I (Neil Vose) was rudely woken up at 6.00 am to find that the weather wasn’t too bad. A little drizzle but not quite as cold as predicted. I parked the car near to the start and got the bike and myself ready. Decided on layers that I could take off as I was sure it would warm up as I cycled round the course. I rode down to the start and already the wind was starting to pick up. At 8.00 am I was in the first wave to start.
The first 15 miles wasn’t bad with a fairly good tail wind I reached Mow Cop (The Killer Mile – 25% in places but not very long) in about 50 minutes. As I was one of the first to hit the hill there weren’t many people about and therefore made it quite easily. The decent was good but the wind had picked up and now hail stones started to fall from the heavens (I have never seen hail like it). After 5 minutes it looked like it had been snowing. A few hills later we stopped at the first feedstation at 31 miles.
Feeling good and after having a banana and cup cake I started the next section to 57 miles. The head wind was brutal and also a few sharp hills in the mix made things a little tricky and the average went down to 15 mph. After the 2nd feedstation the brutal headwind continued but finally the sun came out but I was glad for the last feedstation at 75 miles. Talking to other riders and staff a lot of people had decided to forget the long route and take the medium route because of the bad headwind, but I was up for the challenge and my first ride of 100 miles plus in 2014.
The last 28 miles back to Crewe were a joy. The wind final became a tail wind and I rode with 3 other cyclists who really pushed the pace along. I finally finished in a respectable 6 hours 18 minutes (average of just over 16 mph) and had completed my first 100 miler of the year (103 miles altogether). Next is the Motion in Mercia (around Shropshire, Staffordshire and West Midlands) on Sunday 30th March another event organised by KTG and should be a little easier (92 miles but with no real big hills).