The Power of Chicken Soup

Sunday 9 March

Up at 7:30am and out by 8am, I had arranged to meet Tim at Papworth about 8:30am, so I have half an hour to do an unknown distance by sketchy route, I have pieced together a map from cycle routes available in the bedroom of the hotel an I manage to complete the 9 miles in 30 mins - a good starting speed!

Tim had been waiting for about 5 mins, and had done 24 miles more than me by this point! I am concious that I should be fresher than Tim, but the speed we head off at across Cambridgeshire, Tim obviously wasn't tired! I can confirm that Cambridgeshire is very flat!

No hills to speak of for the first 40-50 miles! Our average speed of over 18mph over the first 60 miles was quite amazing, though we did have a slight tail wind most of the way - and as I said it was very flat!!

I hadn't had much breakfast, so at 43 miles we stop at Tesco in Newmarket and I get a sandwich to supplement the maltloaf! We also spot a lady with her electric pedal cycle, something I suggest we should think about using - especially for the hills!

Anyway back on the ride we start to find hils around Haverhill which come as a bit of a shock to the system! We are overtaken by another cyclist who must have been doing 22-23mph, we were doing 17.5mph and we were left for dead! We justify this by assuming he must have just started out and we were having a chat!

Tim takes up some interesting back roads on the route back to Saffron Walden - very narrow! I think both Tim and I were struggling a bit on the last 15 miles to Saffron Walden, but a timely call from Tracey offereing tea and soup gave us the kick start we needed to get back to Tim's house.

I stop to say hello, chat to the kids, and have a cup of tea and a bowl of chicken soup - very welcome!! After a 30 minute stop I get back on the bike, wondering how I am going to deal with the ride back home!

To my surprise, I feel much better! I realise that if I got straight home I am only going to do about 85 miles, so I add on some of my regular training route to get closer to 100 miles...

As I turn away from Stortford and head out to Takely, it chucks it down with sleet and rain! After 92 miles the rain has eased and I'm thinking about how good it feels to be out on the bike, the next minute I find myself face down in the grass verge! Not really sure what happened, but I clipped the kerb and flew off the bike, fortunately no damage done to me or the bike!

Back on the bike and head for home, as I turn into our road the trip distance ticks over 100 miles with an average speed of 16mph. A great ride - thanks to Clare, Clive and Teresa for allowing me to take up most of the day with cycling!