I tootled off with vaguely renewed vigour. This didn't last long and so I resorted to my favourite pain distraction technique, going slightly mad. I began to visualise myself throwing my bike into the hedge, which was nice. I began to see lots of little people sitting atop fence posts playing banjos. I began to think in a country and western accent. I began to sing some of my favourite songs - in a yee harr banjo stylee.

Somehow I made it to the final check point. 6 more sh1tty pain filled undulating %$$$@@ miles to go.

I've no idea how I managed that last chunk, and the ascent of Pantcrapper was just eye watering. I dug in, I did it. I got round in 5 hours and 3 minutes. I don't think I'll do it again - too many steep descents and lordy, those hills. Still, job done eh wot?

Now the technical crap (took me Garmin y'see)

4087 calories burned (on beer number 2 as I type this)
Total Ascent - 1692m
Ave Speed - 21.1kph
Max Speed - 44.9kph
Number of times passed by Thora - 7
Number of little people playing the banjo - 21#

G'night.

[Ian A4size]

Delightful post from the Bard 'o' Wallington.

We have had some great lines this year- penguins- from George, lets try and keep it up.

For all you non posters out there.... why not add a comment? New input keeps the club alive... who wants to keep on reading the same old contributors, dragging you into their own private hell?

See hall of shame thread!

[Jon H]

What a great day out. Good route, good weather, good company, good cakes. Sundays don't get much better than this.

Started out in group 6 at 9.20, 20 minutes after Huw and 12 minutes after the main Addiscombe posse, in the same group as Keith. Well, Keith started out as if his arse was on fire, and after 1/2 a mile had shredded our group of twenty so only about six were hanging onto his back wheel as we hurtled down Star Hill. As we climbed up Toys hill he vanished into the distance, and I was left with a couple of London Dynamo riders for company, so I worked with them for the next few miles until I came across the Addiscombe puncture repair team. Did some big turns on the front along with Paul & Adrian, and we kept the group more or less together until the checkpoint on the top of Ashdown. I set off down the descent towards Groombridge on the front in TT mode so those behind wouldn't have to brake too much. Then towards the bottom the dangerous brothers from Medway Velo came past and upset the flow a bit. Well, if they're going to come past on the descent the least they could do is give it some welly up the next drag, but no they sat there holding up the group, so I gave it a dig off the front. My intention was to drag Paul, Andrew, Adrian et al away, but it seems I went a bit too hard and dropped everybody. Oh well, carry on regardless. Towards the top of the climb out of Groombridge three Arctic Shorter Rochford riders came past, and I grabbed a tow for the next few miles into Penshurst, where unfortunately they had an attack of the munchies and stopped at the shop. Went straight past a fairly large group on the drag out of Penshurst, and picked up a wheelsucker who glued himself to my rear wheel all the way to the checkpoint at Four Elms. Now I was on familiar territory as these are the roads I use for training rides, and I was catching and passing people all the time now: a bit of local lnowledge definitely helps. Teamed up with a couple of other riders for the loop around Sevenoaks, but somehow lost them at the final checkpoint in Kemsing despite soft-pedalling for a while after getting my card stamped. Blew up a bit after Otford, and had to just stick it in bottom gear and grind away to get back up Star hill to the finish (4:07 for me).

[Toks]

Hey nice work every one, great reports...I bet that FT's been bumped up Huw

[Michelle]

Sorry can't post anything until I get some extra tissues.

Mine are all used up from reading Snoop's report....been wetting myself with laughter.

PS: What is it with the banjoes?

[Michelle]

Sh1t ,just read it again and STILL wettomg ,yself 2nd time round

[Michelle]

so much so I can't typpe!