A cyclist is tragically killed while enjoying a perfectly legal Time Trial event by a carelessly driving HGV operator (BBC Report). What happens next?

Well Quentin Rayner and BBC East Midlands Today decide that it must be the cyclist’s fault for using a road when he doesn’t even pay “Road Tax”. So that’ll be the Road Tax that was abolished in 1937 then? And replaced by a specific tax on Vehicles, which is not earmarked for the roads? And then using that stupidity to indicate that Cyclists shouldn’t be allowed to the use the road as they legally can.

Quentin also tries to intimate that there’s something inherently wrong with the concept of Time Trialing on the open road (there isn’t, and if there was, after this length of time I think the Police might have mentioned it to the CTT) by insinuating you wouldn’t be allowed to ‘race’ on the public highway in any other form of transport. To which I can only say that he’s obviously never heard of Road Rallys (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Road_rally). The main difference is that the “Road Rally”ers have to have a maximum speed to stay legal, most TTers won’t get anywhere near the maximum speed indicated for a road so they don’t need one.

It’s one thing to hear this sort of stupidity from idiots, but to then hear it given prominence on a Regional News show from the UK’s major broadcaster is appalling. Could the BBC not spend a little time making sure their “Chief News reporters” actually know the bare minimum about a subject before they allow them to open their mouths?

[Update]

Better commentary and analysis on this issue over at “I Pay Road Tax”

Having fixed my drivetrain problems I decided it would be a good idea to get some hilly riding in before the Dean. With some decent weather forecast for the weekend I decided that heading for the Peak District was good idea. Not been out that way for a couple of months as I’ve either not had enough time or have been worried about getting caught out by the weather.

I worked out a cut down route based on last years ill fated first attempt at a DIY by GPS that should fit into the 5 hours I had spare. But in a fit of very un-audax thinking I couldn’t be bothered to get a virtual brevet for it, so this hasn’t been officially proven, but autoroute OKs it.

The control points I ‘used’ were:

• Nottingham
• Belper
• Birchover
• Jaggers Lane, Darley Moor
• Nottingham

Autoroute gives this as 100.6km on shortest distance around that lot. The route I took round them looked like this:

It’s a reasonably quiet route. Even the main roads out of Nottingham are reasonably quiet. Rolling roads to Belper and then the proper Peak District hills kick in. Birchover Lane is a very steep little number, I ended up have to walk about 2 meters of it as there was just no traction to be had. The descent from Bichover through Stanton Lees is very fast, but some of the corners are very sharp so be careful. The climb out of Darley Dale is a bit of a struggle, the signs reckon 20%, but that’s if you don’t get the line wrong on the hairpins. Once that’s over it’s a nice rolling ride back to Nottingham.

I made the route 1650m of climbing from my Edge 800, which should qualify for AAA points. But until someone submits it to the AAA man there’s no guarantee. The profile looks like this:

My ride of it went pretty well considering I’m still trying to find my legs this year. The only bit I had to walk was as mentioned above due to lack of traction. That’s pretty good compared to last years attempts. I’m still slow on the climbs, but that can hopefully be improved. Looking forward to getting over to the Peak District a bit more this year, now I’ve got some reasonable pace on the flat I can get over there without wasting too much time. And I’ll give that DIY from last year another go, just to make sure it gets ticked off.

Came up with this when I needed a quickish route for a DIY 200km Audax for September 2011 after a GPS failure on a 400km attempt meant that I had a break in my RRTY attempt. Nothing amazingly fancy, but because of the aforementioned GPS failure I wanted a route with some decent places to get ‘proof of passage’. Nottingham city centre is crawling with early opening places and cash machines, Bourne has a cash machine and a couple of early opening shops even on a Sunday morning, Woodhill Spa has plenty of cafes that do receipts, Lincoln has all the usual cash machines and then it’s back to Nottingham.

It’s all pretty good roads with very little that isn’t paved decently. There are a couple of mainish roads but nothing too horrible, and if you don’t mind a few extra kms most of the them can be avoided). I ended up time trialing it down the side of the A46 to Newark as I got caught in a big thunderstorm and wasn’t happy riding through the woods by thurlby with lightning about.

Most of the climbing, such as there is at 896m total, is in the first section to Bourne, though Carlton hill back into nottingham is a bit of a shock.

GPX of the route: here

nottingham - bourne - woodhall spa - lincoln - 200km profile

Audaxing does seem to be changing how I look at distances and travel. When the opportunity came up to visit some family to help clear out a shed in Luton, my first though was “Wonder if there’s a ride in that?”. Lo and behold, with a couple of well chosen controls it appeared there was a rather nice little 200K available. Started plotting with google maps, but after a few inconsistencies with the length I went onto Ebay and got a copy of Autoroute 2005 (probably much to the delight of my regional organiser) so there now wasn’t any mucking around for distances. The final controls were:

• Nottingham
• Averham
• Newark
• Bourne
• Great Barford
• Luton

Quality Audax roads

Quality Audax roads 2

Audax Roads 3

After that I started to hit a bit of a rough patch. All the usual lack of energy, lack of drive and enthusiasm. The going wasn’t particularly tough so I’m sort of putting this down to 3 things:

• Heat, I’m not a hot weather person
• Lack of food. I’d not eaten as much as usual while riding, and not much during the morning either.
• Lack of liquid. I’d not really drunk much at work before leaving. And thanks to a new larger water bottle I’d not been diluting my lucozade, which I think make a difference as I’m not sure if I  need the liquid more than I need the sugar

It started off with wanting to do Super Randonneur series but not being able to make it any of the AUK calendar 600s as they were all pushed forward by Paris-Brest-Brest. The foundations were really laid with an off hand comment on my abortive attempt at the Moors and Wolds 400 about trying a DIY on the London-Edinburgh-London 2013 route. And then yesterday it was cemented when the brevet card turned up in the post.

The plan is to use the main controls to give a route Nottingham-Spalding-Market Rasen-Pocklington-Thirsk-Scotch Corner-Barnard Castle-Brampton-Moffat-Edinburgh at just a touch over 600k, with a room booked at Scotch corner for a couple of hours rest.

So since then there’s been the planning of routes, booking of rooms and train tickets and pleading for time off. All of which takes a fair amount of time. And then suddenly you realise that there’s only 2 weeks till you should be slogging past York on a bike. Hopefully there’s been enough ‘training’ in the last couple of weeks as it’s a bit late now. Couple of weeks of 100+ miles of commuting should help. And this weekend’s plans should add another 150 miles in to the pot. Not sure if going to the Rock+Bike next weekend should really feature in a taper, but it should be nice and relaxing.

After the Tramway 100 I was away in Germany for the Wave Gothick Treffen so there was more beer than bidons going on. Though I was exceptionally jealous of all the cycling the locals seemed to do. Plenty of people of all ages, sizes and ability pootling around Leipzig getting on with everyday things. Most main roads seemed to have good quality large cycle paths, and if a cyclist wanted to use the road they seemed to be given plenty of room as well.

Since I’ve been back I’ve been trying hard to keep up with the commuting/training rides to and from work each day. Unfortunately as I only live 1.5 miles from the centre of Nottingham this involves a bit of cunning and heading out of the city and then back in to make it worthwhile. I’ve got routes of 15,10 and 8 miles now (with enough hills as well) that I can use on the way in depending on how quickly I get out of bed. Luckily work has showers so my colleagues don’t have to suffer too much. The plan is to try to keep a base of about 80 miles a week going.

Sort of thinking about trying for an RRTY as something to force me out on a longer ride at least once a month. Already had the first 3 months done:

• March – Roses to Wrags
• April – Everyone rides to Skegness
• May – Lincolnshire Cross

But nothing planned in for June. So decided to work out a ‘simple’ 200km DIY to do. After my last fun and games with a DIY I thought I’d come up with something flattish (1400m climbing in 220km is certainly ‘Audax Flat’) that used roads I knew and with a couple of decent places to stop for a sit down and food. So the following was dreamed up:

Depending on how things turn out July’s long ride looks like either being the Cheshire Cat or a DIY ride on the LEL course up to Edinburgh.

Quick little loop to the North East of Nottingham, from Mapperly Top to Lambley to Lowdham to Bleasley to Southwell to Calverton and back to Mapperly Top

Mapperly - Lowdham - Southwell route profile

This works out at about 30 miles with a couple of good climbs, and a couple of fast descents as payback as well. Mostly quietish roads, the only main road is the A612 which is wide enough to keep a bit of elbow room. The drop down spring lane into Lambley is a nice way to start. There’s a long steady climb up out of Southwell which ends up in good fast descent into Oxton. The only real sting is the climb up George’s Lane from Calverton to Dorketts head, starts off gentleish but rears up around the corners (though that’s according to an overweight/underfit me, ymmv).

Thanks to the ever increasing amount of light left after I’ve finished my daily slave over a PC I made it out for a decent ride straight after work last night. Nothing hugely flash, but a midweek 22 miles is more than I’ve done for 18 years so that’s good going. But just a couple of points I need to remember:

• Get ready faster. Took about 20 minutes to faff around from desk to cocking a leg over the bike. What was I doing?
• Don’t assume because I’m not heading far out of Nottingham that I know where I’m going and forget a map
• Turning right onto a major road at peak time is a lot harder on a bike than in a car
• George’s lane is a lot steeper in person than any map tells you
• The road surface on Mapperly top is atrocious!!!!

But other than that it was a great stress reliever, so here’s hoping I can get a few more in. Times like this I wish we didn’t live so close to work, otherwise I could disguise this as a long commute :).

So decided to try and push the ride a little bit this week. Though I’d try north of the city for a change and head for the Peak District, or at least the edge of it.

Nottingham to Cromford route profile

So that turned out to be just shy of 80km of reasonably hilly riding along a nice mix of roads. The route out of Nottingham was pretty good without too much main road usage. The rest of the ride was either reasonably quiet B roads or unclassified lanes. Traffic was reasonably well behaved as well. The only idiot was the woman who shot past at a great rate of knots and then cut straight back in to park at church. Either desperate to pray for forgiveness for almost hitting a cyclist, or cyclists don’t feature too highly in their version?

The hills weren’t quite as bad as I was expecting. I had to stop a couple of times for a quick breather, but I didn’t walk any of them. I did have 2 dodgy moments though, 1 as I was crawling round a tight uphill corner when I caught my front mudguard with my foot and ripped it off the mountings, luckily cable ties to the rescue again. And then on the way home I wandered into the gully at the side of the road, lost traction and toppled slowly over, managing to unclip the wrong foot and hitting the tarmac.

Stopped for a cream tea at Cromford mills. Seemed to do the trick as the ride back took about 30 minutes less than the ride out. Sounds like an excuse for more cream teas.

All in all, pretty happy with that. Still impressed that I managed 900m of climbing and wasn’t completely dead

quiet country bike route from Lincoln to Nottingham

So not the most adventurous of cycle treks, but I fancied something with a little more purpose than just riding around Nottingham. So the idea was born to get the train over to Lincoln from Nottingham and then cycle back. Unfortunately the 2010 winter weather has meant it’s taken a couple of weeks to get round to it. But eventually went out and did it on Monday, taking advantage of the postponed bank holiday.

Was a pretty good run. Only downsides were my saddlepack breaking on the way to the station (repaired with cable ties, and soon to be on it’s way back to wiggle) and the cold which gradually seeped into my bones. Before any more long rides I really need to buy some overshoes to stop my feet freezing. A slight downside as well was a lack of cafes on the routes, many a spot would have been hit by a large hot coffee :).

Other than that it’s a pretty flat 48 mile route with almost no main road riding once you’re out of Lincoln. Some of the lanes even have a little grass down the middle. Road surfaces varied from really good down to a bit rought, but my tender novice behind didn’t seem to have any problems on 25s. Found a couple of nice little places to sit down and eat a mars bar, though there does seem to be a trend of removing the benches from village bus shelters, so it’s hard to get out of the wind. Roads were all very quiet, in fact between Lincoln and Newark I think I saw mores horses and riders than cars.

Definitely noticed the hills as I rode back from the station to home. Definitely something to watch out for. Now a bit happier that given another couple of rides like that I should make it round the “Rutland and Beyond” ride in a couple of weeks. Need to keep an eye on my pacing though, started off strong from Lincoln and really noticed it towards the end, so maybe more of a steady effort