the noble pursuit (i)

have you ever signed up for something and almost immediately panicked? of course you have!

when i got the offer to join a team for a new cycling event here in peterborough called "the noble pursuit", i had just such an experience. that the offer came from a cycling friend who is one of the strongest cyclists i've ever known and whose comment was "we're trying to set something up in the spirit of paris-roubaix" should have set of alarms of all sorts. in retrospect it did, but for some strange reason the volume was set at "mute" on those alarms!

so the morning of the ride arrived and i, armed with the knowledge that it would be "around 140 kms" ate a huge breakfast and packed all sorts of bars and gels on the off chance that i might get hungry. just so you understand, no one but the organizers knew the route for this ride, so no one knew what sort of terrain or road conditions would feature along the way. i even thought we might stop for lunch! ha!

i rode through the empty streets of peterborough. 

until i arrived at the silver bean cafe, where my friend michael (our team navigator) 

was busily charting out the freshly revealed route. 

 there was lots of banter around the various teams as we sucked back mugs of free coffee and amazing granola bars generously supplied by the silver bean. i looked over michael's shoulder several times to see what i could see, but really, the route meant very little to me other than i could see that we went through towns that i had passed through in cars. the route on the map worked out to be just under 140 kilometres so a bit of a distance but i'd ridden further in the past.

team captain dave blondell, freshly returned from a well earned break in holland checked his smart phone for air pressure, wind speed, humidex readings, calibrated his bike electronically, checked and rechecked his caloric intake over the last 24 hours, made sure that the mapping software was good to go, and then checked in on his investments as we waited for the start . . . 

moments later we were joined by one of our team members - kris lew - who true to his word showed up in these awesome white shorts . . . 

the coffee flowed like wine but soon it was our turn to get our bikes ready and lined up for departure. 

each team was released at fifteen minute intervals so as we were the third team, the first team had a half hour "head-start" the second, fifteen minutes and so on.

here we are lined up and ready to roll. 

(i'd like to credit the photographer who took this pic but i can't remember her name. 

if you see this and would like credit please let me know!)

we rode north through the streets of peterborough, 

crossing the river on the london street bridge and then followed the "rail trail" north to trent after which we rode river road north to douro fifth line.

at this point i think i should say that throughout my riding life, i have assiduously avoided gravel and dirt roads as a matter of course. i ride a skinny tired road bike, in fact my skinny tires are summer slicks. not even one tiny bit of tread. so on pavement they are lovely. dry pavement that is! so i was ever so slightly worried when we found ourselves riding past signs like this . . . 

no let's go further. i was scared shitless. there'd been all sorts of talk about needing wider tires, treaded tires, carrying lots of inner tubes and especially fun talk about soft gravel surfaces. great! 

but there i was on my bike, and so what could i do? 

just keep on going . . . . 

and riding with great guys like these . . . 

and this awesome man . . . 

made the ride even more incredible . . . 

tomorrow, some more of the rest of the ride . . . . .