Easter Arrow - 19th/20th April 2019

The simplest description of this ride I can think of is to call it a 24hr Team Time Trial in Audax form.

More specifically, you put together a team of between 3 and 5 riders, devise a route of over 360km (15kmh minimum speed) based on shortest distance between the controls you set, on a route that ultimately leads towards York and then ride it; if you are ahead of time you need to have suitable extension controls ready to up your distance by no more than 20%, or you could hang around at your penultimate control situated over 25km away from your finish control (although not too long) to ensure you meet the requirement of riding 25km in the last 2 hours, if you're down on distance you need to be within 20% of your declared distance, and finally 3 of the riders must finish for the team result and for the finishers in the team to be validated.  Confused? Complicated? Aye me an aw!

I was tempted by an Arrow partly due to it being a requirement for the Audax UK Brevet 5000 and 25000 and ACP 5000 and 10000 awards, but mostly because it's a very different beast from the other types of Audax UK rides and I liked the idea. Robbie was also interested.

At the Yorkshire Grit ride back in February Aiden Hedley was riding with a "Arrow Team Wanted" poster on the back of his jersey and at the Arivée Steve Scott of the Lakes Velo team was hunting around for up to 3 more riders to join the Lakes Velo Arrow team for this years arrow.  A brief discussion was followed up by e-mail from Steve and we had a team together.

Paul Revell had decided to take a year off captaining the team so Steve was getting to grips with the rules in the role of team captain with Paul's assistance when required. We agreed to target a reasonable points distance of 426km on a route of around 440km of riding however this was soon whittled down just over 430km with a bit of tidying up of the route plan.

I darted out of work at 4pm on the Thursday afternoon to get home and changed for the journey south, my packing and repacking done in advance to keep my time comfortable.  At Dundee station a friend from the hiking club got off the train with her bike, unfortunately confusing the guard into thinking we were trying to overload the bike spaces, thankfully after some prompting he saw that the space I had booked was free and I got on, had I missed this train it would have been an expensive taxi to Glasgow or a long drive south. Neither of us had eaten before getting the train and for all Glasgow has to offer, when you've got a bike and 50 minutes between trains about the only location that is suitable to eat is the Glasgow Central Burger King, which is distinctly average.

We arrived at Steve's just after 10pm and after socializing settled in for the night, I opted for the motorhome as it suited me best, I'm used to the sort of cushions used and need a fairly solid bed, I also reckoned on getting woken by the dawn. With our start planned for 9am there was time for a leisurely awakening and breakfasting. As hoped I woke early and naturally as the dawn light streamed into the motorhome helping me avoid my normal morning sluggishness.
Steve prepared a cracking breakfast of Porridge, Eggs and Toast to set us up for the day.

Ready to set off

Paul and Aiden were ready for us at Asda when we rolled in well before 9am allowing for a chat and relaxed collection of Brevedence.
I had got dressed for the morning chill but at Asda I adjusted my kit. I could tell it was going to be a much warmer day than forecast, leg and arm warmers were off Robbie remarking on how pale my "Peely Wally" Scottish skin is, he's so used to riding with me when the weather calls for wrapping up.
For the first time this year I was coating my arms with sun cream.

Riding on the flat of the Fylde

At 9 we rolled out of the car park and set off south for Lytham, it'd been a long time since I'd ridden in a group with the mentality required for staying in the group so it took me a few minutes to get the hang of things again. The hardest mentally was getting positioned behind Aiden on the trike, an activity that was new to me, stay too far back and you'll not get any assistance, get too close to the cassette in the middle of the rear axle and you'll be half-wheeling between the wheels. Aiden and Robbie would be setting the pace for most of the ride, pumping out the necessary speed so getting the hang of this was critical to staying on.

On the road

Although Good Friday is a Bank Holiday in England the roads were not as busy as I was expecting, the surfaces in Cumbria were fantastic but deteriorated as we entered Lancashire. We whizzed towards Lytham on flat or descending roads some of which I remembered from BGB. There weren't too many distractions from the task in hand, only the Cartford bridge and Singleton Fire Engine shed were if much interest to me along the way.





We had split the GPS route into the segments between controls which meant we could focus on each one individually, seeing there is 20km to go to Lytham is much nicer than 410km to York when you're thinking about Lytham and York is another 20 hours away, this also meant that when I was struggling I could only see how far until the next rest, ideal of the mental aspects of the ride.
As we rode into Lytham a 3-way roadwork light controls halted our progress briefly just before the control, however we were targeting a 25kmh average for this section and had exceeded 27kmh, a very good start to the day that we wanted to maintain, the schedule said we were to take a 30 minute break before setting off again.

Lunch Al Fresco at Lytham Booths

As part of ride preparation Steve had scoped out the café at Booths in advance and rejected it as a stop option due to service time.
So we raided the lunch food section of the supermarket instead, in the heat and with the effort expended already I wasn't thinking straight enough to work out the £3 meal deal so ended up spending double that instead on a Sweet Chilli Chicken wrap and a mince and pea Samosa. 
We sat out in the sun next to the bikes to eat, watch comedy parking and speak to some curious locals.



In what seemed like no time the 30 minutes were up and we set off again but had a longer delay at the traffic lights as we chose different methods of dodging round them, the one that involved pushing the bike across the active arm of the 3 way light sequence was the slowest, pushing along the pavement was fastest, but no-one thought to ride on the adjacent cycle track, although it was packed with pedestrians. Once past the blockage we were back out on the same roads we arrived on until Lancaster.
After Lancaster we turned inland and started to climb towards Kirkby Lonsdale, our pace was still as hot as the day was becoming and Paul dropped back from the front to suggest to Steve that we stop early at Devils Bridge.

Teal Bugatti Type 35, based on the Bugatti Type 35 race car

The roads were becoming more interesting both in terrain and what we were sharing them with, the warm weather bringing out classic cars including a Teal "Bugatti" Type 35 and lots of motorcyclists who had, along with many others congregated at the bridge where an Ice Cream van and a burger van had set up stall, curiously a man in full winter cycling kit spent the entire time we were there standing in the doorway of the burger van while we tried to eat our ice creams before they melted. 10 mins elapsed and we were back on the road heading for our next control at Sedberg, the road climbed gently along here with the odd bump and interesting roadside feature to distract from the relentless heat and pace.

Heading for Sedberg

We arrived at Sedberg about 45 minutes ahead of schedule and stopped at the Spar for the planned 30 minutes, I took another wrap this time Chicken Tikka, some coke and a pack of two lemon drizzle cakes, as I prepared to fill my water bottles up I realized I'd made a mistake and had only packed enough powder for 400km at my winter drinking rate of 750ml per 50km.
I was rapidly going through liquid due to the heat, I switched my drink plan, using a half portion in each bottle, as the stages were roughly 80km apart I reckoned this would suit and the lower dilution would make it easier to drink regularly with food than the normal mixture does.

Climbing Garsdale

The problem with starting on the North West coast of England is you have to get over the Pennines, our chosen route over to the Vale of York was to climb Garsdale and descend Wensleydale to our next control at Ripon; the schedule allowed for 19kmh arriving at 2200.
The road out of Sedberg towards Hawes was used in Paul's "Brant and Slape" a tough day out where this road was the start of a long descent towards Kendal that took us from being Full Value to comfortably in time. Robbie commented on the scenery, the descent although steady is fast enough for focus to be on the road not the surroundings, the climb gentle enough that you can look around you.

I've also been over this road before in the car, not long after I passed my driving test, Dad decided I should get "some" motorway driving practice and we set off at silly AM to drive to the Classic Car Show at the NEC in Birmingham.
Having spent all day driving motorways and visiting the SAAB Owners Club stand (Dad was chairman at the time) we set off home via Hawes where Dad wanted to scope out the caravan site as he fancied stopping there for our next family holiday the drop from 10 lane motorway to twisty 2 lane single carriageway resulted in us swapping seats in the car for the drive into Hawes before we switched back so I could drive us out to the A1 route home.

Climbing Garsdale

Garsdale is a good long climb with a couple of steep ramps, though these didn't trouble us much, and as a bonus the surroundings are pretty, just after Garsdalehead the viaduct came into view and as we passed under the Settle and Carlisle railway and into the East Riding of Yorkshire we also crossed the summit of Garsdale into Wensleydale, a short descent towards the Moorcock Inn where a Half Cab bus had stopped was followed by a stiff climb before we'd start to get the main benefits of the descent.

The Moorcock, soon we'll be descending

Descending Wensleydale

We were now over our only real hill of the day, the undulating descent of Wensleydale that we were pre-warned of was presented to us with the occasional steep ramp that briefly dropped our progress into single digits. I was suffering from the heat of the day with the first signs of a dehydration head-ache and the water I had was barely enough to get to Ripon at the drinking rate. We stopped at Wensley by the church to adjust our set-ups for the onset of night, warmers and lights were fitted to bodies and bikes in preparation, for now it was still warm and light but it wouldn't be by the time we got to Ripon.


I took the chance to take a pee but there wasn't much there adding to my dehydration concerns. We knew once the sun was gone it would get cold quickly, at 7pm we rode through Masham, past the Black Sheep Brewery with the temperature now down to 12c from the mid-twenties it had reached only an hour or so earlier.
We reached Ripon McDonald's in the cold dark at quarter to 9, 1 hour 15mins ahead of schedule, our average over the dale was 23kmh considerably better than the 19 that had been allowed for. 


Riders from a VC167 team were there nearing the end of their control rest there, Audaxers have a look about them so although were in a hodge podge of kit they identified straight off that we were riding the Arrow too, Aiden is a VC167 rider so he socialized with them most before they got on their way.

Brief stop at Wensley for a quick snack
and switch to night set ups

My dehydration concerns were proven but I didn't respond to this properly.
I bought a large bottle of water from the co-op garage to top up my bottles with while waiting for my McDonald's meal to arrive as it proved considerably cheaper, but I didn't take in enough extra during the stop.  I had a beef burger meal but stuck with a coke for the drink.
We stayed the planned 45 minutes, before cracking on for Selby, the big digs were behind us, the route a rolling descent into the flatlands, through the dark night, Knarseborough, Wetherby, Tadcaster and Cawood briefly punctuating the darkness, the odd boy racer darting past in a hurry to go nowhere.

Ripon McDonalds
Steve's on the Ice Cream

Selby McDonalds: 10 past midnight, 24kmh.Scheduled : 0215, 22kmh
We were building up a good time cushion, not that I knew it, this information I didn't need or want to know.
I get more proof that I'm dehydrated despite emptying 1.5L of liquid into me in less than 4 hours.
I tuck into another McDonalds meal, I go for a Chicken Legend this time, I'm struggling to eat it but I go back for a chocolate muffin because I know I need it, I really wanted an apple pie but didn't order it with the meal and need something quick to buy.
I have coke left in my cup that I can't drink now so I put it in one of the bottles, the cool air and impact of going so long means I'm getting into the territory of stopping for a pee every 5 minutes. I've hit this during 24hr MTB rides in the past, that's fine when riding solo with a good cushion but in a team that's aiming to press on I just have to ride with a filling bladder, it also doesn't help with hydration.



We spend 38 minutes stopped, but were only scheduled for 30, arguably we're slacking now.
It's flat, being able to draft another ride is critical on the flat, it can be the difference between battering along in Zone 4 at 25kmh and ticking along in Zone 2 at 40kmh. I'm tall for a cyclist.
In a sport that favours the those of shorter stature the problem with being tall is that you can't hide in other riders draft so well;

Ripon

I once entered the Etapé Loch Ness and spent the long flat A82 section along the loch leading a train of riders at a rapid pace towards Fort Augustus. I was flicking my elbow regularly begging someone to give me a break only to find no one coming though much to my irritation, I battered on for my own aim of a fast metric.
When we reached the climb up Glen Doe a mass of midgets split round me and disappeared into the distance as I struggled, grinding away in the granny ring.
I did however catch many of them on the descent back to Inverness, they all tagged on for the lift back to the finish. Only two of them thanked me for the tows at the end.

The other side of this coin does occasionally happen and on one Mukyz Club 100 mile road ride I was placed in the "fast" group with 6' 5" Mark in it, he led us most of the way round the route at a ridiculous rate and on arriving at the Vane Farm junction he was too knackered to stay on the front and I swapped places with him for the last leg back to Glenrothes, this is the only time I've ever seen the fabled 30bpm HR drop between being on the front and drafting.

Riding in the dying light of day

The ride to Scunthorpe was relatively speaking easy, the novelty of the flatness was difficult for me, I've never ridden only 90m of climb in 50km before, even my flat route at home records over 200m in 27km giving the odd easy descent section to rest between efforts. Although I was behind Robbie or Aiden most of the way I was feeling the South Easterly on my head so I wasn't getting full advantage of the draft and shelter. I tried to get low enough on the bike to stay in the void punched into the air in front of me but my belly got in the way, I also can't cover the brakes from the drops well thanks to the same issue that means Lisa Simpson will never be a Professional Saxamophone player, in a group you need to be covering your brakes.

Night Riding

As we hurtled through the darkness in the distance Drax lit up the sky, capable of feeding up to 4MW of electricity into the National Grid, it's a reminder that in some parts of the world Coal is still King though now only a backup power source for when Nuclear and Renewables can't cope, the England and Wales grid is on a record run of days without using this backup, since closing Longannet there is no coal based generation at all, any from Drax or Fiddlers Ferry would be labelled as "Imported".

At the road side a sign proclaims that we've left Yorkshire and entered Lincolnshire, we start to cross many bridges.  The roads are long, flat and straight, more over-tuned hot hatches blast past, their engine lives and suitability reduced by race level tuning, the whiff of over rich exhaust gasses perfume the air as a Fiesta flies past with it's exhaust crackling with a fuel mix best described as excessive. Whoever set these cars up must have failed Tuning 101, unburnt fuel doesn't equate to more oomph.

Scunthorpe McDonalds
I can't face another burger

Scunthorpe McDonalds: 0232;
Scheduled Time: 0415

We've been 22 minutes slower than scheduled, despite this we're still well ahead of schedule.
I can't face another burger, I've had beef and I've had chicken, I forget about the Fillet O' Fish option, doesn't everyone?

Aiden is trying to convince the manager to let him buy a pot of porridge, unlike at previous stops where the request has been granted it's not happening this time. I can only face a punnet of fries and Apple pie, however I've got my hydration back to a satisfactory state at last.


Paul presses us on into the darkness, it's another short flat run now, only 40km to Goole but I'm approaching my natural sleep time and the yawns are concerning. 
We set out at 0310, if I'm up late this is the time I'm usually asleep by, I can feel I'm going to struggle until daylight.
Robbie however isn't suffering from the dozies at all this time and I can see he's still going strong.

Bridge in Wensleydale near Middleham

We ride back out of town the way we came in before splitting for Crowle, ahead we spot the unmistakable sight of a mass of rear bike lights.  I perceive a quickening of the pace as we ride up the gentle hill into the town, in the centre we hurtle past what appears to be two teams worth of riders moving slowly.
A brief pee stop just out of town and I'm convinced I can see their lights coming up the road behind, forgetting it's a long flat straight and they could be a mile or more away I wonder if they'll catch us.  There isn't much to do along here other than hang on to the group, any sights of interest hidden by the darkness of night.

The 'umber bridge lights up the sky in the distance as we ride through the marshes between the Trent and Ouse, we reach the Don on the way into Goole, the teams we passed haven't caught us.
I could say the river here is a bit like the Danube in Vienna, it's been split into a river and a canal, but that's all it has in common with Wien.
We cross the two lifting bridges and enter town.  The GPS route tells us to go right at a junction, Paul, navigating off a route sheet is convinced it should be left. We go right and leave Goole reaching a junction that we shouldn't be at yet.  A quick discussion and we work out the fastest route to the services, we've wasted distance and nearly missed the control, the route we take is the one we would have taken to get to the junction from the services, we'll soon be back here.

Garsdalehead Viaduct on the Settle and Carlisle line

We go to the Spar in the petrol station, the McDonalds "dingied" this time of which I'm thankful as I really can't face another McDonald's and it's too early for the breakfast menu to inject some variety.
Robbie and Aiden want to use facilities which aren't present in the petrol station and end up there anyway, they return reporting about 6 teams worth of riders splashed out, sleeping or eating.
It's 0440 and we're now 37km from York.  The teams sleeping here will almost certainly sleep to 6am and then ride the 37km to York in the last 2 hours in order to meet the 25km requirement. I can hardly face eating anything,

I stagger around the aisles of the Petrol Station Spar looking for something that I'm willing to eat and leave with a water bottle top up, a bottle of cherry coke that mostly went in the water bottle and a couple of bars of chocolate.  This was a mistake.

The sky starts to lighten

We ride out of Goole Services, Steve and Paul are on the back as Aiden and Robbie take turns on the front, I'm hanging on between them as best I can.  The discussion behind me is about the route to take to extend. In front of me there is no discussion, the locomotives of the team continue their pedal mashing.

We've got 4 hours to go, and in the last 2 we must do 25km, there's no way we're slowing to a crawl for 2 hours.  Steve and Paul have scoped out routes in advance and know exactly where we'll get a photo for the 22hr control that'll also show the start of our extension leg.

Dawn at last
A cold mist hangs on the fields and in the dips in the road
Chilling us to the bone as we drop
Warming us as we rise

It's still dark but I can see the darkness of night lifting from the sky, the dark blue of night slowly lightening. As we roll into dips where the cold air is trapped, we#re chilled to the bone despite the warmer night wear, it's probably below freezing at the bottom. Climbing out of the dips we feel the temperature rise significantly only to repeat the process as we go.
The sun rises while a light mist envelopes us, hanging low over the fields and road.
We cross the York bypass and enter Fulford just before 0620, it's only 3km to York City Centre but this is our 22hr control, originally planned for Goole at 0630, we're 34km ahead of schedule.

Riding into the daylight

We have 2hrs 40mins for our extension of 45km to Sherburn in Elmet and back; I have no idea it's this long not the route on my Wahoo but I'm told there's shops at the turn and thanks to my fueling error at Goole I need them, Gels have to do the job for now.

I'm at my most tired, despite the strengthening daylight, I try to hang onto Aiden, Robbie's behind me, I'm struggling to keep in line with the cassette on the trike, my tired eyes make me feel like I'm bouncing between his wheels, fearing it's going to go wrong I drop back, swing out and ask Robbie to go in front, thankfully I can hold his wheel better in this state.

The road looks and feels like it's a perpetual 1% gradient, the world is getting brighter and warmer all the time. A swing bridge appears ahead in a town whose name I recognize but in my tired state I can't think why, I'm sure we've been through a Cawood already as we cross our earlier route at a cross roads. I don't see much more than the wheel in front and the road seemingly rising ahead, I need to focus on them to keep going.
A town starts suddenly with an industrial estate, Paul shouts to turn left at the lights and pick a shop, Spar or Tesco.  I've not even made it off the bike at the Spar before Robbie exists and crosses the road to Tesco, the words "15 minutes for hot baked foods" was mentioned in the process. 
I wander through Tesco, tired not quite figuring out what I want, there's no baked goods here either, I coudl go a sausage roll. I spy a pack of two Cream Slices, Robbie reminds me I need to be careful with Dairy, I tell him that right now I don't care, they'll get me to the finish even if I'm doubled in pain on the train

Crossing The Swing Bridge in Cawood

We're ready to set off before 0740, there 25km to go until breakfast and we have 1hr 20mins to do it in.
It's mostly down hill, the sun is up, the Cream Slices have given me an epic sugar high and I've got a bottle of Cherry Coke as well as energy drink to top up the sugar rush, both with added Caffeine.
Suddenly I'm awake again.  We're riding faster than on the way out, back through Cawood and over the bridge, past York Marina, and we're back at Fulford, we've got 23 minutes to do the last 3km, the last hours happened so fast I can hardly believe it was that long.

One of the VC167 teams

The into York feels like a gentle descent, it's early enough that there isn't too much traffic, I don't know this road or how far there is to go. Suddenly Paul's taken the lead and indicates a tiny gap in the central reserve that allows us to turn onto Picadilly, before I know where I am, I'm trying to figure out how to fit my bike into a space amongst a mass of other bikes without blocking a door in the pub's courtyard.
We've arrived with 20 minutes to spare, time enough to get breakfast ordered for that critical final piece of brevidence.




The pub is heaving with cyclists in various states of knackeredness, although some are looking surprisingly fresh, others clearly show signs of a day and night on the bike.
I still can't face a full meal, so opt for pancakes instead of the cooked breakfast that everyone else tucks into, I'll get my fry up later.

3/5th of Equipe Stravaiging with Robbie

It was an utterly epic ride, a cracking route for making progress while still having scenic interest.

Thanks to Steve and Paul for letting me be on their team, designing the route, setting the schedule (which we smashed) and keeping me going when I was struggling mainly by sitting behind me to make sure I didn't drift back and by reminding me to stay on the wheel. Aiden and Robbie did a fantastic job smashing that pace out all day and night.




It's been so long since I rode in a group, and so long since I set out to ride in a group that I wasn't sure I could ride at group pace at all, my normal Audax pace and strategy being around 20kmh and just letting groups go by riding at my own pace.
This ride really opened my eyes to what I'm capable of; I used to be able to push 25 to 30kmh moving averages on shorter routes but had thought I'd lost it with spending so much time pootling along.
Clearly it's still there I just need to dig it out.

Finished in time for Breakfast

We won't know exactly how we or others did until validations come through later in the year, we rode 477km on the road; our declared distance before extension was 426km, and we think we should get the full 45km for the extension as it appears to be the shortest route, making 471km.
Not bad, Eh!

Total Distance Ridden: 477.6Km
Time Taken: 23:40
Average Speed: 20.18Kmh
Moving Time: 19:30
Moving Average: 24.5Kmh
Estimated Energy Used: 13432Kcal