Life In The Saddle

"A peloton of Wiggle riders headed out from Wiggle HQ yesterday, and joined Mark Beaumont as he rode into Portsmouth on the first leg of his 'Round Britain Training Ride'. Mark is preparing for this 'Round the World in 80 Days' record attempt later this year, and Wiggle are thrilled to be supporting him!"

Dawn breaks over Pendennis Point, Falmouth, one of the most westerly towns in the UK. Overnight an Atlantic storm has battered our hotel, and whilst the rain has ceased for now, the wind is still extreme. Time to start a bike ride to London. The Trafalgar Way holds a lot of heritage, especially for someone that has grown up near the Victory in Portsmouth. In 1805, when Admiral Nelson died in the battle of Trafalgar, Lieutenant Lapenotiere rode non-stop along this route from Pendennis Point to Admiralty House in Whitehall, London. The journey took him 37 hours and he used 21 horses. I planned to attempt it on a push-bike, in 24 hours. Joining me on the journey was a team of riders that would do certain legs of the course with me, as well as a support crew in a camper-van and a film crew. It was to be a real team effort. We headed out of Falmouth, down the cobbled high street and up into the hills behind the town. The weather was mild, and the wind was from behind, all set for ...

I thought last weekend's ride was big, it was certainly my longest ride to date. This weekend things are about to get a whole lot bigger though... I've been invited to 'Ride The Trafalgar Way' this Saturday; a route that follows the historic path a horse messenger rode non-stop in 1805 to announce the death of Admiral Lord Nelson. The route traverses the country from west to east; from Pendennis Point in Falmouth to Admiralty House in London. The distance is 500 kilometers (310 miles). My hope is to complete the ride in around 24 hours. Non-stop. To say that I'm a little nervous would be fair, this will be by far the longest that I have ever ridden in one go, and the latter part of it will be in the dark. However, I'll be fully supported by the RTTW (Ride The Trafalgar Way) team, and will have a support car, camper van and some very experienced personnel on hand to help me through. I'm not doing it alone either; at the same time as I hope to rid...

Autumn can be one of the best seasons to ride in; changing colours and interesting conditions. Yesterday was certainly interesting. I decided that having let a number of my  2014 Objectives  slip away from me, it was time to knock off at least one more, and complete a double imperial century (200 miles). If I was sensible I would have done this in the middle of summer, with a long summer day... unfortunately, those are now long past though, so I decided it had to be an Autumn Epic Adventure. The plan was simple: ride to the Yarmouth-Lymington ferry, meet up with the Wightlink Race Team boys, head over to the start of the Wiggle New Forest 100 near Ringwood, complete the 'epic' sportive with them and ride home, probably with an extra loop to bring the miles up. The reality, was that the weather made it far from simple. In order to get to get to the start on time, I would need to be up at 04:30, out the door by 05:00 and in Yarmouth by 06:00. When my alarm went off thoug...

2014 has been a mixed year for me on the bike; with some great highs and some pretty significant lows. The highs include such moments as winning the Team GC at the  Ras de Cymru  with Team Wiggle. The lows included moments like being sat at the side of the road, bruised, blooded and head in hands, having crashed for the fourth time in the space of a few months. Let's call it a Yo-Yo year. 2014 has been my first year of full-time work, and that kind of change brought a lot of uncertainty about how things would pan out in terms of racing and training. Long gone are the university days when I could grab a few hours on the bike in the middle of the day; now my training consists of commuting and weekend rides back on the Isle of Wight. Racing was going to be a question mark as well; with the move to Team Wiggle from Wightlink RT making travelling to events from home more difficult and at times prohibitively expensive or unattractive due to a lack of companionship. It's been...

Go big or go home. That seemed to be the mantra for today's 14 Hills Killer. In truth, the reason I chose to do the 14, rather than the 7 this year, was just because it started closer to home; it saved me riding out to Freshwater from Sandown to start! Turns out the 14 was one hell of a challenge... Conditions were near perfect; it's been dry for a long time in the later part of the summer, and it's left the Isle of Wight trails as dusty as I've ever seen them. With a decent easterly wind, it looked like we'd have a helping hand on the outward leg to Freshwater as well, countered by a nice headwind on the way home! Pre-event involved a fair bit of faffing. The checkpoints are normally in pretty similar spots, but my old riding buddy Jamie had laid them out yesterday and hidden them in rather different locations. I'd decided not to take a map, but on finding the "fresh" positioning of the marks, rather wished I had. Photos on my phone and scribble...

Last road race of the season today: not an amazing result, but a great race all the same. I rode the Cricklade Kermesse two years ago, and came second in the KOM classification. This year the target was on the overall though, in a last ditch attempt to get enough points to retain my second cat licence going into next year. I came 9th in the end, so I didn't get the points I needed, but it was one of the best races I've had all season.  This is a FAST circuit; with 15 laps of a tight course, a lot of spectators and a high street finish. Positioning is key, and that became pretty obvious on the third lap; on the slight drag that features on the circuit a split occurred in the peloton, luckily I was on the right side, and so started a 15 man breakaway.  Once the gap was established, the break got organised, and we started to power round the circuit with an efficient through-and-off. The gap got bigger, on lap 8 (I think) we got a time check: 1 minute. By lap 9 that ha...

Today was my first road race since the Ras de Cymru (far too long a gap - but this is not the place to explain the reasons for that). I came away with a top fifteen result I think, which I was satisfied with; not pleased, but satisfied given the last week... The last week has been a long one. Last Friday I came down with flu; a chest infection and sinus infection combo. I was meant to be racing on Sunday, but instead spent most of the weekend in bed. Bank holiday Monday was a right-off as well, and I didn't touch the bike all weekend.  Tuesday morning I went off to Eurobike; the world's biggest bike trade show in Germany. I hadn't got shot of the cold, but there was no way I was missing this. The event was an incredible experience, and there was so much to see ( Link to Wiggle Blog articles ). It was three very long days though; on our feet from first thing in the morning until last thing at night. By the time I got home at 1:30am on Friday morning I was pretty...

From Wednesday to Sunday last week I was in Wales for the Ras de Cymru stage race. As an individual it was a bit of a mixed bag of success, but as Team Wiggle, we came away with some great results including stage wins, the sprinter’s points jersey and the overall team prize. The week started out with a team time trial, which at only 11 kilometers long, on a flat course, was always going to be a whole world of pain. I won’t make any bones about it; I’m lacking top end power at the moment, and knew that going into the event. A short team time trial was therefore always going to be a struggle. I lasted about 6 kilometers and then dropped off the back; it was only the first three times that counted, and I really couldn’t keep up with the pace. It was disappointing, but probably predictable. I ended up a good 2 minutes down on the team’s eventual time, and whilst they won the stage, I was placed almost dead last on GC. A good start for Team Wiggle, not such a good one for me. Th...