A sunny and warm morning greeted a good number of riders out this morning.
The long run left for Dagfields, and similarly, we left for Audlem via one of Al’s magical mystery cycle tours. A great day out it was too.
We headed out through the lanes towards Nantwich and then Wrenbury at a non-too shabby pace for almost the entire journey (average 16.6mph by my GPS), with hardly any stops, no punctures or delays. So much so, that we had to throttle off a little so that we didn’t arrive too early. We met a few early triathletes out on the course in the Cheshire Triathlon. The usual run up the hill for the cafe sprint was punctuated by some temporary traffic lights at the bottom of the hill, but at the top, Al dug in and made an honest sprint to take 1st at the cafe.
We did arrive early, and the Priest House was already busy. This was okay though, and we all ordered tea, apart from Spanish Jed, who went for green tea – just to be different and a little bit more continental, I think.
Caroline entertained us with stories of pumping up her tyres, and eventually we were served with bacon butties and beans on toast aplenty on some of the most impressively thick homemade slabs of bread that I’ve seen.
..so this guy says, I’ll lend you my pump, but you will have to pump it, and I’ll watch… oo..err..
We thus gorged ourselves on the feast, although our Chairman, as the evidence clearly shows, didn’t eat his crusts. You’ll never grow up to be big and strong if you don’t eat your crusts.
Shameful..
..eat your crusts (evidence quickly hidden by serviette and sheepish guilty look).
The ride back was equally held at a good pace (by the time I turned off, we were clocking an average of 16.8mph), and all seemed to be happy with the loop put in back past Reaseheath and we saw many more triathletes cycling along on some interesting machinery. A mix of full-on tri-bar equipped TT bikes, and first timers eager to give it a go on knobbly-shod full-suspension mountain bikes!
On we soldiered and were soon back at Whitegate where the slog up the hill began. I’d been on the front for 90% of the day, so just churned on whilst happily followed. At the predicted juncture, Wood, with fresh legs from a day safely nestled in the bunch (!!), easily pushed forward followed by many others. I assume he took the sprint. Shortly after, I turned off towards home. Around 52 miles by my reckoning for the run, as I had just over 76 on the clock when I got home.
Another great run by Al, and a fantastic day to be out on the bike.