The Imperial Century A Month Challenge Chatzone

[Aravis]

It's sad to see participation in this challenge apparently in decline. I've had a look through the historical threads; however hard I look I can only find 8 finishers in 2020 but apart from that I concur with @ianrauk's numbers.

Since the beginning of 2008, 68 people have entered the challenge at some point, and 38 of these completed at least once. There have been 124 successful campaigns to the end of 2022.

It gets more interesting when we look at the records of all participants in diagrammatic form. Fairly obviously, green indicates that a rider completed the challenge in a particular year, red indicates that the challenge was started but not completed:

A few observations:

• The world as we know it began at the start of 2011. No-one who had completed before ever did so again.
• Until 2019 a healthy number of new riders joined the challenge each year. Some of these became regulars and participation expanded each year.
• The last new rider joined at the start of 2020, before the vast majority of us had any inkling of what was about to be unleashed on an unsuspecting world.

Looking on the bright side, all four of this year's entrants are experienced regulars, so the flag still flies strongly. Could I can once again find it in me to get ready for a day's riding and head out into the early morning darkness? It seems unlikely. But ICaM was something I loved doing - many very happy memories.

 

[Dogtrousers]

That's a fantastic analysis @Aravis I pretty quickly managed to find my own row.

The only suggestion I'd make would be to add 2023 with an amber bar for those in progress, which is what prompted this discussion.

It looks like '18 and '19 were the classic years with high numbers of starters and high completion rate. But 2020 not only had a low completion rate (as you'd expect) but also lower number of starters. As you said, no one knew what was to come in 2020 so we can't blame Covid for that. I started the challenge that year with great hopes. Personally, I was actually knocked out of the challenge in 2020 due to crashing and wrecking my bike (and not doing myself much good) before lockdown intervened.

Using your data above, and going back to the start of "the world as we know it" in 2011, here's a summary of totals:

 

[Rickshaw Phil]

February's ride is done for me. 102.26 miles round South Shropshire yesterday, on a day that turned out to be much colder feeling than expected from the forecast. I did struggle quite a bit with this one and thought about abandoning more than once. Stubbornness won through though.

The ride write up is here for anyone interested: https://www.cyclechat.net/threads/your-ride-today.173254/post-6915773

A few of the snaps that didn't make it into the report:

 

[robjh]

Just got back from February's ride, a one-way to Lincoln with a train home. This is a good ride on a winter day with a wind from the south, and gets surprisingly hilly in southern Lincolnshire after Stamford and around Grantham. I chose this way to avoid the Fens - I've ridden the flatlands numerous times and the appeal has largely worn off. The route includes about 3 miles of very rough pavement right beside the A1, but it provides a useful direct way from Wansford to Stamford, where I had breakfast at just over half way.
The sun only came out after that, but gave a nice afternoon of hazy sunshine, finally turning very cold towards sunset in Lincoln. I arrived there in plenty of time for my train and had a look round the cathedral area on its hill in the middle of town. Lots of cobbles there!
I was on 112 miles by the time I got to Lincoln station, and finished with another 8 miles home at the other end.

 

[Supersuperleeds]

Just got back from February's ride, a one-way to Lincoln with a train home. This is a good ride on a winter day with a wind from the south, and gets surprisingly hilly in southern Lincolnshire after Stamford and around Grantham. I chose this way to avoid the Fens - I've ridden the flatlands numerous times and the appeal has largely worn off. The route includes about 3 miles of very rough pavement right beside the A1, but it provides a useful direct way from Wansford to Stamford, where I had breakfast at just over half way.
The sun only came out after that, but gave a nice afternoon of hazy sunshine, finally turning very cold towards sunset in Lincoln. I arrived there in plenty of time for my train and had a look round the cathedral area on its hill in the middle of town. Lots of cobbles there!
I was on 112 miles by the time I got to Lincoln station, and finished with another 8 miles home at the other end.
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I ride to Lincoln a lot from Leicester and get the train back, though to make it 100 miles you have to do a lot of zig zagging or head east and then loop back round. I did 115 miles last weekend to there.

 

[robjh]

I've just done March's one, and it was one of the wettest long rides I've ever done.
We didn't expect it to be quite this wet and set out at 8 am. in the hope of a greyish day with an occasional passing shower, but at 10 o'clock the rain started, got heavier and heavier, and didn't stop till 3. Nonetheless it was an excellent day out, with seven of us who have ridden together many times before, and the mood never dropped, in fact becoming more cheerful and sillier in the face of such meteorological adversity. There were cold and wet hands and feet aplenty, we shivered at the stops, but we won't forget this ride easily!

It was a rerun of one of my routes from last year, from Cambridge out west to Sandy and Ampthill, south over the Chiltern ridge via Sharpenhoe Hill (short but vicious) and Lilley, then a stop at Spokes CC café at Codicote, before returning to Cambridge via Puckeridge and Clavering.

My Garmin started misbehaving on the last stretch, I suspect through water ingress where one of the rubber socket covers has come off, and so far I am unable to retrieve the ride by any means I can think of. Nonetheless I know I finished on 107 miles, and this is a map from one of my team-mates

This photo with a wet lense isn't great but gives a flavour of the conditions

and these were at Spokes in Codicote

 

[Dogtrousers]

I've just done March's one, and it was one of the wettest long rides I've ever done.
We didn't expect it to be quite this wet and set out at 8 am. in the hope of a greyish day with an occasional passing shower, but at 10 o'clock the rain started, got heavier and heavier, and didn't stop till 3. [...]

My Garmin started misbehaving on the last stretch, I suspect through water ingress where one of the rubber socket covers has come off, and so far I am unable to retrieve the ride by any means I can think of. Nonetheless I know I finished on 107 miles, and this is a map from one of my team-mates

I know how you feel. Forecast was grey with a few raindrops for me too, and I got absolutely soaked, although I was only out for 100k. Mind you, my 100ks take longer than some people's imperial tons.

Re the lost socket cover, I had the same problem and raised a ticket with https://support.garmin.com asking them if it was possible to buy them (as I couldn't find one, even from obscure ebay sellers). Anyway they sent me one free and gratis. Of course, if your Garmin doesn't recover after drying out it will be a case of locking the stable door after the horse has bolted.

 

[Supersuperleeds]

I’m currently 65 miles into my March century. So far no rain, but a lot of very wet roads. I’ve had a headwind most of the way, so looking forward to a tailwind on the last stretch.

 

[Supersuperleeds]

I've just done March's one, and it was one of the wettest long rides I've ever done.
We didn't expect it to be quite this wet and set out at 8 am. in the hope of a greyish day with an occasional passing shower, but at 10 o'clock the rain started, got heavier and heavier, and didn't stop till 3. Nonetheless it was an excellent day out, with seven of us who have ridden together many times before, and the mood never dropped, in fact becoming more cheerful and sillier in the face of such meteorological adversity. There were cold and wet hands and feet aplenty, we shivered at the stops, but we won't forget this ride easily!

It was a rerun of one of my routes from last year, from Cambridge out west to Sandy and Ampthill, south over the Chiltern ridge via Sharpenhoe Hill (short but vicious) and Lilley, then a stop at Spokes CC café at Codicote, before returning to Cambridge via Puckeridge and Clavering.

My Garmin started misbehaving on the last stretch, I suspect through water ingress where one of the rubber socket covers has come off, and so far I am unable to retrieve the ride by any means I can think of. Nonetheless I know I finished on 107 miles, and this is a map from one of my team-mates
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This photo with a wet lense isn't great but gives a flavour of the conditions
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and these were at Spokes in Codicote
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If it is important to you, you can easily fake a ride to get it into Strava

 

[robjh]

On the wet Garmin front, I can report that leaving it in bowl of rice overnight to draw out the moisture works like a wonder, and today all is back to normal. I recovered the file from yesterday by connecting to the laptop and using the fit file repair tool. Yesterday it wouldn't even register that the Garmin was there.

 

[13 rider]

Marchs done 107 miles ,Kept dry very overcast . Headed towards Coventry ,Rugby and Lutterworth collecting a few veloveiwer squares

 

[robjh]

Marchs done 107 miles ,Kept dry very overcast . Headed towards Coventry ,Rugby and Lutterworth collecting a few veloveiwer squares

A good choice to do it today and not yesterday 🌧️

 

[Supersuperleeds]

A good choice to do it today and not yesterday 🌧️

I think, apart from today, it has rained every day during March in Leicester. It has been horrendous weather wise.

I tell a lie, there were two days when it didn’t rain, that’s because it was that cold the water fell as snow.

 

[13 rider]

A good choice to do it today and not yesterday 🌧️

Correct

I think, apart from today, it has rained every day during March in Leicester. It has been horrendous weather wise.

I tell a lie, there were two days when it didn’t rain, that’s because it was that cold the water fell as snow.

I was being to think I might not get a March ride in

 

[ianrauk]

Unlike poor Rob, I chose probrably the only day I'm March not to have any rain. It stayed dry all day today though the roads were pretty mucky in places. Strange temperatures though, at 6.30am it wass showing 7degs, but didn't feel like it. A few hours riding and it was warming up but only by 4 or 5degs, but once again, not feeling cold.
Anyhow.. March's qualifying ride done and dusted. A few future Eddingtons to boot.
A great days cycling. 118 miles on the clock

That there London, from Orpington

One for the post box thread. Check out the age of the pub.

There's Sheep's there.