The Annual Lunacy (aka "I Don't Do Winter") Challenge Chatzone

[ColinJ]

That's another Lunacy Challenge completed. Five done now. That said, whilst my target is 150km, and I've done thirteen, my stretch target is 161km, AKA an imperial century, and I've posted twelve of those, so I certainly hope to get the thirteenth ridden sometime in the next few weeks

Well done!

I had hoped to do 3 metric century rides on my recent Devon trip but after the first 2 I ended up fighting off a nasty lurgy*** that my sister was suffering from so I decided to be sensible and help her with her gardening instead! I still feel a bit rough so I don't see me doing another longish ride for at least a week. Completing this year's challenge will be, er, challenging again!

I'll keep my legs turning on some easy short local rides until I feel better.


*** It may have been Covid; her test was negative, but I'm not sure that she did it properly. (She swabbed her throat. The tests that I have done all used nasal swabs.)

 

[Sea of vapours]

Thanks Colin.

I hope you feel improved enough to get a longer ride in sooner rather than later. Two in Devon is still pretty good going though :-)

 

[ColinJ]

I hope you feel improved enough to get a longer ride in sooner rather than later. Two in Devon is still pretty good going though :-)

They were pretty easy by Devon standards!

The first ride had only about 1,000 m of ascent. (The 65 km from Exwick/Exeter to Exmouth and back is almost entirely flat using the Exe Estuary Trail.)

The other had more like 1,500 m, though most of that was in the very lumpy first half. The return leg was on the Estuary trail again, though the first part of that was on the other side of the Exe.

I was feeling fairly pleased with myself doing about 30 km/hr into the wind along the trail, but then a couple of lads on knobbly-tyred mountain bikes overtook me and disappeared into the distance ahead... That put my efforts into perspective!

 

[Alex321]

10th ride today. Absolutely beautiful weather for bike riding, so I though I'd go for a fairly long one - at 40 miles, my 2nd longest of the year in fact. And one of the more enjoyable rides of the year.

Included one bit of road I'd never ridden before, and a bit more that I had only done in the other direction, once, in the dark and raining (that was when getting D-E-F-G in the ABC of towns/villages).

 

[Sea of vapours]

Stretch target of an imperial century, or thirteen of them in fact, duly completed. Phew!

What a great day. I like warmth and today was the first time this year that I've gone out for a long ride with just a jersey / shorts and no 'spare' clothes, since it really wasn't going to either be wet or too cold. Hebden Bridge and its environs really are somewhat hilly. I, entirely predictably, found myself leaving it up a rather steep thing just at the hottest, sunniest part of the day, and it went on being rather upward for quite a while from there. That road over the top past Warley Moor Reservoir really is mighty fine, @ColinJ ; well worth the trip, which is essentially what today's long-planned ride was about. Come to that, the road past the 'salt and pepper pots' follies was good too. My new road quotient on that ride was much higher than is typical.

I'd probably not have done that ride today were it not for this challenge, so it proves its worth yet again :-)

 

[FrothNinja]

Stretch target of an imperial century, or thirteen of them in fact, duly completed. Phew!

What a great day. I like warmth and today was the first time this year that I've gone out for a long ride with just a jersey / shorts and no 'spare' clothes, since it really wasn't going to either be wet or too cold. Hebden Bridge and its environs really are somewhat hilly. I, entirely predictably, found myself leaving it up a rather steep thing just at the hottest, sunniest part of the day, and it went on being rather upward for quite a while from there. That road over the top past Warley Moor Reservoir really is mighty fine, @ColinJ ; well worth the trip, which is essentially what today's long-planned ride was about. Come to that, the road past the 'salt and pepper pots' follies was good too. My new road quotient on that ride was much higher than is typical.

I'd probably not have done that ride today were it not for this challenge, so it proves its worth yet again :-)

Congrats, that quite some feat

 

[ColinJ]

Stretch target of an imperial century, or thirteen of them in fact, duly completed. Phew!

What a great day. I like warmth and today was the first time this year that I've gone out for a long ride with just a jersey / shorts and no 'spare' clothes, since it really wasn't going to either be wet or too cold. Hebden Bridge and its environs really are somewhat hilly. I, entirely predictably, found myself leaving it up a rather steep thing just at the hottest, sunniest part of the day, and it went on being rather upward for quite a while from there. That road over the top past Warley Moor Reservoir really is mighty fine, @ColinJ ; well worth the trip, which is essentially what today's long-planned ride was about. Come to that, the road past the 'salt and pepper pots' follies was good too. My new road quotient on that ride was much higher than is typical.

I'd probably not have done that ride today were it not for this challenge, so it proves its worth yet again :-)

I'm glad that you enjoyed it - a great effort!

Thanks for inviting me to join you for the local section. I definitely did the right thing turning you down though - I was going to do a short flattish ride instead but my throat was still sore so I made do with a mere 9 km with 125 m of ascent. It looks like the Indian Summer might be over by the time that I am fully de-lurgied.

My brain must be seizing up... Remind me where/what those follies are!

 

[Sea of vapours]

Thanks. It was certainly a /lot/ of effort. I much prefer this sort of temperature, but it undeniably makes things a little harder (and more expensive: I had to buy drinks twice!).

A wise choice on your part not to do it. Apart from anything else, I'm pretty sure you're not a fan of these temperatures in general and the local, to you, section was easily the hardest part and the hottest section of the day.

They are on the road heading east from Cowling, on Earl Crag. One's at: OS Grid Ref: SD 99226 43069 , Altitude: 339 m and the other is about a klick to the west of it. They're rather good.

 

[FrothNinja]

Thanks. It was certainly a /lot/ of effort. I much prefer this sort of temperature, but it undeniably makes things a little harder (and more expensive: I had to buy drinks twice!).

A wise choice on your part not to do it. Apart from anything else, I'm pretty sure you're not a fan of these temperatures in general and the local, to you, section was easily the hardest part and the hottest section of the day.

They are on the road heading east from Cowling, on Earl Crag. One's at: OS Grid Ref: SD 99226 43069 , Altitude: 339 m and the other is about a klick to the west of it. They're rather good.

I've fallen off Earl's Crag twice when climbing solo - once in front of Mrs FN who was not impressed.

 

[Sea of vapours]

I've fallen off Earl's Crag twice when climbing solo - once in front of Mrs FN who was not impressed.

Oops. Whilst I could see that it's not especially high, it did appear to feature rock on which to land; a famously unforgiving material to fall onto, from whatever height !

 

[FrothNinja]

Oops. Whilst I could see that it's not especially high, it did appear to feature rock on which to land; a famously unforgiving material to fall onto, from whatever height !

Falls were 25ft (onto rock - corkscrewed knee then repeated climb and walked down to Cowling to catch the bus) and 18 ft onto loose rock (bit bruised but nowt compared to freaked out missus).
All in all, not recommended.

 

[bluenotebob]

Stretch target of an imperial century, or thirteen of them in fact, duly completed.

Well done !

 

[Sea of vapours]

Thanks @bluenotebob :-)

@FrothNinja I concur on the not recommended aspect there. You got off rather lightly on both occasions really.

 

[FrothNinja]

Thanks @bluenotebob :-)

@FrothNinja I concur on the not recommended aspect there. You got off rather lightly on both occasions really.

Not something I care to test again - coming off the bike off-road is more than enough now, & I'm not keen on that either

 

[ColinJ]

They are on the road heading east from Cowling, on Earl Crag. One's at: OS Grid Ref: SD 99226 43069 , Altitude: 339 m and the other is about a klick to the west of it. They're rather good.

Ah, I know Lund's Tower. This is a picture taken of my pal Bill climbing up ahead of me with the tower above him.

For some reason, I don't recall the other one though I can see on Street View that it is clearly visible from the bottom of the climb.

Did you end up taking that bridleway section round Luddenden Dean or did you go via 'Jowler' on Bank House Ln?