www.dadswell.co.uk Mostly cycling records, mostly on three wheels
You won't catch this Bus !
Sept 2002
Months ago, Dave Johnson had said that he was prepared to ride the
Icknield Road Club 12 hour on the tandem tricycle (with me!). In
many ways, it had actually been his idea. I'd mentioned that I'd
like to do it, but it was definitely him who said "National Champs 12
hour on 18th August, followed by taking the tandem trike around the
Icknield 12 two weeks later". It took me no time at all to accept
the offer, and it was penned into the diary.
Therefore, with four weeks to go, I was quite alarmed to hear that he
didn't think he could do it after all. We had a phone call with
lots of long pauses, deep breaths, and general uncomfortableness.
We agreed that he would "think about it". Thankfully, he decided
to give it a go. A good thing really, as I wasn't looking forward
to smashing all the windows in his house. It would have put our
friendship under stress, I suspect.
We
rode the Championship 12 hour on solo machines, with Dave taking an
exceptional 5th place, and me getting 16th on my tricycle. All we
had to do was recover. I also had to repair the damage done to the
tandem when we had previously ridden it. With a week to go the
transmission had been rebuilt, and the only problem was one jumping
gear, which I made a hurried effort to sort out.
We
started last, at 7:04 on Sunday 1st September. Certain members of
my family felt that it was inappropriate to do a race on my son's second
birthday, but I checked with Henry and he said it was okay as long as he
got his presents a day early. Conditions were good (although Dave
was uncontrollably shivering for the first few miles). We held our
schedule at the first check, and were a couple of minutes ahead at the
next.
The
record for "two blokes and three wheels" was 257.47 miles. I had
previously had a share in the record, as Gerry Lewis and I had clocked
251.25 m in 1997. We'd done this despite changing a puncture,
riding 5 miles on a flat, and then losing 10 minutes with a
potentially 'terminal' mechanical problem. Add to this the fact that
Liz Milne and I had ridden 258.26m for the 'mixed' record, and you can
see why I felt confident that I could retake the men's record.
After much thought, I decided that Dave and I should target 275m, and so
a schedule was devised ....
We
were moving really well. At one point, when we were clocking over
30mph on the flat, Dave commented "this is almost embarrassing ...",
because things just seemed so easy. We went through 50 miles
in 1 hour 53 mins, which was about 6 minutes faster than scheduled for.
Were we trying too hard? We had to hope not.
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The
first 80 miles were on the A1, which is usually quite a fast road.
Things then became a little more difficult when we moved east, and onto
rougher stuff. That said, we still went through 100 miles in 3
hours 55 mins, so hadn't slowed up much. We were very much in
touch with the best of the riders in the solo event - Gethin Butler and
Ian Cammish were only a few minutes ahead.
We
then started the first lap of a 15 mile circuit. We were beginning
to notice a breeze, which was an irritation at times. However, we
held a seven minute advantage over schedule for the next few hours.
150 miles passed in 6 hours 9 mins, but by about 7 hours Dave was
beginning to complain a bit. We had started to use lower gears
after the first few hours (not least because I hadn't managed to fix
that jumping gear!), and now we were seeming to slow down.
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Curiously, however, we were still hanging onto our advantage. At
the end of our fourth lap, the normal course was to head back west
.... but any riders expected to beat 275 miles were sent on an extra
lap. Dave was hoping to avoid this little "bonus", but he was
disappointed, and so we ground our way around for a fifth time.
The
standard fix for someone wilting in a 12 hour is to eat some food, drink
plenty, and "concentrate on the pedalling". Eventually, you feel
better (or the time runs out!). As we returned to
Biggleswade, Dave was brightening up again, but we were down to just a
five minute advantage on the schedule at the 200 mile point (8 hours 25
mins).
The
next sections were a couple of detours near Bedford, and we were riding
much better there. We dragged ourselves up to a 10 minute
advantage, but were back to 8 when we started the Finishing Circuit at
235 miles. We had taken a 'natural break' at 101 miles, and took
another at 243 miles. As a result, we completed the first lap with
a five minute advantage.
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For
the first time, I felt confident enough to predict that our final
mileage would be above 275. Until then, there was plenty of scope
for things to crack up, like they had done for one of the other tandem
pairings, who had started quite quickly, but were last seen travelling
at about 10 mph after about 160 miles.
We
rode a solid second lap, and had 36 minutes remaining when we started
our third lap with 265.6 on the clock. We rode past the Event HQ
with about 90 seconds remaining, having covered over 277 miles.
And then we collapsed. Suddenly, we had nothing left.
But
we had to continue to the next timekeeper after our time expired.
We were around the twisting bends at Jordan's Mill, and were over the
narrow bridge when the 12 hours came up. There was then an uphill
section before a couple of right turns. The marshals had gone home
rather prematurely (Paul and Nikki, you know who you are!), but we knew
where to go. Then there was a rough stretch with a sharp
bend before you could see the timekeeper.
Except we couldn't ! There had been a clear sign on previous laps,
but suddenly it wasn't there. There were some cars, but no sign
denoting a timekeeper. I continued, believing that it would be
around the next bend (I've been deluded before, you know!). But
there was nothing there, so we decided to cut our losses and retrace.
We were, after all, over 3 minutes past our limit, and completely
knackered.
Luckily, the timekeeper had actually been sitting in his car preparing
to leave, and so by chance was able to record our time. I have a
feeling, though, that if Tim (our backup / feeder / mechanic) hadn't
stopped the car and alerted him..... well, who knows? But anyway,
we were grateful to get an official time and hence credit for the last
mile or so before 7:04 pm.
Back at the HQ things were a bit of a blur, and for a while we were
credited with almost 279 miles. However, when the calculations
were checked, we ended up with 277.92, which is just over 20 miles in
excess of the previous mark. It's fair to say that we're pretty
happy with that.