After completing Audax rides this year at 200, 300 and 600 km, I was only a 400km ride away from being able to call myself a ‘Super Randonneur’, in having finished all the major distances in a season.
As the year rolled on, I ran out of calendar events to ride at this distance, and so chose to ride by myself, using a pre arranged route and receipts from shops, cafes and ATMs to prove my passage.
I chose a route that passed through my home town for convenience and so headed out of my front door one early one Saturday morning in late September just before first light (6.40am) as the birds were singing their hellos.
Heading across the Severn Bridge into Wales always seems a great way to start an adventure, and so it turned out to be. By the time I had reached Chepstow, a very kind tailwind blew me northwards through Devauden and helped me deal with the hills up and beyond Abergavenny.
Just before Builth Wells, I passed a good café that I have used on previous rides, and even though I had only done 70km I turned around in the road and stopped for a full meal of eggs chips and beans washed down with a cup of tea. The stop was rather lengthy which gave me some time to readjust my saddle which was (unusually) causing me some discomfort. With the saddle lowered a few millimetres, the discomfort disappeared, thankfully not to return.
My route followed a roughly triangular shape and as I headed north, I cycled through Llandrindod Wells before turning east and heading back into England. The wind that had helped me thus far now blew at me with such force that I was forced to a crawl. Passing through one exposed valley, I was forced to have a little ‘cry break’ behind a stone wall as I had slowed to almost a standstill. After giving myself a stern talking to, and digging out some Haribos, I set off again and focused on the task at hand, taking each moment as it came without thinking of the large distance that remained.
In time, and with continued movement, I found myself heading back southwards through Cheltenham, Tetbury and the Georgian City of Bath at just after midnight. By this time I was running low on water and realized I was quite dehydrated. While sitting on a garage forecourt munching some salted crisps, I was puzzled to find they tasted just like cardboard! Finding clean water became a priority now and I was a little anxious that I would not find anywhere open at such a late hour.
My route took me through many small, sleepy villages however, and around 12.30am I found a small public house that was open and still serving drinks, so I enjoyed water and a mango juice dressed in my cycling gear while all the locals were knocking back the beers.
Although rain was forecast for 10pm, it held off until around 1am as I was leaving Bath. I was once again thankful for my Gore-Tex jacket as I was now riding through a thunder storm with rain stinging my face. To try and take my mind off the rain and lightning, I watched the raindrops bouncing off the flooded roads ahead of me. Shining under my bright front light, the drops seemed like little nature sprites dancing in the night. Maybe my imagination was running away with me, because around this time I was feeling very tired indeed.
I thought it funny that the hallucinations that had affected me during my 600km ride earlier in the year did not appear this time but my overall physical tiredness was much more severe. This showed itself by my not being able to hold my bike in a straight line when riding down the narrow country lanes, and also not being able to cope with the sudden changes of gradient on the small roads. For this reason, I decided to avoid the small lanes which were hard to navigate in the wet and dark. I had also drifted into a grass bank earlier while not paying attention which was not a good sign.
When doing these rides I am very conscious of the need to stay safe, and although I try to push my body, mind and heart beyond my preconceived limits I do not want to jepordise my life through reckless behavior. In this case, the roads were almost deserted and I felt safe enough was to follow the white dotted line in the centre of the road so that when I wavered, I did not end up in a ditch or up a bank (again).
Continuing southwards to Wells however, with my tiredness deepening, I struggled to maintain my enthusiasm for cycling up hills. One particular road kept rising and falling with such regularity that my heart was really sinking with each new elevation. I kept telling myself that I just had to get to Wells, and obtain my final receipt before I could rest. This was my manrtra, “Get to Wells, just get to Wells” However, at one point, just as a further uphill section revealed itself, I came upon a bus shelter at the side of the road and I calmly got off my bike and walked inside, unable to take any more.
The shelter itself was tiny. A clear plastic structure on a concrete base. It had no seats but at this point I did not care. I looked around to see if there was any dry ground where I could lie down, but due to the heavy rain, it was completely wet. One part was muddy, another had weeds and brambles growing and the middle was just wet concrete.
At this point I was so tired that I just did not care and so I tried my best to move the thorny brambles aside and lay down. For a couple of seconds, the relief of lying down was truly blissful. This was short lived however as the wet floor soaked through my thin cycling shorts and made me even colder than before. I also realized that the walls of the shelter didn’t reach quite to the ground, so that a cold wind blew in from time to time, further chilling me to the bone.
A realization was dawning on me that sleeping in this place was really not a good idea, and as if to confirm this, a little voice inside me was very forcefully telling me, “You need to get up, NOW and continue”. Staggering to my feet on stiff legs, I wondered what it might feel like to die of cold and hypothermia, but I also realized that now was not the time to find out.
By the time I reached Wells it was 3.10am and I was relieved to find an all-night garage where I could buy something in order to obtain a receipt. As my stomach couldn’t really handle any food at this point, I decided on a coke (full sugar) and did my best to hand over my money to the cashier, though I was shaking and shivering so much, it was quite a struggle.
After putting on all my available clothes, I looked forward to the homeward leg, 60km from Wells to Bristol (or as I more fondly thought of it, my bed). This thought kept me going well enough not to consider lying down again. For once I was glad of the long hills to climb as they allowed me to keep warm. I was grateful too that the thunderstorm had passed and only gentle rain remained to see me home.
At around 5.15am I made it back and very happily peeled of my soaking wet clothes before enjoying the luxury of a warm shower, clean teeth and bed where I spent most of the following day.