Club run reports - 8th October

Category 6 ride led by Tony Dos Santos

Today was the day, when I realised the cat 6 is like herding cats! 

The weather gods have been shining on us this month. The forecast for today was 25°C, for a trip to Shenley, via the hilly route. 

Hertford was the start location. I rocked up at twenty to nine, but not a soul in sight. Then it happened again, as the whole club turned up. OK, OK, a bit of an exaggeration - fourteen at the start and one to join en route. Welcome to Stewart A, on his first ride. 

I advised everyone who had GPS devices to load their routes, which they duly did - more news on this later! 

We rode off a tad late as we were all too busy chatting. Good to see Richard H back after his fifth bout of Covid. He has a new AKA, which is “Lucky”. Love you Kev! 

Nice to see Lisa on the ride, as her son’s football was cancelled. So change of plan and she jumped on the ride with Elio, who’s coming back from his injuries. 

Off we went along the Lower Hatfield Road. Everyone assumed we were going up Brickendon Lane, but I did say it was the hilly route and instead we ascended Robins Nest Hill. As we were going up, Carolyn said her stupid Garmin (her words) was telling her she was “off route”. We got to the top and Carolyn realised she had loaded the New Forest route, which she did last week. I mean, how can this route be loaded! There will be an inquest after this! 

We rode through Welham Green, and onto South Mimms. 

We got to the top of the hill, before Shenley, where Carolyn and I were chatting and were also the  “Lantern Rouge”. At the top, there was not a rider in sight. I was scratching my head. We turned right and then a quick left and dropped down to the cafe, assuming the other twelve were waiting. But there was no one was there. Now, this is where I was confused, as at least five of the twelve had the route on their Garmins! 

I sent Lisa (another competent ride leader) my location on Google Maps. By now Carolyn was doing her nut (she wasn’t really, but you can imagine what was going on in her head :-)) and I got a message from Lisa saying “turning around”. Now, the reason we left at 9 is because Shenley gets busy. Obviously the twelve riders didn’t understand this! I was actually amused by the whole situation as I think I’ve broken the club record for losing that number of riders. 

The shamed twelve came rolling in, tails between their legs. 

As usual, Shenley fed and watered us in minutes, even with two riders, yes two, having a full English. I’m not going to name and shame Ian and Stewart! 

All finished and having a chat, Claire was cleaning her riding glasses and as we were chatting away, Elio couldn’t find his glasses. This is when the penny dropped - Claire had beautifully cleaned his glasses. Claire did say, she was surprised as the glasses she was cleaning were lovely! 

Now, if you know Carolyn, you will know that she doesn’t like chips, but there she was eating chips (see image attached)!

Just going back to the riders that went the wrong way, the image above is the two riders that did NOT go the wrong way lol. 

There’s also an image of the reprobates, nay the magnificent twelve who were sliding doors (they went left when they should have turned right, lol).

Off we rode and nothing really eventful happened on the way back, or did it…..

As we were riding along, Stewart said he had done a 50km run the day before;  that’s like 400 miles or something! Amazing Stewart, well done. 

We all agreed that today was not the day to race down Brickendon Lane. As we got to the top, Ian shot off, with Peter Bloomfield in hot pursuit. Then Claire shot off. The “real” race is between Lisa and me, as that is the “Battle of Brickendon” isn’t it? 

Off I went in pursuit of the others and racing down, I looked over my shoulder and saw a rider or two behind by about two hundred metres. 

About a mile to go and the race was on, my legs somewhat tired from the one hundred and fifty miles I did over the last three days (don’t think I mentioned that :-)). My legs were screaming, but there was no way I was going to let anyone get past me. I powered down and got to the end and I was the winner, well, when I say winner, I came fourth, but the main thing is, I beat Lisa. 

We got to Hertford and Carolyn and others said goodbye. 

As we turned into Hartham Common, there it was, standing in front of us, the amazing little van that shouted out “come and eat me”. Yes it was the Ice Cream Van. Elio, Lisa and Davina and I had a lush ice cream. The ride was over for another week. 

All in all, a good ride, mayhem ensued as normal, but that’s par for the course isn’t it! 

Obviously, written from the throne with very very very sore legs! 

Love and kisses.