About This Blog
Team Rear take on the infamous English Coast-to-Coast bike ride. We begin riding on Friday 31st July and finish on Tuesday 4th August 2009. In five days we'll ride a shade over 210 miles and climb 8500m - roughly the height of Everest through the best scenery England has to offer. Our route follows Alfred Wainwrights walking route where permissable and practical on bike. We deviate only to hook into the best riding we can.
We've completed this fantastic ride once before but blog technology wasn't invented in Lancashire until 2009 so I ended up with a big mural on my bedroom wall instead. We were happy then because we were poor.
In an unprecedented turn of events all four members of Team Rear will be present if not very correct, so here's a run down of the chosen few:
Cast List
James 'Cartilage' Clegg - a freak of nature able to ride with the stamina of ten men thanks to some unique adaptations to both body and bicycle.
Jon 'The Rear' Pearson - the 2004 World Puncture Champion is back with a vengence, looking to make this years crossing as difficult as is humanly possible.
Lee 'Wiggo' Wiggins - mild mannered business man by day, freelance dog wrestler by night. Wiggo's only preparation for this challenge is to order a tanker full of Guiness for the trip.
Adam 'Extra Loop' Lewis - not to be trusted with a map under any circumstances.
With special guest appearances from:
Chris 'The Wizard' Wilson - swapping football boots for fireroads The Wizard will be putting himself through considerable discomfort over the next few days as he'll be missing Man United's crucial 4 match warm up tour of hot countries with large populations.
Kieran 'Toddmeister' Todd - with three decades of intense training in some of the finest curry houses in the UK, Toddy is salavating at the prospect of being able to burn off almost as many calories as he'd normally imbibe in ten minutes at the mighty Raj Douf in Hitchin Town.
Van Driver Needed
That's the star-studded line up, we're still looking for a van driver for the trip -volunteers welcome, no experience/license necessary. If you're unemployed, independently wealthy or just an Aussie who's given up watching cricket for the summer, then we'd be pleased to have you on board.
Getting Organised
Below is an excerpt from an email with instructions of what to bring (apart from the bleeding obvious) and which bits of your bike to make sure aren't going to fall off immediately. I sent it to everyone just to make Jon feel that he wasn't the sole intended recipient!
Over the next few days I'll finalise logistical arrangements and accomodation and explain a bit about the route and so on. I hope to document the ride as best as I can providing an informative-photo-journal-come-humorous-anecdote type work of art delivered via the internet. They really should come up with a modern phrase for this sort of thing.
Yours truely, Extras.
Team Rear take on the infamous English Coast-to-Coast bike ride. We begin riding on Friday 31st July and finish on Tuesday 4th August 2009. In five days we'll ride a shade over 210 miles and climb 8500m - roughly the height of Everest through the best scenery England has to offer. Our route follows Alfred Wainwrights walking route where permissable and practical on bike. We deviate only to hook into the best riding we can.
We've completed this fantastic ride once before but blog technology wasn't invented in Lancashire until 2009 so I ended up with a big mural on my bedroom wall instead. We were happy then because we were poor.
In an unprecedented turn of events all four members of Team Rear will be present if not very correct, so here's a run down of the chosen few:
Cast List
James 'Cartilage' Clegg - a freak of nature able to ride with the stamina of ten men thanks to some unique adaptations to both body and bicycle.
Jon 'The Rear' Pearson - the 2004 World Puncture Champion is back with a vengence, looking to make this years crossing as difficult as is humanly possible.
Lee 'Wiggo' Wiggins - mild mannered business man by day, freelance dog wrestler by night. Wiggo's only preparation for this challenge is to order a tanker full of Guiness for the trip.
Adam 'Extra Loop' Lewis - not to be trusted with a map under any circumstances.
With special guest appearances from:
Chris 'The Wizard' Wilson - swapping football boots for fireroads The Wizard will be putting himself through considerable discomfort over the next few days as he'll be missing Man United's crucial 4 match warm up tour of hot countries with large populations.
Kieran 'Toddmeister' Todd - with three decades of intense training in some of the finest curry houses in the UK, Toddy is salavating at the prospect of being able to burn off almost as many calories as he'd normally imbibe in ten minutes at the mighty Raj Douf in Hitchin Town.
Van Driver Needed
That's the star-studded line up, we're still looking for a van driver for the trip -volunteers welcome, no experience/license necessary. If you're unemployed, independently wealthy or just an Aussie who's given up watching cricket for the summer, then we'd be pleased to have you on board.
Getting Organised
Below is an excerpt from an email with instructions of what to bring (apart from the bleeding obvious) and which bits of your bike to make sure aren't going to fall off immediately. I sent it to everyone just to make Jon feel that he wasn't the sole intended recipient!
------------------------------------------Moving On
*Bikes:*
Ensure you're bike is in very good working order, over five days it will get found out
*Pre-ride:**On-ride:*
- brake pads - if in doubt fetch a spare set
- gear cables - not frayed and outer cables aren't about to burst out of their housing
- tyres - if they are looking worn then put a new one on otherwise it will be puncture o'clock
- bottom bracket - if there's excessive play then get a new one fitted before the ride, if this goes then it's game over
- We'll need two tool kits - I'll fetch mine, we need one other set of:
- Puncture repair stuff + pump for both valve types, chain tool, allen keys, chain oil, adjustable spanner, tie wraps, philipps screwdriver
- 2x spare inner tubes each
- water supply (Wiggo for 'water' read 'Guiness')
*Clothes:*You can generally wear the same riding clothes each day if you wash and dry them over night. This is the lightest way to travel without humming too much!
- Waterproof riding jacket
- padded shorts if you wish
- dry clothes for the evening
------------------------------------------
Over the next few days I'll finalise logistical arrangements and accomodation and explain a bit about the route and so on. I hope to document the ride as best as I can providing an informative-photo-journal-come-humorous-anecdote type work of art delivered via the internet. They really should come up with a modern phrase for this sort of thing.
Yours truely, Extras.
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