The 2021 Annual Lunacy Challenge

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ColinJ

Puzzle game procrastinator!
Welcome to the 3rd 'Annual Lunacy Challenge'. This challenge is not intended to replace any of the 3 current monthly challenges. They are fine tests of cycling consistency throughout the whole year and I encourage you to attempt any (or all!) of them if you feel able to. This is something different, which you might find interesting. Please read on...

This thread is only for the logging of your qualifying rides.

PLEASE DO NOT POST ANYTHING ELSE BUT QUALIFYING RIDES IN THIS THREAD


1. Choose a target distance, for example 100 miles, but it can be any imperial or metric distance which will be challenging for you to complete thirteen times in a calendar year.

2. The distance is a daily distance, not a 'ride' distance, where a day is defined as 'from getting up to going to bed' (which covers night rides which go beyond midnight). This means that you can add up two or more rides in one day to count towards your target distance and therefore allows, for example, two commuting rides to be added to reach a target. The idea of this is to make achieving longer distances a more realistic proposition for many people who struggle to find enough spare time for individual long rides.

3. Each time you complete a day's riding which meets or exceeds your target distance, post in the challenge thread, stating your target and how many times you've met it at the top and then listing each ride which meets your target below. The post should ideally include details of the rides completed including how far, a list of points on each route, perhaps the elevation gain, and a link to the route(s) if you recorded it/them. The idea of these details is to maintain everyone's interest in where people are riding, as well as their progress towards their goal.

4. Chat about rides, etc. goes in the associated chatzone thread, located HERE. Please don't post anything other than lists of your rides in the challenge thread.

5. Even once you have completed thirteen qualifying rides, you can keep posting new ones where your 'top 13' has changed. Just post your thirteen longest. At the end of the year, your thirteenth longest ride is your actual achievement for the year. NB If you keep cranking out rides exactly hitting your target, you would struggle to exceed it later in the year. For example if your first 10 rides were exactly 100 miles, you would have to do another 13 rides of 101 miles to increase your lunacy challenge achievement to 101 miles! If you like the idea of trying to beat your target, it is always worth adding at least a few miles/kms to as many of your long rides as possible throughout the year. In that respect, every duplicated ride distance is 'wasted', although each will qualify for the basic challenge that you set yourself.

6. Since the only rules are to state a target distance and complete it thirteen times, anyone can join at any point during the year where there are sufficient days left to complete. It also means that an unavoidable break for illness, injury, childbirth, pressure of work, mojo-loss, freak weather conditions, [insert applicable excuse/reason here] would not bring your challenge to an abrupt finish, unless that happened to be so late in the year that you would not have time to complete the challenge once you started riding again.

7. The following year, everyone who met their stated target can display the crescent moon 'Lunacy Challenge' icon in their signature. Something like this:

View attachment 443792 View attachment 443792 Annual Lunacy 2019 (161 kms), 2020 (168 kms)

8. There are many ways of ‘gaming’ this challenge if all you want is a shiny, crescent moon in your signature. (Picking an easy target is the most obvious of those. Seeing how you’ve done in October and entering the challenge then by posting all your best rides is another.) The spirit of the Lunacy Challenge, however, is to stretch yourself beyond whichever every-month-of-the-year challenge you can manage, so your target should really be a distance which you are genuinely unlikely to complete in some or all of the winter months. This should be treated as an opportunity to choose a genuinely challenging target, avoid the hazards of winter, and enjoy a bit of support with it along the way.

Those are the guidelines. Stick as closely as you can to them, but this is supposed to be fun so tweak them to suit yourself. For example - If you only want to count single rides at the qualifying distance rather than daily totals, that is fine.

See you in the Chatzone! :hello:
 

steverob

Guru
Location
Buckinghamshire
Target distance: 62.14 miles (or 100km). Also have 65 miles set as an optional "stretch" goal.
Today's ride: 65.20 miles - https://www.strava.com/activities/4738582885 - First half of ride, roads very wet but skies clear and optimistic they'd dry out. Second half of ride, torrential downpours, roads even wetter! Haven't been soaked through like this since RideLondon 2018.
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Rides in order of distance so far this year:
1. 65.20 miles - 5th February - Got absolutely drenched riding back from Oxfordshire
 
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steverob

Guru
Location
Buckinghamshire
Target distance: 62.14 miles (or 100km). Also have 65 miles set as an optional "stretch" goal.
Today's ride: 62.31 miles - https://www.strava.com/activities/4866533591 and https://www.strava.com/activities/4866724554 - Another jaunt out to Bicester (this time much drier), followed by a short ride with my wife, her first since recovering from injury, to take me to 100km.
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Rides in order of distance so far this year:
1. 65.20 miles - 5th February - Got absolutely drenched riding back from Oxfordshire
2. 62.31 miles - 28th February - Ride around Bicester followed by chaperone duties
 
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steverob

Guru
Location
Buckinghamshire
Target distance: 62.14 miles (or 100km). Also have 65 miles set as an optional "stretch" goal.
Today's ride: 65.77 miles - https://www.strava.com/activities/5020530060 - A trip south and west, ending up just shy of Wallingford and the Thames before heading home. More detours due to road closures, so cut some extra bits off route to keep it at planned distance.
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Rides in order of distance so far this year:
1. 65.77 miles - 27th March - Detour affected route SW down towards the Thames
2. 65.20 miles - 5th February - Got absolutely drenched riding back from Oxfordshire
3. 62.31 miles - 28th February - Ride around Bicester followed by chaperone duties
 
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aferris2

Guru
Location
Up over
Target distance 60 km.

3. 30 Mar 81.94 km Strava The Hanningfields, Bicknacre, Cock Clarks, Woodham Mortimer, Maldon, Heybridge, Goldhanger and return 418 m.
1. 21 Feb 65.23 km Strava Billericay, Mountnessing, Blackmore, Writtle, Chelmsford, Bicknacre, East and West Hanningfield. 383m.
2. 21 Mar 60.74 km Strava Billericay, Mountnessing, Blackmore, Writtle, Chelmsford, Bicknacre, East and West Hanningfield. 385m.
 

steverob

Guru
Location
Buckinghamshire
Target distance: 62.14 miles (or 100km). Also have 65 miles set as an optional "stretch" goal.
Today's ride: 63.12 miles - https://www.strava.com/activities/5149529320 - Rode east, through Hemel and Redbourn, skirting round St. Albans and Harpenden, climbing The Crong en route. Noticibly busier in terms of traffic than it has been for many months.
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Rides in order of distance so far this year:
1. 65.77 miles - 27th March - Detour affected route SW down towards the Thames
2. 65.20 miles - 5th February - Got absolutely drenched riding back from Oxfordshire
3. 63.12 miles - 18th April - East as far as St. Albans and Harpenden, lots of traffic
4. 62.31 miles - 28th February - Ride around Bicester followed by chaperone duties
 
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aferris2

Guru
Location
Up over
Target distance 60 km.
Rides so far: 4

3. 30 Mar 81.94 km Strava The Hanningfields, Bicknacre, Cock Clarks, Woodham Mortimer, Maldon, Heybridge, Goldhanger and return 418 m.
1. 21 Feb 65.23 km Strava Billericay, Mountnessing, Blackmore, Writtle, Chelmsford, Bicknacre, East and West Hanningfield. 383m.
4. 20 Apr 60.99 km Strava Billericay, Mountnessing, Blackmore, Writtle, Chelmsford, Boreham, Baddow. 386m.
2. 21 Mar 60.74 km Strava Billericay, Mountnessing, Blackmore, Writtle, Chelmsford, Bicknacre, East and West Hanningfield. 385m.
 

steverob

Guru
Location
Buckinghamshire
Target distance: 62.14 miles (or 100km). Also have 65 miles set as an optional "stretch" goal.
Today's ride: 67.94 miles - https://www.strava.com/activities/5268916459 - VeloViewer tile hunting in and around Luton, which involved riding on some surfaces that maybe weren't best suited to a road bike. Even went through a ford for the first time - let's just say I was glad it was a warm day!
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Rides in order of distance so far this year:
1. 67.94 miles - 9th May - VeloViewer tile hunting around Luton on variable surfaces
2. 65.77 miles - 27th March - Detour affected route SW down towards the Thames
3. 65.20 miles - 5th February - Got absolutely drenched riding back from Oxfordshire
4. 63.12 miles - 18th April - East as far as St. Albans and Harpenden, lots of traffic
5. 62.31 miles - 28th February - Ride around Bicester followed by chaperone duties
 
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aferris2

Guru
Location
Up over
Target distance 60 km.
Rides so far: 5

3. 30 Mar 81.94 km Strava The Hanningfields, Bicknacre, Cock Clarks, Woodham Mortimer, Maldon, Heybridge, Goldhanger and return 418 m
5. 11 May 81.19 km Strava Whitstable, Herne Bay, Reculver, Margate and return. 224m.
1. 21 Feb 65.23 km Strava Billericay, Mountnessing, Blackmore, Writtle, Chelmsford, Bicknacre, East and West Hanningfield. 383m.
4. 20 Apr 60.99 km Strava Billericay, Mountnessing, Blackmore, Writtle, Chelmsford, Boreham, Baddow. 386m.
2. 21 Mar 60.74 km Strava Billericay, Mountnessing, Blackmore, Writtle, Chelmsford, Bicknacre, East and West Hanningfield. 385m.
 

bluenotebob

Veteran
Location
France
Target distance – 84km

Rides so far – 2

2. 27th May 2021 - 90.87km Home – Pont Ruelland – Gaël – Loscouët-sur-Meu – les Treize Chênes – St Launeuc – le Gué des Meules – Eréac – Lanrelas – Trémorel – Illifaut – Ménéac – Corbinais – Kerminy – St Brieuc-de-Mauron – Home

1. 7th May 2021 - 86.85km Home – Pont Ruelland – Gaël – Loscouët-sur-Meu – Plumaugat – Lanrelas – Eréac – le Gué des Meules – Trémorel – Illifaut – la Ville Jallu – Corbinais – Kerminy – St Brieuc-de-Mauron – Home
 
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