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!

Following my ride to Dover last week, I rode to Canterbury this weekend.

As with last time I got up at 4:30am had a bowl of porridge and a banana first.  While I was having breakfast I was watching the Olympics on BBC one which had the men’s road race.  It was interesting watching them in the first half as if they were out for a Sunday ride while 2 breakaway riders were powering ahead but would be caught by the group later.  One thing that made me chuckle was the support cars.  As I watched one of the lead cyclists from the Italian team dropped back to the support car and hung on to the door while he spoke to the coach.  He was only there for 3-5 mins max but what a great way to rest your legs!  Just let the car drag you along.  Then he powered back to the front half of the group and continued the race.  Is that allowed?  I don’t know but surely he had an advantage from that!

Anyway back to my ride.  I left the Olympic cyclists at 5:30am and headed out on the same route as last week.  Once again traffic was low but it was quite cold.  I followed the same route on the main roads up to Tenterden and then turned onto cycle route 18.

Once on the cycle routes the road quality decreased and it became much more hilly.  We followed route 18 right through Ashford.  Coming out the other side of Ashford the route split into two directions a diversion route and a normal route.  We didn’t think there would be anything to divert around!  Usually on a bike you can get through most things!  However as we cycled on through playing fields, I started to think the path got awfully narrow as it went under a railway bridge only to discover it ended at fence completely overgrown.  No getting over that.

Thankfully though we had just missed a sign and it was a simple matter to get back on track.  The road between Ashford and Canterbury took us over the North Downs.  This was great hill practise but awfully steep and seemingly never ending at points!

Then coming into Canterbury it was fun to ride though the cobbled streets of the historic town, we took pictures outside Canterbury Cathedral, and then went to Cafe Rouge for a coffee and a Bacon Baguette!

We thought there was plenty of time to get the train but went to the wrong station!  So pedalled fast back through the town centre just in time to jump on the 10:06am back to Paddock wood.

The Stats

Total Distance 48.35 miles – not as far as it was to Dover last week but the hills certainly made up for that!  I have now done 969.2 miles on my bike.  Looking forward to breaking through the 1,000 mile barrier.

Time 3 hours 11 minutes.

Average Pace 3.57 mins per mile

Average Speed 15.2 mph

Max Speed 34.6 mph Down one of the hills on the way to Canterbury

Total Ascent 3377 ft

Calories Burnt 3223 (how many are there in a bacon baguette?)

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The Great Kent Cycle is a circular route from Ashford which covers 59 miles (though we were told 53).  It is run by bike-events for the Canterbury Oast Trust.  I went with 3 other riders who are all doing the London to Paris.  We arrived at 8am and signed up there and then (didn’t pre book).  I was number 628.  It was my first time at a event so I was really surprised at the size of it and the number and range of bikes.

We headed off at 8:15am so weren’t the first people to start but not the last by any stretch either.  The first mile or so was through quite narrow cycle paths through Ashford, so initially kept the pace of the bikes ahead, but then over took a few.

The first 14 miles took us out of Ashford and down through the Romney Marshes to New Romney.  During this time I was so shocked at how many people I was over taking!   The Romney Marshes are very flat (being marshes and all that) so I pushed a high average speed of between 18 – 20 mph and really cruised past a lot of other cyclists.  It was great that there were such a range of cyclists out, families and people on heavy mountain bikes right up to professionals on amazing bikes (though I didn’t catch them!).  I didn’t see anyone in a conical racing helmet mind you (that would have been over the top!)

At New Romney we turned right onto the coast road.  We were instantly hit by a heavy oncoming wind.  This really slowed us down to an average of around 12mph.  We stopped for the first refreshment break 19 miles in at The Pilot Public House in Dungeness.  This brought back happy memories of going to the coast with my grandparents and having huge portions of Fish and Chips in the Pilot despite ordering a small. Though instead of fish and chips I was eating Powerbars and energy drinks!

From Dungeness we continued up to Lydd, passing Dungeness 1 and 2 (The Nuclear Power Stations).  Then turned down to back to the coast and Camber Sands.  Down on the sands there were plenty of people kite surfing, from a distance the skyline was full of kites.  Stopped briefly in Camber for another refreshment break (which was just under halfway).  Then headed on through Rye, from Rye headed up to the Isle of Oxney which included a couple of steep hills, then onto Tenterden.

In Tenterden we stopped at Woolworths for a chocolate top up and got back on the bikes.  Leaving Tenterden we passed (well I say passed they were going in the other direction) a professional cycle race, complete with pace safety cars and motorcycle outriders.

Headed up to Woodchurch and the route took us through the rare breds centre.  Part of this we had to walk through which is why that lap time looks really slow (honest).  From here there was a countdown of miles to go from 10.  This was a great motivator, and we saw the miles tumble past quickly as we went through Shadowhurst and on to Ashford.  The end of the route went back though the cycle paths which was good (safe) but prevented you from really pushing fast on the last two miles as you couldn’t see round the corners.  Went through the finish line in 3 hours 58 mins.

So the Stats

Total distance 58.98 miles

Time 3 Hours 58 Minutes 22 Seconds

Average Pace 4.02 minutes per mile

Average Speed 14.8 mph

Max Speed 31.7 mph

Total Calories 3621 (though who knows how many were in the Powerbars I ate!)

I am really pleased with these results, I set myself a time of 5 hours including breaks and met this exactly despite the route being 6 miles longer than I expected.  I was also amazed with the average speed I kept up.  It really shows the difference it makes to be on the flats rather than hills, you can be cruising along at 18 mph easily.  Though it did show me to better prepare myself for the Pedal to Paris I need to practice my hill climbs!

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Was really looking forward to this trip, and wasn’t disappointed! The weather was great, a slight breeze on a warm but not overly sunny day. Seemed perfect weather for cycling. I met up with a work collegue at Paddock wood Station to cycle the 40 miles to Ashford via the Sustrans cycle route 18.

We set off at 10:45am through Paddock wood, taking the normal route to Horsemonden. Here we picked up route 18. I was really amazed at how well signposted it was. There was only one turn which we couldn’t find a sign on (though some were a bit hidden) and it was a wonderful country route. From Horsemonden we followed the route down past Goudhurst and through Bedgebury forest. Bedgebury forest contains a National “class” mountain bike route and a nice family route. I didn’t fancy trying off riding in my road bike though. We stuck to the central road through the forest (which is an offroad section of route 18.) made up of tarmac and gravel and full of potholes! there were several groups of people in the forest and I soon learnt that while everything else will run away from a bike, dogs will run straight at them! No accidents today though!

Leaving Bedgebury we continued east. I have a scare going down a hill, I think this was at Four Wents but not sure. I saw the route 18 sign pointing left but was heading fast down hill and didn’t slow enough. As I went to turn left my wheels touch gravel and slide out from under me. In one swift and paniced motion I pulled my foot out of the clips and managed to steady myself.

Carried on to St Micheals where we stopped for a light lunch from costcutter and headed off again, if you can see the squiggles on the map its because I started off in the wrong direction! Carried on through towards Ashford. Once we got into the centre of Ashford we followed cycle routes along the river and through parks. This was a great way to avoid all the traffic but went too far. It seems cycle route 18 goes right through Ashford and we didn’t realise till we were about a mile past the train station. I still don’t think we went the right way into the station! We followed a sign Ashford T and rail services which took us right onto the platform. It was then a mad dash to the other platform and a 25 min train journey back home. From there took the direct route back to Matfield.
All in all I thought this was a great cycle route, avoided all major roads and really light traffic. It was fairly hilly but then that can only be good for fitness!

Stats Cateye Mity 8

Distance 45.78 miles (including to and from Matfield)

Max Speed 39mph

Time 3 Hours 41 mins 45 secs

Average 12.3 mph

I haven’t mentioned my new Garmin Edge 205 yet!! It is excellent! I plotted my ride the previous day on www.mapmyride.com Found this site excellent, very intuitive to use and the key thing was you can tell it to “follow roads”. Other mapping software have used forces you to draw straight lines but MapMyRide allows you to click points and then will automatically draw a route following the course between them. This then downloads as a .crs file which Garmin reads as a course.

Out on the road it is really easy to use and follow, the garmin displays a line of the route and you can zoom to up to 800 feet. When you come to a junction you just look down and see which way the line goes. This never failed me, however when we stopped for lunch we were on a road parallel to where we had come from and I went the wrong way (can’t really blame the machine for that!) also I programmed in a route which was slightly different to the cycle route 18 but it just bleeps when you go off course and lets you continue, still tracking your route. On the other hand it was a life saver when I couldn’t see the road signs but the garmin line pointed down a turning.

However (and this is the first day I have used it) the PC software doesn’t seem so great. I have the Garmin Training Centre and also SportTracks which I have seen recommended on a lot of forums. I think once I use it more often it might be better to view progress over a time rather than one individual route.

Garmin Edge 205 Stats

Distance 42.47 miles (doesn’t include first trip down to Paddock Wood)

Total Time 3 Hours 29 Mins 46 Seconds 29 Milliseconds (I’m not really good enough to worry about Milliseconds….. or seconds for that matter)

Average Pace 4.56 minutes per Mile

Average Speed 12.1 mph

Max Speed 37.7 mph

Total Calories 3066

Total Ascent 4321ft

Total Descent 3696ft

Some SportTracks Stats

And to cap it off a Memory Map OS elevation map

I added this in as the Edge 205 does not have a barometric altimeter, it relies on its position between the satellite’s. Though comparing this one above to the edge’s below, It looks very accurate.

Sorry for the long post, it was a long ride too! Hope you have enjoyed reading this, let me know through the comments what you enjoy reading, and what you don’t, eg more or less stats ( know I have overdone it today) and the same goes for ride narrative. Sorry there were no pics this time.

Please sponsor me for my Royal British Legion Pedal to Paris by clicking here. Many thanks to those who have already sponsored me or have pledged to.