Chapter 11: The Longest Shortest Day

So a bit of a mad challenge in Christmas week – to cycle 200 miles on the shortest day of the year.

Why?

I’ve been looking into doing a skiing race to the North Pole, which it turns out is actually quite hardcore. You have two weeks training in Austria, one weeks training around Resolute, the town nearest the magnetic North Pole and then a two – three week ‘race’ to the pole. The race involves teams of three wearing the warmest clothes known to man and simply cross country skiing for about 9 hours a day.

What this actually means is walking endlessly along in freezing temperatures, where you can just about see the line in front of you - and nothing else.

So what better mental training than cycling 200 miles, with most of it the pitch black. I did it to see how I felt along the way, how hard mentally would it be to keep going in the dark and cold for hour upon hour.

I left home at 7am to head towards Brighton. It was bloody cold – even if it was only the Surrey Hills and not a polar ice cap. I struggled to get going and stopped at a café for coffee and cake early on.

Got to Brighton (55 miles) and headed east towards Folkestone, along the sea front. This was the enjoyable 70 miles of the day, all in good sunlight, through seaside towns and with not too much of a headwind.

I picked up a sandwich on the go in Newhaven, that I have to say must rank as the worst British town I have ever visited – it was shite. I was busy cycling away from the town scoffing my tuna mayonnaise roll when I noticed it tasted a bit creamy. I looked down to find the whole thing seemed to have been filled with a pound of margarine. At this rate I would be checking into a hospital in Folkestone recovering from a heart attack cased by blocked arteries.

By the time I got to Dungeness I was back into the dark and cold. I didn’t think I had gone quite far enough along the coastline but decided to turn back towards London anyway.

This was then followed by four hours of what are supposed to be A roads but seemed to be pitch black B roads and as I neared the outskirts of London – plenty of hills.

Every car that approached from the other direction was on full beam and didn’t feel the need to drop the headlights as they past me. So I was either blind from the darkness or blind from headlights – it was great!

The only points of interest were the Christmas lights that adorned country houses and pubs that I would pass every few miles. It gave a slight warming cosy feel to the slog.

As I got into South East London my chain slipped a couple of times, followed quickly by the rear derailleur shearing itself off and planting itself into the spokes of the back wheel. Luckily I was going up hill behind a bus so managed to not fall off as the bike ground to a sudden halt.

Even more luckier and maybe some payment back for having madly cycled by that stage 190 miles, a tube station was 100 yards away. I clomped back down the street and onto the platform, up to Charing Cross and home to a lovely bath in Hammersmith.

So it was OK.

It was obviously fairly hard physically but much harder mentally. I think having a supportive wife txting away and three kids to get back for, was a great help. I think if I had been aiming for anywhere other than home, on my own and had to repeat it the following day, it would be a hard mental challenge.

But anyway it makes a good challenge – Dec 19th 2005 – the longest shortest day – who’s coming?