Sunday 27 February 2011

Its getting closer....

Time is ticking on and May is fast approaching. Less than a 100 days to go and preparations are in full swing. I thought a brief update on a few things was much needed.

Bed and Breakfasts

We met up early February to review the final route, collated by Rodger (and available on the Route pages of this blog) we have split the route down and each taken a number of days to find accommodation for. Easier said than done! Some of the villages and locations we finish the day in have just one bed and breakfast. When there are 7 of you that can make things interesting.

I am certainly looking forward to discovering what a "put em up" temporary bed looks like and whether I get any sleep in it :)


Fundraising

We are increasing our fundraising efforts. We have created information pages and on line sponsor forms on the Intranet at work that we are publishing in a variety of ways. I have even tried pure bribery taking donuts and cakes in on a Friday and offering them in exchange for sponsorship. This is working well.

we also have a half page article in my local Parish Magazine March edition, talking about the challenge ahead and asking for support through sponsorship. This is starting to generate interest in my local community. Watch this space for further updates.

Training

I have been trying to acclimatize myself in the best way possible and starting to ride in all weathers from high winds gusting at 50 - 60mph to setting out on frosty mornings when the temperature is below freezing. So far so good. I am looking forward to the clocks changing and longer evenings to allow more opportunity to train mid week as its purely weekends at the moment.

We have also only been on one group ride so far this year and will need more of them to get used to riding as a team.

Its getting very real now and I am excited!

Thanks for reading, thanks for following and thanks for all your support so far.

Ian

Saturday 12 February 2011

Friday 11 February 2011

December / January Update

Not much cycling during the Xmas period. Training did continue, however, with 41 miles on the rowing machine in December, and 47 miles on the rowing machine in January.

After one aborted ride of just over 4 miles in January (very cold, fingers nearly fell off and had to turn back), I did manage a 16 mile ride the day after (now with extra layers and proper gloves).

I've also bought more stuff ready for the ride. I'll publish a full list soon.

We also had another team meeting (yes, down the pub again) and agreed the final route. The Our Route page is now updated with the details copied from BikeRouteToaster.com. I'll add links to the published routes at some point.

On with the training...