War of Attrition

On the surface this may not appear a very inspirational photo of me but let me explain. I took up cycling at age of 46 to get fit. Managed to complete a JOGLE and following year a LEJOG. Unfortunately after those I was plagued with back sciatica issues. Skip to last year ten years later. I had to have an operation on a disc located finger at the beginning of the year, this was then followed by two long bouts in hospital eventually resulting in an emergency gallbladder removal. A few months later, I had to have a double discectomy, two disc were shaved to release pressure on my nerve! The day after at the end of October 2021 , in my hospital bed I set myself a challenge to take part and complete Chase the Sun South 205miles between sun rise and sunset . Plenty of time to slowly get back to fitness I thought, so I booked it . I left hospital and started to plan . Two weeks later I was back in hospital with full blown sepsis!! Got back out just before Christmas but was pretty much bed ridden until the beginning of March. I had 271 days off between beginning of February 2021 and February 2022 either in hospital or recovering from it.

Yesterday I started and completed the epic ride with my long time cycling buddy Colin. I finish inside the time by a full 12 minutes. It was a war of attrition especially as the rain was full on for the last 30 miles.

Completing this ride was the single most proudest achievement of my cycling efforts and in part I thank GCN , and especially Mark Beaumont and his epic rides and his advice on mind games. I could hear his voice all the way . Thanks GCN 👍🏼

I also want to give a huge shout out to infinity bike seats . My saddle is the Elite Series – E1X. Now it wasn’t love at first sight but with careful setup and support from Dr Vince I found the sweet spot. I’ve never looked back and genuinely had not a single issue after this ride . Amazing. If you want to invest here’s a discount code Gravel4u. I do get a small commission but I am genuine in my endorsement 👍🏼