DEAN IS TEMPTED BY THE DARK SIDE

A bright dry evening saw Dean on his new hard tail, Andy J who’s always got something new, Jim on his Stunt jumper and me Tom on my retro hard tail, leave Sainsbury’s towards Cawston Woods and Potsford Dam on a couple of untried paths.

The speed as usual for a Tuesday was relentless as we tried to get 20 miles in before we lost the sun, Jim had bought a couple of sets of hi powered lights to try out and was gutted we got round without giving them a go!

Up to Lawford Heath and a blast along the lanes to the bridle path to the Fosse and then road to Stretton, this is where Dean’s problems started as we got on the path which leads towards Mitchell’s he swapped bikes with Jim.

As I know if you ride a hard tail, once you have tried a full susser the smoothness as the rear end glides over the bumps draws you over to the dark side, it can only lead to more expense firstly on more magazines, then fuel as you visit more and more bike shops followed by the inevitable big purchase, yes Dean we are both on the slippery slope!

Trans 41 and the meadow lead us back to Thurlaston and via Half Way Lane into Dunchurch where Dean and Andy spit off to home leaving Jim and I to head back to the cars.

Great weather and route for the time we had and good banter as usual.

I know Andy is looking to go to the Peaks this Sunday if any of you are interested in joining us.

Tom



We were riding along in woods at Brandon when it happened. Stuart pulled out to overtake Martin on the trail, struck an obliquely-positioned log that was hidden in vegetation, and the rest as they say is history. Most of it medical.

Stuart – front wheel taken out - piled into Martin. The pair of them went down heavily, bodies and bikes skidding along the mud and gravel path. The ride stopped. Martin rose. Stuart just lay in the nettles – ashen, shaking with pain, unable to stand.  He was silent, on the point of passing out, clutching his left arm.

“It’s my shouder,” he was able to say eventually, “It’s dislocated. I’ve had surgery on them both for the same problem.”

Mark called for an ambulance. He and James rode off to guide it into the wood.

After about ten minutes Stuart was able to rise to his feet. We made a sling from an inner-tube and he walked slowly towards the chicken farm to meet the ambulance.

Martin, Mandy and I looked at the bike – the brake-lever wouldn’t clear the top tube to release the handlebars from their twisted and locked position. I took out an allen key and slackened the bolt, so the bike could be wheeled.

Ann, Stuart’s wife, came to collect his bike. As we loaded it into the car she said matter-of-factly, “We’ve been here before”. She went off to see the ambulance crew, who were administering strong analgesics to the casualty before taking him off to A & E at Walsgrave.

* * *

What else was there to do? What else but have a cup of tea. We tootled off at a sedate pace to the café in Coombe Abbey.

Shortly after we'd sat down the wind increased and it rained. The external part of the café had a roof to give us shelter. While we waited for the rain to abate we discussed Giant Anthems (Mark has just built one up and likes it), the Alps (Martin and Mandy have just got back from some fantastic mountainbiking there) and whether one speedy person amongst us (James-the-whippet) should consider joining a competitive club in addition to ours.

Sadly, the rain did not abate. But time and tide wait for no man (or person, if you prefer) – and nor does Sunday lunch. A mere sausage roll or so later it was time to go - into a torrential downpour. Happily for Dean he had a waterproof. Unhappily for me it was mine. We rode off into the windy wetness.

By now I was acutely sensitive to cooking-aromas. In that no-man’s – no person’s - land that lies between Brandon and Wolston I thought I caught a whiff of traditional Great British tandoori chicken. It would probably be a half-chicken, I decided. Did these wonderful things start off as half an egg? Clearly, I was beginning to get hungry and was losing the plot. I speculated - as I am given at times like this - about the practicalities of our downhill trifle-eating contest. I stretched back and hauled a vaguely restorative something from a sodden pocket. It was disappointingly bananary. I wondered how you could tandoori a banana.

We whirred through Stretton, up Knob Hill, and took the bridleway through to Bourton. From there it was one our usual returns into Rugby through Thurlaston and into Dunchurch, where we split.

* * *

I had a chat with Stuart at about 4pm – he’d had to wait hours in the hospital until an orthopaedic doctor could be found to examine and treat him. There was a complex dislocation with an accompanying fracture. Ann told me that she was trying to get him to take up chess.

Stuart will be off his bike for a few weeks. I’m sure everyone would like to join me in wishing him a speedy recovery.

Pete

Miles: 26

Punctures: 0

999 call-outs: 1

Andy J (a l'Orange), Tom and Pete showed up and had the best of the day romping around tracks south of Rugby. There was an element of cheeky trailing, which took us nearly to Willoughby, and a gated road previously unridden by Tom and Andy.

The road led to Wolfamcote and then we took a bridleway ajacent to the Leam.

From here it was all hills to Hellidon. We braved cows and... "And, Tom, I think that's a..." a bull. Happily for us said bull was a knackered-looking specimen. Just as well, because we had to shift it out of our way.  

When we arrived at Lower Shuckburgh we laned it back to Woolscott. Tom - unable to face the climb up the bridlepath to Ashlawn Road - wisely decided to return to Dunchurch on the A45. Andy and I slogged it out. I was spotting mushrooms. Andy didn't care, just pedalled. Considering he'd eaten little but junk food the day before, had been to the pub that night and then toddled off somewhere else and got in at 3am he was in horribly good form.

It just ain't a fair ol' worl'!

Pete

Miles:  25

Punctures: 2

The Tuesday night thrash saw Stuart D, the irrepressible Andy J, Pete and the two whippets Joe and James set off in steady rain.

We dropped from Toft onto the Draycote perimeter road, where the fast pace was set by James - with Stuart on his wheel.

The ride continued relentlessly to Birdingbury bridge, which we descended in slippery conditions, before the drawn-out climb into Frankton.

The fast and loose descent from the end of the lane brought us to beneath Windmill Hill, where we picked up the Oxford Road and stormed through Marton.

The ride sped along the old railway line to Hunningham Bridge, for the most part dodging around large puddles, sometimes ploughing right through them. We caught our breath before shooting off down the overgrown branch line towards Long Itchington.

This was followed by a high-speed chase along the canal towpath, up to Stockton top lock. From The Boat we headed towards Birdingbury, but turned right at the first cross roads to bring us to a bridleway to Leamington Hastings.

We then roaded it through Hill and took the Southam Road home, doing a version of bit-n-bit, which turned into bit-n-a-bit-more until the pace grew so high that even Joe dropped off the back for a while.

Finally, we made it to Draycote Water. James fixed a puncture and we headed home in the dark.

Stuart noted that it won't be long before basic LED lights will no longer be sufficient and that  will need proper night-riding headlamps.

Pete

Miles: about 22

Punctures: 1

[Editorial note: Our good friend Barrie felt complelled to share his wisdom in the form of three top tips. These preceed his account of today's cycle ride]

Top tip 1

Do not be too over enthusiastic when applying silicone polish to your pride and joy, as it may have an adverse effect on your brakes’ performance.

Top tip 2

Do not ride half asleep when the Old Biddy Brigade are starting to venture out on their mobility scooters.

Top tip 3

Do not combine top tip1 and 2 on the Dunchurch cycle path unless you want to have an in-depth conversation about anti-social bikers going too fast on foot paths and having no respect for their elders.

In my defence, M’Lud, I did not hit the scooter that hard. She was on the wrong side of the path. I did shout to tell her I was coming past (and as I am approaching a landmark birthday very soon I was also looking at the make and model of said scooter!)

___________________

The ride on Sat. was wet to start with, but still warm. Two keen mtbers and myself set off  to the Leamington Pump Rooms for cake and coffee.

It was a fairly uneventful first hour, with the rain cooling our sweating bodies. I quickly realised that - having not been out for a few weeks due to work and family commitments - my legs and lungs no longer worked in tandem.

Just before we hit the Green Way, I noticed Pete jump off his bike behind me. I did a quick u turn to find him lying flat out on the floor staring under a gate.

Three thoughts came quickly into my mind:

Who is hiding from?

Is he knackered from climbing the last hill?

Should I rob him?

And, er - oh yes - is he all right? (This last was, I admit, very much an after-thought.)

But all was well with Pete. He had spotted - wait for it - a

mushroom!

So, as fascinating as this fungus might have been, we moved quickly on to the more sensible coffee and cake and said no more about it.

We returned back along the Green Way and old railway into Rugby. Rain stopped Pete’s mushroom-watching. Joe waited for me at all the right places. All was well with the world.

See you soon,

Barrie

Miles: 32

Punctures: 0

We were at Ryton Pools – five of us; Rom, Alan, Phil, Graham and me, Pete. There had been a couple of other mountain bikers there when we arrived – rufty-tufty, gruff-looking, weather-beaten types on very serious machinery (a blue top-end Yeti and something similarly exotic). If they returned acknowledgement it was a nod too subtle for me. They immediately  left to continue the Battle with Nature (red in tooth and claw, don’t'cha know) and pursue the goal of ultimate engrizzlement.  

Over tea and coffee we chatted away.

“My lad’s off climbing in the Alps.”

“Mine’s just come back from Everest.”

“Top that!” says Phil. “Next week mine’s  off to the Moon!”

Everest looked down and fibbed, “All right. I admit it. I don’t have a kid.”

“Nor me.”

“Me neither.”

Two people, adjacent, looked uncertainly at each other.

“Last time I was here,” said Graham, “I got into a fight…”

* * *

It was a lovely morning – somewhere between late summer and early autumn.  Recent rain and, now, bright sun had brought up the first mushrooms.  At Ryton a buzzard wheeled overhead.

* * *

What else happened? Rom, it seems was the flavour of the day. By that I mean that a spotty dog almost bit him near Frankton. It had been pulled back by its long lead at the moment just before its jaws snapped shut on the Gallic shin.

Then, a little later, as Rom and I rode back along the Ashlawn cutting, he suddenly accelerated like crazy. A sprinting labradoodle had him in its sights.  It wasn’t interested in me in the slightest – probably thought that the much younger Rom was better meat. Age, it seems, does have some advantages.

Now, where did I put my glasses…

And the buzzard - that went hungry.

Pete

Miles: 24

Punctures: 1

I studied Mad Andy J’s machine as he rode along. Just about everytime I’ve been out there has been something fancy and new – usually blue – contrasting against the orange of his new Orange. The carbon bars and blue Hope floating rotors were proud recent additions. Tonight, however, nothing was obvious. I asked the question and back came the reply:

“Saddle. I’m trying to get used to it. Feels like a cross between a Biro and a razor-blade.”

“So it marks you up and carries out an automated vasectomy…”

Andy winced. He lifted himself up onto his pedals.

I had a squint at the new throne. I had never seen anything like it on a bike. “That’s not a saddle, Andy, that’s a suppository!”

* * *

I didn’t quite know where we were. What’s more I didn’t really care. Vaguely – Marton. We had just ridden through one of those farms where there’s a sign saying that the bridleway is a dead-end and finishes at the parish boundary. Historically, I suppose, people – peasants, naturally, perhaps starving, scouring the hedgerows for a forbidden berry or two - would have dragged their wretched bodies up to this virtual line and, fearing the blunderbuss, turned back for the safety of their dripping hovels. Nonsense of course: the right of way would have gone all the way through to a settlement or road. Anyway I was glad we had ignored the prohibition, because this landowner’s denial of access is clearly overbearing and needs a challenge. Grid ref please someone.

The reason for not knowing quite where I was was due to the mental confusion associated with being just a tad knacked.  The ride had shot off at a good clip, and then, for good measure, added extra speed.  My principle concern was minimising my own suffering, which, as we were some miles from home, I imagined might increase. Horribly, and soon. I was not wrong.

At some point on this lunatic thrash we ascended the towpath adjacent to the flight of locks up to The Boat. Then the ride whirred along the Southam Road to join a bridleway leading into Leamington Hastings. The first of the lights were switched on. A red sun hung low under dark cloud.

As it happened, the farmer had ploughed the path, leaving eighteen inches – plus-or-minus eighteen inches in places - of rough turf to ride, alongside the thorny hedge which he had just shredded. Most people were forced to abandon riding at some point.

In the next, grassy, field came the inevitable cry of, “Puncture!”.

The sun plopped below the horizon. A breeze got up. Riders pulled on jackets.

We looked at our machines. Thorns studded tyres like cloves in a Christmas orange. As people pulled at bits of twig, so their tyres deflated.  It was an inner-tube massacre.

Mad Andy J was the last to be pumping up. But the tyre didn’t inflate. It was one of those handy pre-punctured tubes that  – at some point or another (usually when knackered, it’s dark, the rain is pissing down, it’s freezing cold etc etc) - we all carry about with us and then fit. He borrowed a new tube and changed it again.

Then the ride charged off into the gloom, over the fields, onto lanes, onto the Southam Road. It was a time-trial now. A road-train. A bash. Sane Andy J got dropped. We waited. Gordon had another puncture. He decided to pump it. Off again. Faster.  This time I got dropped.

Eventually, we met up again at the top of Windmill Lane to say goodbye, split, and go our separate ways.  It had been a good, if demanding, ride.

Pete

Miles: Too many (about 22)

Punctures: about 8

Pace: Off a shovel

Riders: Gordon, Mad Andy J, Sane Andy J, Stuart D, John-the-Derby-Roadie, Flapjack Tom, Bridlepathpete, Daventry Jim

Six went out this morning - Joe, James, Andy H, Geoff, Graham and Pete.

It was a warm, sunny day, with a steady easterly breeze.

* * *

Something along the lines of the following must have been playing at the forefront of Graham's consciousness:

Two men were arguing about a flag flapping in the wind. "It's the wind that is really moving," stated the first one. "No, it is the flag that is moving," contended the second. A Zen master, who happened to be walking by, overheard the debate and interrupted them. "Neither the flag nor the wind is moving," he said, "It is MIND that moves."

After about forty minutes Graham decided to try a little of his own Zennish philosophy in the face of adversity. He adopted a calm declamatory voice, to lend gravitas to the impending utterance. After a thoughtful pause he said, "A puncture is all in the mind".

It wasn't, though - the puncture was in all Geoff''s front tyre and it was caused by a frickin' thorn.

* * *

We were at Flecknoe, and had just ascended the valley from Miry Bridge. We had then to descend and then climb into Staverton village.

* * *

The whippets set most of the pace today; the run along the lane to Upper Catesby was no exception. Eventually we - the more mature contingent - caught up. We turned towards Lower Catesby and dropped at speed over the first cattle grid, past Catesby house, then squinted hard at 40mph to read the sign in front of the second cattle grid. The grid was closed - but happily there was a way around the side.

* * *

The rough byway to Upper Shuckburgh was still very wet from yesterday's downpour. By the time we had got along it we were muddy - something (along with extensive post-ride bike-cleaning) that we're going to have to get used to again.

Natural justice came into operation - Graham punctured. Oddly, we heard nothing about it all being in his mind.

* * *

We crossed the Priors Marston-to-Napton road and rode over the fields to Marston Doles. Another bout of whippet-chasing took us into Napton village and yet another climb.

A bridleway - whippets away - led to Broadwell and then it was lanes and main road to Draycote Water. By this time Graham was knackered. It may be that the only thing about him that moved at the end was his MIND.

Pete

Miles: 27

Punctures: 3

“It won’t make you live any longer – it’ll just feel like it,"said the new-man Graham to a good-natured elderly jogger, slewing sideways to let the bikes pass on the towpath.  Graham has either studied the blogs closely or is a natural at passing off a perverse brand of cruelty as a sense of humour.

* * *

We’d started off in rain – only the four of us – Dean, Tom, Graham and me, Pete, from the car-park of the new Aldi near junction 1 of the M6..

We headed into Newton on a bridleway.  Crossing through a hedge, a front-wheel-sized scoop threatened to pitch the unwary/half-asleep/ptill sissed over the bars. Happily, we were all fullly alert and remained firmly in the saddle.

From Catthorpe we headed up a long and bovine-infested path to Swinford Corner. Graham had clearly been waiting for the end of this path before donning a shocking-pink jersey: “If anyone passes a comment, I’ll say I’m exploring my femine side.”

Tom muttered, “Good job Pete isn’t wearing his pink shorts, otherwise we’d look like a right bunch.”

Out of devilment I expressed the notion that I might yet spray my bike bright pink.

Tom began to look a little uncomfortable.  He can be so unreconstructed.

We moved on. The lane deteriorated. By the time we dropped down Gravel Hill it had become a rough track.

From Stanford we took another bridleway, where we transferred (vagueness vagueness) to a cheeky trail.  “If anyone says anything speak gobblegook, “ I said. To illustrate I spoke some incoherent Russian – pretty girl, car, friend, truth, goodbye, tomato (or was it grandmother?) and, very oddly, fridge. Already regarded with a very satisfactory level of suspicion, I then received a thrilling look. Clearly something approximating an explanation was called for: “The Cold War was on when I was at school. The Beak - bless him - was a pessimist.”

We climbed the Hemploe Hills. Dean discovered that he has a very favourable power/weight ratio and romped away upwards for the sheer enjoyment of it until we reached another bridlepath. Gravity did not discriminate between us on the way down. At one point we fended off three dogs (with eleven good legs between them) and a small boy with a sword. Oh, and Dean punctured.

Another long bridleway took us under the A14, where once some of us we had waded (see old blog ?January), bikes above heads, in winter floods.

We passed through Lilbourne, the radio masts at Hillmorton,along the canal towpath to Brownsover and, with the assistance of a friendly local dog-walker, managed to return through to Aldi on rough ground by Coton Meadows.

It had been fine and interesting ride, with a very high proportion of off-road. Thanks to Tom for plotting the route.

Pete

Miles: 25 (felt like it was more)

Punctures: 1