Dear Diary - 2nd day of our adventure

parkrun anyone?

It turns out that within 30 minutes of leaving the Weatherdown Lodge, we will be cycling through the Queen Elizabeth Country park in Horndean and guess what? There is a parkrun there starting at 9:00am! This is too good an opportunity to be missed, we are all keen fans of parkrun and would not miss out on the chance of going 'tourist' to bag another parkrun course.  So change of footwear is needed and lock for the bikes.

One slight issue is that this particular parkrun is one of the more hillier parkruns in the country.  Start is all up hill!

So we left the lodge at 8am with a  lovely 7km ride to the start of the parkrun. Lots of lovely flowing trails and the team all rode together at good speed to the start.

We attended the new runners briefing and the severity of the amount of climbing was explained.  Two laps, with lots of up hill and some big down hills.

Phil, the Queen Elizabeth Run Director was fairly comical and mentioned the team from Panshanger that had come all this way just to collect a 'Q' (parkrunners like to collect courses with all letters of the alphabet and 'Q,s' are hard to come by).

Parkrun results for the team

Chris finished 2nd overall with 20.34.

Gary finished 12th with 22.25

PG finished in 26.18 in 39th place

Hugh got the 71st place just ahead of Andy (they finished together) in 30.16 and Andy 30.19.

Adrian was the only sensible one and didn't run!

Back on the bikes, still got 66km to go!

Queen Elizabeth Park has a nice cafe, so Andy, Chris, Gary  and PG went for breakfast rolls and coffee.  Hugh and Adrian, set off on the SDW to get a head start at 10am, with the others leaving at 10:30 after the very nice breakfast rolls.

Well earned bacon roll and coffee

The Queen Elizabeth temporary cafe

It was about 6 miles before Andy; Chris and PG caught Adrian and Hugh after our coffee and bacon roll.  Chris and Gary were steaming and no chance of Andy and PG to keep up with their pace.  A couple of times they waited for us to catch up, but they had legs that carried them up the steep climbs with little effort.  Andy and PG rode together for most of the day and on the steeper climbs and descents Andy would leave PG, but as soon as the climbs and descents became less steep, PG got back on Andy's wheel.

It was agreed to regroup at Whiteways cafe. A bit of joke as it isn't a cafe, but a glorified brick-built tea hut, with a big car park. Popular with bikers and just us mad cyclists. As there was no inside (as we were hoping), we all got cold very quickly sitting outside.  PG and Andy spotted Bovril was available. It was soo cold PG had 3 hot Bovril's with added salt! And then a cuppa tea, while waiting for the others arrive.  (We were waiting for Hugh and Adrian, plus GarryG who was out walking today). They all turned up at about the same time, about 50 minutes after the first cyclists had arrived at the tea hut.  We were absolutely frozen and there was a bit of fight bagging a seat in the car to get warm again (Garry had conveniently left in the car park, before heading out on a walk).  

Whiteways cafe... I mean tea hut

Bovril time.  Hmmm!

Chris sticks with coffee

After Hugh and Adrian arrived, Chris, Gary, Andy and PG set off wearing loads of layers to keep warm!  Adrian and Hugh took to a road route as a sensible alternative given their level of tiredness after a tough days riding. 

Once the lead team had warmed up and stripped off the extra layer, we were flying again!  Andy couldn't keep up with PG and Chris and Garry were storming ahead.  Some of the climbs were outrageous!  Often PG resorted to walking the steep climbs that seemed to go on forever!  The steep chalk/flint down hills left the Cyclocross rider struggling at times and just taking it easy, Andy is an ace downhill rider and flies downhill (his weight probably helps as does having a MTB with disk brakes and fat tyres).

The last 4km to the YHA, were outrageously uphill! Absolute killer of a climb, not too steep, but just long and at the wrong end of the day for exhausted riders.  It took for ever to knock off 100 meter chunks from my GPS displayed distance to go. First off road, passing lots of new born lambs and then the road. It kept climbing and climbing, up and up.  Everyone struggled on this hill and we were so pleased to see the Welcome to YHA Truleigh Hill sign.

Phew!  What a tough day.  Chris and Garry arriving first, then PG; Andy with Hugh and Adrian not far behind.

Other bits missed.

Mechanical's for the day.  Chris suffered another puncture, but his slime inner tube sprayed green fudge out and did the job to keep the tyre inflated!

Andy, came down one hill full blast only to enter the biggest puddle going flat out. Absolutely soaked!  Not so good as this was the coldest day and keeping warm for the rest of the day would be a challenge.

Hugh claimed he had suffered a body failure.  The inclusion of a parkrun, was too much!  

PG fell at 2mph going up hill. All slow speed, so no harm done.

Today's stats

PG Strava stats for SDW day 2 1st bit

56.79km total distance
23:34 moving time
59m of climbing
17.3km/h Average speed
50.8Km/h max speed
Heart rate AVG 116bpm and Max of 165bpm
Estimated AVG power = 65watts

PG Strava stats for SDW day 2 parkrun

5.35km total distance
26:03 moving time
111m of climbing

PG Strava stats for SDW day 2 2nd bit

66.51km total distance
5:31:43 moving time
1216m of climbing
12.0km/h Average speed
52.2Km/h max speed
Heart rate AVG 109bpm and Max of 170bpm
Estimated AVG power = 80watts