The Annual Lunacy Climbing Challenge Chatzone

[Dogtrousers]

Yes, I think I should aim for an honourable failure rather than just 'doing a López' (abandoning in a strop)!

I want to do that toughie but I worry slightly about the health risks! (I'm not entirely joking - my heart has the rhythm flutters again tonight and that was after just doing a flat singlespeed ride to Hebden Bridge and back.) On the steepest ramps I'll have to do it at the slowest speed that I can manage without having to put a foot down.

Take care, but keep at it! You just need to find a balance.

I had to put my foot down on the steepest bit of York's Hill (I think it's ~20% at its steepest. Some people say more, I don't think so). I hit a bit of debris, wobbled sideways and that was it. But I was enormously proud of the fact that I managed to restart.

The mucky, rubbishy back lanes also gave my mudguard QRs a chance to show their paces. Somehow a stick made its way into my spokes and pop! the stays detatched. Fortunately I wasn't going much faster than walking pace at the time.

I saw some pretty stupid cyclist behaviour on some of those tiny lanes (about 1 o'clock of my loop). These are very steep, sunken high sided lanes, often twisty, often debris-strewn, only room for a single vehicle, often with blind entrances and I saw three riders come flying down one of them as I creaked up. Now I don't expect everyone to descend like me - not much faster than I climb - but a bit of caution is needed.

I also saw a quite amusing incident. As I climbed Toy's hill I saw two cyclists approaching behind in my mirror. The first passed me quite quickly, but the second, who I guess was trying to keep up with his faster mate, suddenly popped and transformed from "cyclist approaching from behind" to "cyclist weaving all over the road". I felt quite sorry for him. His mate was waiting at the top and he had the ignomy of being led up the hill by a trundly old git.

 

[ColinJ]

Well, I did my second qualifying ride this evening, the same route as my first ride only done in the opposite direction. It is tough both ways, but I think this way is slightly harder.

I didn't want to do it in the full heat of the day so I didn't start until after 17:00. The light was lovely until about 19:15 but I was riding too slowly to get round in daylight. I did several of the last few kms on unlit roads. I had taken emergency lights but the front is definitely a 'be seen by' light NOT a 'see by' one! It was a mistake. If I'd had a puncture after sunset then I would have been trying to fix it in the dark! And the steep descent into Todmorden in poor light was a bit scary...

Another time, I would give myself an extra hour. Mind you, that could well be the last day this year when I will worry about feeling too hot when riding so I'll probably just go out at midday instead!

 

[Dogtrousers]

I've got some good routes planned, but real life is getting in the way.

In the meantime, this colour coded topographic map looks like a really good resource for route planning. If only you could plot GPX tracks on it.

https://en-gb.topographic-map.com/

 

[Sea of vapours]

In the meantime, this colour coded topographic map looks like a really good resource for route planning.

Hmm..... very nice, though what the England one mostly seems to illustrate is how impressive your routes are to achieve the climb rate in low lying countryside! Then again, my difficulty in route planning for this is the loop aspect. It's fairly easy to get the climb rate high due to all the high things here, but remarkably tricky to end back at the start after the optimal thousand metres ascent due to the sheer size of the climbs and the paucity of roads to choose from. Perhaps the ideal terrain for this is, after all, very crinkly with lots of roads.

 

[Dogtrousers]

Then again, my difficulty in route planning for this is the loop aspect.

What I've learned is: Proper loops are really difficult. Out-and-back is way easier. Or a branching collection of out-and-backs.

I've just been and checked the original thread to verify if out-and-backs are OK, and it's actually not clear on this point. I hope they are, because I've made heavy use of them! Even my proper loops sometimes have small sections where the road is used in both directions - where there's a small sub-loop like a balloon on a string, and the string is used both ways.

 

[Sea of vapours]

I've just been and checked the original thread to verify if out-and-backs are OK

Agreed on the proper loops difficulty. Several of mine are loops .... Hmm..... actually, that's only true for values of 'several' equating to 'two'; and those two are the same one, near enough, in opposite directions. Scratch that then :-)

We definitely did discuss the out and back thing. Colin relented on that one in this post . I knew that since I'd not be doing it at all otherwise

And to add to that, unless someone is doing a stealth version and not posting here, then only you, Colin and I are doing it, making it rather moot as to the precise interpretation of the rules As it is, I gave up on my self-imposed rule of not repeating routes ages ago. Also - and I'd forgotten this - Colin was suggesting doing the same route and trying to improve the time: not the best proposal ever, that one

Oh dear: I was imagining I'd done nine or ten and reviewing the threads has shown me that it's only eight.

 

[ColinJ]

I have plotted a route that at least looks interesting...

I thought that the loop around Pendle hill would do it but it was way short so I had to add that extra loop through Blacko with out-and-back to join it on. It was still short, so I then added a silly little detour down to Higham and back up to the nice lane that I wouldn't normally have left. STILL short so I included the out-and-back to/from Padiham Heights at the start and finish. It will be very close... Memory Map reckons 1,152 metres of ascent but it is exaggerating. I think that I can see about 1,030 m and hopefully it will be around 1,050 metres. It is 39.6 km so I don't really have enough spare distance to add much more climbing and keep the distance within my target.

Bonus: I'll ride there and back to get 100 km in for the day and kill 2 Lunatics in 1 day on the bike.

(Fear not... I will not be riding on the nasty A59 - that section near Clitheroe is mainly on a couple of nearby lanes, and there is a cycle path to join them up. I just have to make it across the road in one piece! )

I had thought of doing the ride in the middle of this week but it has been too windy. I'll check the forecast for Saturday again tomorrow and see if that looks ok for it.

 

[Dogtrousers]

Looks good. My point about loops being difficult is borne out by the flat bit at 30 km. This always happens when I'm planning a "nice" hilly loop. I always end up having a flat bit that gets in the way and drags down the overall %.

 

[ColinJ]

Looks good. My point about loops being difficult is borne out by the flat bit at 30 km. This always happens when I'm planning a "nice" hilly loop. I always end up having a flat bit that gets in the way and drags down the overall %.

Yes - that is the unavoidable section alongside the A59.

My first attempt at planning this route was entirely out-and-back, over the Nick of Pendle in each direction, and so on. The thing is, looking at that, I just didn't want to ride it!

 

[Sea of vapours]

The thing is, looking at that, I just didn't want to ride it!

Exactly! This is, I think, the inherent problem with this challenge, as we may have discussed on the Bowland ride: routes tend to be unappealing. It's not so much that they are steep, it's that they are often aesthetically unsatisfying; inelegant if you like. Having said that, I do rather like my 'all three ways up to the Kirkstone Inn' route and I do hope to do it again in October when the Lakes has become a little less of a grockle-fest and thus the roads are quieter, if not quiet as such. It's a sort of easier version of doing all three routes up Mont Ventoux continuously and with, I'd argue, better scenery ;-)

 

[ColinJ]

Yes!

I will do my horribly hard out-and-back local ride just one time, so that...

1. I can say that I have done it.
2. To remind me to forget about it and to never mention it again***!

*** Unless by some miracle I actually enjoy it, and it doesn't make me fear for my life!

 

[Sea of vapours]

Aha! I checked and, using just the two roads to the actual summit of Mont Ventoux (the third splits off too far down to be useful here) the distance required is 26.8km, which is over a kilometre more than the Kirkstone. So Kirkstone is *better* than Ventoux in this respect. Excellent stuff!

 

[Dogtrousers]

It's a sort of easier version of doing all three routes up Mont Ventoux continuously and with, I'd argue, better scenery ;-)

Funny you should mention that. I've got a big birthday coming up year after next and I've decided to go to the continent to ride up some big things. Ventoux sprang to mind immediately but the more I looked into it the less appealing it became. I fear it may be rammed with cyclists, and although it has a kind of brutal beauty it does look a bit ... harsh.

I'm still pondering where to go. The Grand Colombier is a front runner. And they have a special club, the Fêlés du Grand Colombier, like the Cinglés du Mont Ventoux, for multiple ascents in a day - but their bar is lower, only two ascents required. It looks quite nice round there and there should be other stuff to do. Maybe even get to visit CERN.

Then there's logistics - I don't think I'd want to have to take my bike and I fancy hiring a really fancy road bike. I've never ridden a carbon bike in my life.

Plenty of time to plan ... There's always Kirkstone ...

 

[ColinJ]

I have just Street Viewed my Pendle route. I thought that I had ridden all of the roads before but, to my great surprise, I haven't! About 13 km of the 40-odd are new to me. Some of them are singletrack which would be a right pain with traffic, but SV showed hardly any cars on them. Many of the pictures were taken this summer.

 

[ColinJ]

Memory Map reckons 1,152 metres of ascent but it is exaggerating. I think that I can see about 1,030 m and hopefully it will be around 1,050 metres. It is 39.6 km so I don't really have enough spare distance to add much more climbing and keep the distance within my target.

I tackled it on Sunday... It turned out that for once MM was about right - my Garmin clocked it at 1,156 m and it certainly didn't feel much less than that! A tough little loop. The HR of 29.5 makes it seem slightly easier than it actually was because about 25% of the loop was easy - the climbing was pretty tough in places.

I could have got away without my little detour through Higham, but it made a change to go that way.

It is interesting to find little villages like Higham which have now been bypassed by A-roads. Worston, later in the ride, was another example. I reckon it was once on a lane from Downham to Clitheroe but the A59 bypasses it now.