James on Bikes

But the rain it fell and fell

Not the most successful ride ever. I have never found riding in heavy rain to be parcticularly enjoyable and today was no exception. It was dull and overcast when I left, it started to spit after I'd done a few hundred metres, then it darkened as soon as I entered the woods and the heavens opened. Extreme wetness ensued and, although I struggled manfully on my hired bike, I gave it all up for a bad idea and slogged back to the apartment having done only 5.5 miles.

It's now lunchtime and I'm clean and mostly recovered. I might have another go this afternoon if the weather brightens a little more, but my kit is still damp and I'm not sure I really want to fight the bike again even though the route I followed was pretty good (if I ever return I'll bring my own bike).

So what have I learnt today? 
Cotton shorts are no good on a bike in the rain,
Check the brakes before departing; this bike had the rear brake on the right rather than the left,
Never hire a bike you haven't seen; visit the shop, speak to the people, hire a decent machine, don't get ripped off,
Take your own kit; helmet, mitts, pump, etc. and don't rely on the hire shop knowing which end of a bike is the front.

It was a fun ride, but not the greatest; in good weather and with a better bike I think it might have been epic. 

Route: I'm having problems extracting the route info from my phone, but my starting point is here.

How many hills on the Isle of Wight? Lots.

To be honest, I'm not sure if it's "lots" or just "many" but some of them seem fairly big when you're halfway up and the sun's beating down like a musically-challenged drum major. It's been 17 years since I've been riding on the Isle of Wight and I'd forgotten how many hills there are. It's also been a while since I've been on the hovercraft, which is definitely the best way to get to the island, and they seem to be fairly casual about taking bikes.

The hovercraft disgorges in Ryde, so I bought an OS map of the island and headed for Newport. I had an idea that it might be a good idea to acquire a rear mudguard because there had been rain overnight and I didn't fancy riding the hovercraft back to Southsea caked in mud but it was not to be; I rode round Newport a couple of times but couldn't find the shop I was looking for, so I gave up and made for Sandown on the dismantled railway line (at least, that's what I think it was). 

These lines are pretty useful for travelling quickly but they get very boring, very quickly - they're flat, hard-packed, clean and dull. A couple of miles was enough, after which which I turned back onto the road and climbed up to Godshill, which is basically a village with a picturesque church on a hill in the middle of the island. Hunger was starting to set in by this point so I stopped at the village shop and bought a frankly revolting sausage roll and a barely edible sandwich. Having failed to sate my hunger, I headed south out of the village up the big hill, looking for bridleways where, it was rumoured, the offroading was pretty good.

Happily, the rumours turned out to be pretty accurate; lots of tricky (for me) climbs in low gear and some frantic downhill runs. Great fun. The OS map showed several bridleways around Godshill but I only found the one. By the time I'd reached the bottom of the hill I couldn't really face another climb, so I decided to meander homeward.

After this point things started to blur a little. The sun had come out and the temperature in the middle of the island was rather higher than on the coast; I was roasting and tiring, so I turned east on the easy trails, picked up the dismantled railway line and headed for Alverstone where I made a mistake and headed north up a little-used bridleway. 

North seemed like a good idea; it took me up the ridge in the centre of the island, the ridge I needed to cross on the way back to Ryde, but it didn't curve - it just went straight up, getting steeper and steeper. By the time I reached the top (having pushed the bike the last third) I was shattered and still a good distance from Ryde. From here, though, it was mostly downhill. In fact, it would have been almost entirely downhill if I hadn't made a schoolboy navigational error and headed back inland when I reached the coast rather than following the shoreline. 

Anyway. Great fun, lots of hard work. I'll definitely be going back, but not until I've forgotten how tired I now am. Here's the route: link. 

And what did I learn? Under Armour t-shirts are a definite improvement on cotton. 2 water bottles isn't enough; CamelPak next time. Buy sandwiches from Marks & Spencers rather than local shops. Avoid unbranded sausage rolls. 

Oh, and my front tyre suffered a minor puncture at some point fairly late in the ride, which was lucky because I didn't have the right tools (no tyre levers) and I'd have looked a bit daft if it had happened earlier in the day.

Riding the forests of Warsash and Whiteley

Sunday morning, bright and sunny, off on the bike. Pretty good route (link) along the Hamble, through the woods around Whiteley and back along the dismantled railway line. Just under 20 miles - really good ride.

Once again the iPhone and MotionX GPS saved me from getting lost. It's a fantastic piece of kit but you can't beat an OS map for finding bridleways; the laminated Explorer maps (like this one) are the ones to go for.

Off to the Isle of Wight tomorrow to find some hills. Report to follow.

Road bike or mountain bike?

I've got a problem; I've been wondering over the last couple of days if I should have bought a road bike instead of a hardtail mountain bike because there aren't all that many places to ride offroad near home.

 I've spent hours researching routes but most of the decent ones are a train or car ride away; riding to them isn't really practical. Then I had a revelation - if I bought a road bike, I could go anywhere, without a car, no problem.

 And that was fine, until I realized that all I really wanted to do when I reached the destination was head offroad, so it looks like the mountain bike was the right choice after all. Much joy.

Cycling: Great Outdoors Guides - Times Online

To celebrate the start of summer, The Times is giving away a collection of guides to the great outdoors, showing you how to make the most of the British countryside. Your next instalment, inside The Times this Saturday, June 13, is a superb guide to cycling, filled with ideas, advice and wry observations from Times journalists.
via timesonline.co.uk

I'm always suspicious when newspapers use the word "superb" about their own writing, but you never know. We normally buy The Times on Saturday anyway so I'll be giving this guide a glance.

Mud. Lots of it. And Puddles, lots of them.

Apparently it rained last night, quite heavily. I hadn't really noticed (I snored through it, apparently) but it was pretty obvious on the tracks that quite a lot of the English Channel had dropped in for a visit; they were wet, puddle-strewn, muddy and messy. Marvellous.

I popped out this morning to do a quick lap around my default local route (which I've mentioned before, a couple of times) and by the time I got back the bike was covered in crud (I really need a rear mudguard) and so was I. In fact, even my phone was caked because I forgot to use the wet weather cover and it sat in its pouch on the cross bar, nicely open to the elements, picking up, it would appear, every stray piece of mud.

So, between the mud, the water and the dozens of people out walking their mutts, I wasn't really expecting to be all that quick but it turns out I did the 7.48 miles in 44:30, a minute faster than a fortnight ago. Woo hoo! Ok, so that's still only 10.3 mph, not exactly quick, but faster than last time and maybe next week, on dry trails, with fewer walkers, I can go a little bit faster.