Dave Lloyd Mega Challenge

227km and 5416m of altitude gain, add some downpours and headwind and you've got the Dave Lloyd Mega Challenge in North Wales.

Catching some early starters at World's End. Click on the picture to enjoy the scenery, and note the road in the distance.

The Manchester Wheelers train cruising on a rare section of flat road.

Mountain Mayhem

What an experience! The funny sight of 600 bikers in cycling kit running in the Le Mans start, the team effort, the little moving lights scattered over the hillsides at night, the atmosphere around the start/finish area, all night long, the cheering for the solo riders disappearing into the dark night for yet another lap... 24 hour mtb racing is tough, especially when the weather turns nasty at 2am, but such a thrill!

Our "Manchester Mixed Bag" mixed team (Jerry, Viv, Mick, Harsharn and myself) did rather well, with a 16th place out of 146 teams. We'll be back for that top 10 spot!

Agenda

For the coming weeks, highlights will be a 25 mile 4UP team time trial with the Manchester Wheelers in Warrington. My team mates manage sub-hour times doing this distance solo (i.e. above 40 km/h average), so I'll be the weakest link. I guess I'll just try to hang on.
The weekend after that, I may have a spot on a Mountain Mayhem team. That's 24hours of continuous mtbiking, from saturday noon till sunday noon, in teams of 5 riders. Especially the dark hours will be interesting...

Marin Rough Ride

I did my first ever mtb marathon the past weekend. Race of choice was the Marin Rough Ride in South Wales. The course was 80 km long, with about 7000 feet of climbing, mostly on grassy moorland. It took me 5h10m33s, good for 16th place out of 360 riders riding the long distance (880 participants in total). My new bike performs brilliantly!