First full team ride...

Saturday 15 Feb 2008

After a night in Fraser's room on the blow up bed, the alarm woke me at 6:50am, dozed until 7:10am. Still feeling nervous about the ride, though I'm always like this before I go out!

Had some breakfast with Iain and Tim before getting my kit on for the day. I heard Rich stop by before he went for a warm up ride on his bike - as if the 70 miles wasn't going to be enough!

The team slowly assembled at Iain's before 8:30am and we cycle gently 2-3 miles through Guildford to get to CHASE. Bridget welcomes us with juice, water, tea and cake before telling us about the work they do at the hospice. Christopher's is not just a children's version of an adult hospice, it is a whole lot more than that to the families that need it.

They have amazing facilities, play rooms for youngsters, a hang-out zone for teenagers, they have parties, take the children out on all sorts of activities like fishing, they learn to cook, they paint, they have music rooms to listen and play along, they have a pool, they have sleep-overs. There is so much energy in the place it is truely inspiring!

The staff are passionate and have some much love to give the children and families, but there is also a sense of frustration that they could do so much more and support so many more families if the government would provide more funding. Children's hospice's are just not funded by the NHS...

Andrew Castle came along to meet us, talk to us about our event and have photos taken with us to help promote and publicise the event. He even noted that our event was during Wimbledon and would try to mention us during his commentry! We also met the Mayor of Guildford, who had turned up in his cycling shorts to meet us!

After the tour of CHASE we were off our our team ride - 70 miles, to Chichester and back via the South Downs. For Tim and me this would introduce the concept of hills! Something we don't have a lot of in Essex!

We set off at a steady pace, just under 15mph, and got the feel of riding together, said goodbye to Ciarán after about 10 miles - he needed to get back to pack for his skiing holiday! Though he was encouraged by what he had seen of our riding so far!

Continued the ride to Chichester via Pepworth and Duncton (the start of the hill!). Managed 5mph up the hill, and at the top looked out across the fields and saw two stags in the distance staring at us! Going down the other side was spoilt by a tractor pulling out in front of me! Grrrr.

Made it to Chichester for a cup of tea and some more malt loaf before heading back!

Slightly slower on the way back as we were in to a slight head wind, but saying that, we couldn't have asked for better weather really - it was glorious!

After a couple of big hills on the way back and a minor altercation with a car cutting us up badly, we were back in Guildford just as Ciarán was about to leave. Jules was out with the camera to record our return from a great first team ride!

After a shower, some toast, malt loaf and tea, I loaded the bikes on the car and took Tim back to Saffron Walden before heading off to Rachel's 50th birthday party...