The Barsley Brief

Almost a year ago I completed the Great Kent Cycle.  I was reading my ride review to remind myself how things went last year.  Why you may ask?  Because on the spur of the moment I did it again today!  Other commitments I had disappeared so I had no excuse but to go to the ride.  As my lack of posts has indicated this year I have done very few long rides so I wasn’t sure how things would go.

As we arrived in Ashford it was spitting with rain, but we had been assured that this would clear.  We set off at 8am on rather wet roads.  The further we went though the better the weather got.  Most importantly unlike last year there wasn’t a wind coming across the coast and comparing my spilt times to last year I was up to 30 seconds a mile quicker on these sections.

Also unlike last year I pedalled up all the hills!  In the end I was just 3 minutes off last years time, over 60 miles thats not bad!

As we approach the end of 2008 I felt I should post a short post to round off 2008 – The year of the Potato!

Cycling

Back in January I resolved to get fitter, to motivate me to this end I signed up to the Royal British Legion 2008 Poppy Cycle to Paris.  In January it seemed like a long time off – it wasn’t until September that the cycle started but I wuickly started training.  I soon bought a new bike a Giant OCR 4 (road / race bike) and almost every week went into Evernden Cycles to accesorse it!

I was rather slow on my bike to begin with, looking at one of my posts from February I was struggling to complete 30 miles.  That soon changed though and my furthest training was 76 miles to Farnham, in 5 1/2 hours.

Then in September I completed the Pedal to Paris, 283 miles in 4 days.

Over the year I have cycled 1526 miles acording to my speedometer.  For 2009 I am going to aim to cycle 1000 miles – a drop I know but I am not currently planning any big multiday events and want to set an achieveable goal.

House

I have completed most of the renovations and decorating on my house over 2008 and am enjoying living in it.  Currently I am stocking it with pots and pans and other necessities – I wasnt short of ideas for Christmas this year!

For 2009 I want to finish the house – although is a house ever finished!  For me this means all the little touches, light fittings, doors, skirting boards, window sills oh and a dining room floor!  Also I want to start work on the garden/

Computing

I started this website “The Barsley Brief” back in January 2008 and have written 76 posts since then.  I have enjoyed writing about my cycle to Paris but am now sometimes at a loss at what to write about.  I think I will continue into 2009 writing book reviews and my views on news and events.  A challange for me will be to move server when my current contract expires.

Though the Barsley Brief is not my only website, I became captiavted with the idea of affiliate marketing.  To explain what this is I’ll used the example of Confused.com, many people go there to get car insurance comparisons.  If you use them and then sign up for a insurance plan that they suggest they will recieve a commison from the insurance provider for selling their insurance plan.

I started out along this route with no real expectations, as I didn’t believe that it is possible for one person to make a really difference among so many large affiliate companies.  To date I have 3 completely unique affiliate marketing websites with mixed success, but not ready to retire yet.  Aim for 2009 – that they break even (pay for the web hosting £60)

Wishing you all a great 2009!

Charles

I was surfing the interwebs at 6am a time when all sorts of strange things jump out at you.  One such thing was cycling safety videos.  This stuck in my mind as I drive to the train station in the early hours of the morning I regularly see a cycling commuter lacking any sort of hi vis clothing, and while he has lights on his bike he doesn’t use them despite many cars having lights on.

I saw the following and thought they we quite interesting ways to make a dull subject of cycling safety / watching out for cyclists memorable.  I looked for a few more but struggled to find any others which we so interesting and engaging, most just preach to you.

They are from www.dothetest.co.uk a Transport for London campaign encouraging drivers to be aware.  While I haven’t seen any of these adverts on TV I thought they were really create, taking a completely unrelated environment and showing how important awareness can be.  I failed both.  Leave a comment with how you did!

I couldn’t believe it was already the last day.  The final push from Beauvais to Paris.  Our pre ride instruction booklet said we would arrive in Paris at the Arc de Triomphe at 3.21pm  though there was still 55 miles to go first!

It was an even earlier start than usual!  Everything was about an hour earlier as we would be cycling longer through the morning to get to Paris for 3.21pm.  For a change we joined the 10 mph group.  This was a really interesting experience.  In the 14mph which I had done the previous 2 days I felt as if I was always pushing, I stayed up with the group well but there was no time to coast.  The 10 mph group was a completely different experience.  I found I wasn’t pushing so hard so it was fun to play, letting myself drift to the back of the group and then working my way back up to the front.  There was one long hill which kept turning back on itself, I really steamed up it overtaking people left and right which gave me a great boost and the energy to carry on.

We stopped in a little village for a break and to let the group close up.  We saw this village had a small cafe so 50 of us descended on it at once.  We weren’t stopped for long though so really had to gulp down the coffee.

I did have some trouble in the second half of the morning though.  I heard a hiss coming from behind me so I stopped and found I had a flat back tyre.  This time though instead of having to sit in the van they just swapped the whole back wheel and gears for someone else’s.  I found the gears weren’t so long so I was having trouble getting up some hills.  Though I was enjoying cruising through the back markers and quickly found myself back near the front.  Then we stopped again so that we could all cross a busy road in one group.  As we were stopped I found the repair van as I wanted my wheel back.  They had replaced the inner tube fitted it to my bike and dropped the back of the bike to the ground and BANG the tyre blew again.  The original puncture had actually ripped a two inch gash in the tyre so it was back on with the other wheel while they replaced the whole tyre.

We were back off on the last leg till lunch.  As we cycled towards the village we were lunching in we noticed a strange site.  The Americans had invaded!  All of our motorcycle escorts had disappeared and were replaced with WWII re-enactors dressed in American military uniform complete with jeeps and guns.

A military road block!

At lunch  got my old wheel back with a brand new tyre.  After lunch we would leave in one large group.  It was worth spending the morning with the slower group as the 14mph group arrived just 20mins before we all had to leave again.

The final leg of the ride into Paris was an amazing experience.  We cycled solidly there from lunch and it was amazing to come over a crest and see Paris spread out below us.  As we got further into Paris people on the pavement and in their cars cheered and waved, I didn’t want it to end.  An amazing feeling thinking all the roads are closed for you (and the other 250 cyclists!) .  We rounded a corner on cobbles and saw the Arc de Triomphe at the end of the road.  This seemed to be a sign to sprint and we all found a last surge of energy to fly to the Arc.

Once at the Arc we were greeted by crowds of well wishers including family and friends.  There was lots of time for photos and some people already mentioning next year!  I received my medal from the president of the Royal British Legion.  We paraded up the Champs Elysees for a short service and then cycled through more of Paris to load our bikes into lorries for their journey home.

It was a amazing 4 days of cycling.  It showed me what I was capable of, when cycling by myself I sometimes stop and push but with a group you just keep going up any hill!  Also I have never cycled four days straight 6 hours a day and have found since getting back I have so much more strength and endurance smashing some of my old training times.

I was on the cover of the Courier my local paper this week.  You can read the story here.

A clear sunny day at last!  Not perfect though as there was a strong headwind of around 25mph.

The Service in Abbeville

Another good breakfast at the hotel and then a long bus back to Abbeville to pick up the bikes.  After the rain the previous day we tried to clean off most of the dirt from the bikes and re oil the chain.  Several people found punctures where their tyres had slowly gone down overnight.  My bike was ok though.  The war memorial was on the main roundabout of the town and once again all traffic was stopped for a brief remembrance service.

After the service we popped into a cafe for coffees.  As we were in their we heard a loud bang as someone over inflated their tyre!  The majority of us were riding road / race bikes with slim profile tyres which were at over 100psi.  The theory is that this high pressure gives you extra speed as the tyres have less surface area on the road digging in and causing friction.

We were off at 9am.  I found the morning much tougher than any of the other days.  Much of it was across exposed farm lands where we battled a strong wind.  I found I wasn’t in the front group and was going straight into the wind unshielded which made each mile tougher.  Lunch was in Poix de Picardie and I learnt that the reason I was finding it so tough was that I spent the morning at the front of packs with people drafting along behind me.  In the afternoon I made sure that I kept behind other people to block out some of the wind.  This really helped.  Also the fact that Lunch was much later today meant psychologically it was better as you knew after lunch you were half way there!

There's always time for tea

We met up with the other groups at Auchy la Montage.  The village held a party for us.  It was great to stop for a drink and sandwich and short speeches before carrying on.  During the speeches we were caught out as God Save the Queen went into a second verse and 250 people mumbled the verse up until the last line!

Then as a group we left for Beauvais our final night stop before Paris!  We arrived here safely and had another rememberance service before leaving our bikes in the fire station ready for the final day!