Holdsworth
Guru
- Location
- Crewe, Cheshire
These past few months haven't been too good on me, ever since I was sacked from my last job I have been out of work and only doing the very occasional temp work. As such I no longer commute, this combined with little motivation to ride for fun and the inevitable weight gain + inactivity over Christmas means I am out of form again.
Then yesterday I thought I'd at least make a start and do something about it. In Crewe we have one well-known local cycling club, the Crewe Clarion Wheelers. I'd known about them for quite some time even before I started riding the year before last. But TBH I never felt compelled to go join a club preferring instead to ride solo where I want and at my own pace.
But I felt I should give it a go and went down to the town centre in Crewe which is the starting point for their Sunday runs. There was only one bloke there when I arrived at 8:55 and over the next 10 minutes 5-6 more showed up. All seemed friendly and talked about where we would be riding toady, it was generally agreed that a short ride towards Cholmondeley and back would be preferable.
We set off at a gentle pace averaging around 18mph on Nantwich Road heading towards Nantwich. I was taking it relatively easy at the back of the group in the slipstream chatting to one of the blokes. I did notice that for the majority of the ride, regardless of lane width, that the group cycled two-abreast. Not that I have anything against that sort of road positioning it just seemed a little weird to be taking up half a lane all of the time. It did inevitably attract a few bips of the horn from one motorist who tried to pass approaching a pinch point but other than that the ride was uneventful.
I was pleased to see that even with my Christmas-weakened legs I was still keeping up well with the rest of them. Then I remembered about the slipstream and felt a little deflated
Since I have never tried to ride in a group before I was slightly nervous about getting close to the rear wheel of the guy in front, all of this despite being constantly encouraged to get as close as possible.
The ride was gentle until the last 10 miles when everyone started breaking away and I was told that the pace would quicken to as fast as you can go without anyone waiting for you. I am not sure if this is typical of the Sunday rides but it certainly did give me a work out for the last part.
The ride ended up being just over 25 miles and I completed that within 1hr 30 mins which is fairly good for me. There is a ride every Sunday and I'll hopefully be doing a supposedly longer ride (70 miles) in a week's time. I enjoyed the ride but found the new experience of riding with someone else strange, it will take a few rides to help me decide whether or not club riding is really for me.
Then yesterday I thought I'd at least make a start and do something about it. In Crewe we have one well-known local cycling club, the Crewe Clarion Wheelers. I'd known about them for quite some time even before I started riding the year before last. But TBH I never felt compelled to go join a club preferring instead to ride solo where I want and at my own pace.
But I felt I should give it a go and went down to the town centre in Crewe which is the starting point for their Sunday runs. There was only one bloke there when I arrived at 8:55 and over the next 10 minutes 5-6 more showed up. All seemed friendly and talked about where we would be riding toady, it was generally agreed that a short ride towards Cholmondeley and back would be preferable.
We set off at a gentle pace averaging around 18mph on Nantwich Road heading towards Nantwich. I was taking it relatively easy at the back of the group in the slipstream chatting to one of the blokes. I did notice that for the majority of the ride, regardless of lane width, that the group cycled two-abreast. Not that I have anything against that sort of road positioning it just seemed a little weird to be taking up half a lane all of the time. It did inevitably attract a few bips of the horn from one motorist who tried to pass approaching a pinch point but other than that the ride was uneventful.
I was pleased to see that even with my Christmas-weakened legs I was still keeping up well with the rest of them. Then I remembered about the slipstream and felt a little deflated
Since I have never tried to ride in a group before I was slightly nervous about getting close to the rear wheel of the guy in front, all of this despite being constantly encouraged to get as close as possible.
The ride was gentle until the last 10 miles when everyone started breaking away and I was told that the pace would quicken to as fast as you can go without anyone waiting for you. I am not sure if this is typical of the Sunday rides but it certainly did give me a work out for the last part.
The ride ended up being just over 25 miles and I completed that within 1hr 30 mins which is fairly good for me. There is a ride every Sunday and I'll hopefully be doing a supposedly longer ride (70 miles) in a week's time. I enjoyed the ride but found the new experience of riding with someone else strange, it will take a few rides to help me decide whether or not club riding is really for me.
were you all on motorbikes?
