ColinJ
Puzzle game procrastinator!
- Location
- Todmorden - Yorks/Lancs border
Do you fancy doing a 100 mile / 100 km ride with me and @Littgull on Saturday, 23rd March? We will be catching the train out to Garforth station, just to the east of Leeds and doing a big clockwise loop. Our official start time is 09:15, about 5 minutes after our train is supposed to arrive. Obviously, if the train is held up there might be a delay. I'll make sure that I have a phone number for at least a couple of people meeting us at Garforth so I can let them know if there are delays.
NB Despite being a small town, Garforth has a second station (East Garforth) - don't go to that one by mistake!
)
It is an EXTREMELY flat route which I will be tackling on my singlespeed bike. Ideal for anybody else who fancies a long ss/fixed ride, or anybody with gears who would like an easy chatty ride.
I won't be aiming for a quick ride, but given that it is such easy terrain I'd hope that we could manage an average of (say) 20 kph/12.5 mph, giving us a ride time of 8 hours with an hour or so of stops on top of that.
NB I have updated the route, map, profile and GPX below after the discussions which followed on the next few pages. Make sure that you have the latest version for Saturday. Check on Friday evening to see if there have been any last minute changes.
Rough description of route: Garforth, Barwick in Elmet, Aberford, Bramham, Wetherby, Spofforth, Cowthorpe, Boston Spa, Bramham again, Ulleskelf, Cawood (cafe at Cawood park), Wistow, Thorpe Willoughby, Gateforth (shortcut across to Hillam for anybody wanting to do only a metric century; shown on the map by a dashed purple arrow), Carlton, Snaith, Gowdall, Moss, Trumfleet, Thorpe in Balne, Campsall, Norton Priory, Womersley, Cridling Stubbs, Beal, Hillam, Fairburn, Allerton Bywater, 'The Lines', Garforth.
Map:
Elevation profile:
They don't come much flatter than that! Hills will not be a problem. (PS the lumps are so small that the vertical scale is not showing any detail. Garforth is the highest point on the whole route and even that is only at 80 metres above sea level.) Wind ripping across the flatlands might be a problem, but we won't mention that. (I mentioned it once, but I think I got away with it ...
)
We have used the cafe at Cawood Park before and we will use it again for this ride. It means any 100 km riders get the chance to have a stop with us before taking their mid-ride shortcut.
I have been looking for another cafe around Campsall but they all seem to close early on Saturday for some reason. If we can find one on or near the route which will be open by the time we get to it we will have the option for a second stop. (ANY SUGGESTIONS, bearing in mind our proposed average speed and closing times of businesses?)
A GPX file of the proposed route is attached below. I have simplified it to less than 500 trackpoints for those of us determined to get our money's worth from ancient Garmins with limited memory!
I will check as much of the route as I can on Streetview to see if it looks ok but I won't get to ride it beforehand so comments about potential problems would be helpful. There are a few shortish stretches of offroad cycleway such as 'The Lines' which may be muddy if there has been a lot of rain, but most of the route is on quiet roads, or a few proper cyclepaths next to busy roads such as the A1M.
If you like the sound of the ride, express your interest below ... If you have ridden with us before then you know what to expect. If you haven't done a forum ride but fancy a chance to puts some faces to forum names, you'd be welcome to join us.
You don't have to have ridden the distance before, but I'd suggest that you should have comfortably completed a ride of 2/3 of 102 km/63 miles (about 65 km/40 miles) or 2/3 of 161 km/100 miles (about 110 km/65 miles) in the recent past so you are not pushing your limits too far.
NB Despite being a small town, Garforth has a second station (East Garforth) - don't go to that one by mistake!
)It is an EXTREMELY flat route which I will be tackling on my singlespeed bike. Ideal for anybody else who fancies a long ss/fixed ride, or anybody with gears who would like an easy chatty ride.
I won't be aiming for a quick ride, but given that it is such easy terrain I'd hope that we could manage an average of (say) 20 kph/12.5 mph, giving us a ride time of 8 hours with an hour or so of stops on top of that.
NB I have updated the route, map, profile and GPX below after the discussions which followed on the next few pages. Make sure that you have the latest version for Saturday. Check on Friday evening to see if there have been any last minute changes.
Rough description of route: Garforth, Barwick in Elmet, Aberford, Bramham, Wetherby, Spofforth, Cowthorpe, Boston Spa, Bramham again, Ulleskelf, Cawood (cafe at Cawood park), Wistow, Thorpe Willoughby, Gateforth (shortcut across to Hillam for anybody wanting to do only a metric century; shown on the map by a dashed purple arrow), Carlton, Snaith, Gowdall, Moss, Trumfleet, Thorpe in Balne, Campsall, Norton Priory, Womersley, Cridling Stubbs, Beal, Hillam, Fairburn, Allerton Bywater, 'The Lines', Garforth.
Map:
Elevation profile:
They don't come much flatter than that! Hills will not be a problem. (PS the lumps are so small that the vertical scale is not showing any detail. Garforth is the highest point on the whole route and even that is only at 80 metres above sea level.) Wind ripping across the flatlands might be a problem, but we won't mention that. (I mentioned it once, but I think I got away with it ...
)We have used the cafe at Cawood Park before and we will use it again for this ride. It means any 100 km riders get the chance to have a stop with us before taking their mid-ride shortcut.
I have been looking for another cafe around Campsall but they all seem to close early on Saturday for some reason. If we can find one on or near the route which will be open by the time we get to it we will have the option for a second stop. (ANY SUGGESTIONS, bearing in mind our proposed average speed and closing times of businesses?)
A GPX file of the proposed route is attached below. I have simplified it to less than 500 trackpoints for those of us determined to get our money's worth from ancient Garmins with limited memory!
I will check as much of the route as I can on Streetview to see if it looks ok but I won't get to ride it beforehand so comments about potential problems would be helpful. There are a few shortish stretches of offroad cycleway such as 'The Lines' which may be muddy if there has been a lot of rain, but most of the route is on quiet roads, or a few proper cyclepaths next to busy roads such as the A1M.
If you like the sound of the ride, express your interest below ... If you have ridden with us before then you know what to expect. If you haven't done a forum ride but fancy a chance to puts some faces to forum names, you'd be welcome to join us.
You don't have to have ridden the distance before, but I'd suggest that you should have comfortably completed a ride of 2/3 of 102 km/63 miles (about 65 km/40 miles) or 2/3 of 161 km/100 miles (about 110 km/65 miles) in the recent past so you are not pushing your limits too far.
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