Each year in the UK over 37,000 men are diagnosed with a male-specific cancer.  In 2010, I was one of them.  

 

Following my treatment last year (which appears to have been successful), I took part in the 44 mile OrchidCycle New Forest bike event in September 2011, and  raised over £1,800 for the charity. 

 

This year I have continued to raise money for Orchid by taking part in the 100 mile "Wiggle New Forest 100 Sportive" event on 7th October 2012.  (http://www.ukcyclingevents.co.uk/events/wiggle-new-forest-100-sunday-sportive-2012/)

 

This was my first "Century" bike ride and required some serious training time in the saddle beforehand. 

Over the course of the year leading up to this event I took part in increasingly long "sportive" events to act as "milestones" in my training: the Wiggle New Forest Spring Sportive in April (57 miles), the Wiggle Bournemouth Sportive in May (75 miles), and the New Forest Rattler in August (80 miles).

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Thank you.

 

--- Progress Updates ---

April: 

Wiggle Spring Sportive (57 miles): Gold time achieved (3h 21m)
Also took part in a 10 mile time-trial in Brockenhurst (New Forest Cycling Club) - nearly managed "evens", recording 30m 15s.

May:

Wiggle Bournemouth Sportive (75 miles): Silver time achieved (4h 44mins), 15.7mph, nearly a Gold (16 mph). 

July:

Not so many long rides (a couple of 40-milers) but I am getting out a few lunchtimes a week for half-hour/10-mile-or-so blasts around the local Bournemouth roads.

August:

New Forest Rattler (80 miles); completed this in 4h38m, slightly quicker than my target of 4h45m. The final hill (short but 1-in-4) was a bit tough - quads in both legs were cramping up, so it was a definite case of "Shut Up Legs" for a 20mph final couple of miles.

September / October:

Lots of short 10-mile rides in early September, but no long rides.  Last 2 weeks of Sept I was on holiday and the only cycling I did was on an electric bike in Seville! (Don't think that counts...).

- - - - - - -  7th October  - - - - - - - -

Alarm was set for 6.30am; woke-up at 5.15, couldn't get back to sleep so had an early brekkie, left the house at 7am (lovely sunrise across the forest, with a light patchy mist), and arrived at a bright but chilly Brockenhurst College at 7.30, which was already a hive of activity. Got myself registered, collecting my free pack of MaxiFuel stuff, and finally got underway at 8.26.

The first section to Lyndhurst is fairly flat, so a reasonable amount of ground is covered quite quickly.  The first feedstation was the otherside of Ashurst, at which I refilled one of my bottles with MaxiFuel, downed a flapjack and pocketed a cereal bar for later.  I spent a bit longer than planned at this stop while I helped someone out who had not got the right map on them.

The easy stage done, now there was a bit of climbing up into the Forest, and it was nice to see the wife, the brother-in-law and family at the top of Shepherd's Gutter to cheer me on.  The sun had disappeared into the fog and as I turned right at the "Epic/Standard" split-point everyone else seemed to turn left; ah the loneliness of the long-distance cyclist...

The second feedstation was up at the northerly end of the route at Lockerley, as we headed west towards Salisbury.  I hadn't drunk enough at this point, and still had nearly full bottles.  Whoops.  I paid for this shortly after when a quad or two in both legs started cramping up.  An emergency banana, cereal bar and energy-drink were consumed in the hope this might remedy the situation; while it did help, the rest of the ride was all about controlling the cramping quads, so my average speed did take a turn for the worse at this point.  I was concentrating now on cycling at high cadence (100rpm+) to minimise the damage.

A fast run into Godshill (it is slightly downhill but doesn't look ike it so is very good for morale!) was followed by a climb up the mercifully-short but painfully-steep 1-in-4 Blissford Hill.  Feedstation 3 was on the easy section down to Moyles Court, although the legs still weren't 100% so I did have to curb my enthusiasm to go fast.

The climb up past High Corner Inn and the subsequent climb from the A31 to the Canada memorial was reasonably pain-free, and the relatively easy forested ride down Bolderwood, across the A35 and down Rhinefield Drive was done at a reasonable pace.

Then it was time to bounce off the outskirts of Brockenhurst and out the west side, the climb out onto the forest was moderately-slow but the mobile-fan-club at the top of the hill cheering me on helped.  From here there was just one more climb towards Sway, a drag down to the New Milton road, under the railway and back into Brockenhurst.

Considering the "leg" problems I experienced on the entire second half of the ride I am very happy to have completed the ride in a "silver-time" 6 hours 44 minutes, more or less matching the target I set myself.