I'd love you to sponsor me for the Argus 109 km cycle challenge around the which I have recently completed!

The reason for my back pedalling is that before the race I was not clear what I wanted to raise funds. The following week I travelled with Khulisa, a crime prevention organisation, into some more rural parts of South Africa, and was inspired by a community development in Hammanskraal which is a district 50km North of Pretoria where they're supporting an extraordinary range of projects including;

a crèche in a very remote village, a shelter for 45 parentless children, a brick building project, HIV/Aids peer education in a secondary school, au ubuntu (community) club for unemployed youths, a football club for grannies, and on the drawing board are an internet cafe and recycling plant. 

The limiting factor to these developments seems to be transportation because distances are significant and there is no reliable public transport. The staff take the communal taxi vans but they're expensive and take an inordinate amount of time, as they only leave once the van is full. 

Hence my goal is now is to raise funds to buy Zain, and his team, a minivan with a tow bar, and potentially a trailer, so that the Khulisa team in Hammanskraal can operate more efficiently and do even more with their scarce resources. I want to do this now because during the world cup all children in will be off school for 5 weeks which is a particular problem in the rural areas. If they have transportation Khulisa would be able to run more programmes during this forced holiday.

So what have I done to deserve your sponsorship? I cycled 109km in the heat and wind on a very hilly course around the . 

If you want more about the course here's a link to the profile of the course and a map of the course.  

Do watch the video link above which Simon took and captures the awesome scenery and gives you a sense of how windy it was.  

And here are some of my reflections from my cycle tour;

One of the more scary moments was coming across baboon on a hill climb. They were big guys sitting feeding on the remains of the gel packets deposited in the road. I was immediately worried that they'd smell my food supply and knock me off my bike so I pedalled furiously on to the top of the hill. Then we came to the BARONE pit stop and found trays of mars bars being offered by scantily glad ladies, much to the boys delight. From there we crossed inland and had an exhilarating ride freewheeling down hill with the wind on our backs. I was going 58km/hour, the fastest that I've been on a bike, and tandems were roaring past me.

Reaching the East coast I remember the sound of the waves crashing against the rocks as we rode through Misty bay. It was awesome. Then we stopped and fuelled up on bananas and yet more ghastly poweraid. 75km down, we headed off in trepidation with the infamous Chapman's Peak just around the corner. Simon was slightly ahead of me so I tried to catch him up but something didn't feel quite right. And a second later my chain snapped and I'd lost Simon in the throng of bicycles. I shouted forlornly into the crowd. No response. I was on my own, penniless and with a broken bike. Rather fortunately a friendly bp jersey directed me to the bike repairs. I walked back and found a mechanic who fixed my chain and I left with an IOU for 25 rand.

Around the next bend was Chapman's Peak which we'd scouted the previous day in a car. It's a 250m climb over 5km. Happily the mighty Chapman's Peak was not so bad after all. As I started to climb I seemed to be in the fast lane which felt great. Undoubtedly inspired by the views out across the I kept a steady pace all the way to the top. Well, not quite the top because with just a few metres to go I was blown against the cliff face! A huge gust of wind was funnelled between the cliff and an outlying rock and it flattened the two cyclists next to me. I was ok as happily I was on the inner edge and put an arm out to the rock wall as I desperately tried to unclip my cleats.  

I'd worn the only cycling top I have, which has a huge bp helios logo on, which I'd worn for my only other cycle race, the to , many years ago. It proved a great choice as on the hills I heard many voices shouting "come on BP".

The Argus is a truly amazing experience that I'd recommend to you to all.

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