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I'm thinking of doing a fundraiser/awareness raiser for something, in the form of riding my bike from one symbolic point to another in one day, for a total of approximately 140 miles.
For a regular rider who will happily do a 100km ride on a Saturday morning, do you think - with the appropriate preparation - such a plan is reasonable?
If so, how much time would you suggest I plan for such a ride? And what would you do by way of prep?
Anything's do-able. I did 100miles once after 8 months of barely riding, just planned a route and rode it with a bag of jelly babies. Wasn't flat either (Saltburn-Whitby-Scarbrough-Dalby-Whitby-Guisborough-Saltburn). Another 40 miles on the day would have been helish (TBH the last 50miles already was hellish, just keep turning the pedals) with a modicum of training would be far from impossible.
Being fitter would just make it easier/faster/more fun (or at least less painful).
When? Let me know 🙂
It's a great plan of course, as you know I'm doing something similar. If I were you I'd try a few longer rides just to see how they go. Are you planning road or off-road? They are rather different IMO when distances get long. On road it's positional fatigue that seems to get me. I end up with sore neck, hands, arse and I get cramp earlier than off-road, because there I'm moving around a lot more, lifting bikes over gates and so on.
I think you need some experience of longer rides to get the hang of what you need to eat, what works and what doesn't for stuff like clothing, eating, drinking and so on. Also how to ride, how to choose your pace, and what to expect after the eighth or fifteenth hour.
A 100 mile road ride from your house is easy to plan so you could easily do a few of those. You can extend road rides as far as you like. And in your case, you can do the same for off-road, there is plenty to link up.
I rather like the off-road ITTs (individual time trials) which are often planned by people and publicised in a sort of word-of-mouth way, or sometimes they are official trails like the South Downs Way or the Trans Cambrian Way. To my mind these are much more fun and there are plenty of them.
I did Trans Cambrian Way as the first big ride in many years two years ago, which is 100 miles. I was on form at the time but had very little long distance in my legs. I managed, but it was hard in places and it took a long time. However having done full all day rides in the past I did sort of know what to expect and how to approach it. And I was with someone who knew the route and knew the stops, which helped.
In terms of routes, there's North-South Wales on road, about 220 miles IIRC. You can get the train up there, stay in Conwy and ride home. There are also classics like various coast-to-coast rides - I can see some online that are crossing up north, but I'm sure there was one known route that was something like Aberystwyth to Great Yarmouth.
When? Let me know
Oh, I definitely will. It's an idea that came to me as I was riding to Ogmore today.
I am thinking Monmouth to St David's on-road. But we'll talk about it off-forum.
Why not do Rapha's Manchester to London next weekend ?
Yes, I keep trying to send you facebook messages 🙂 Need something to ride on Monday!
I don't regularly do 60 mile rides but I knocked off a 160 mile and a 240 mile ride last autumn with no major issues.
Pace yourself, refuel sensibly, avoid long stops and you'll be just fine.
Thanks for that, scotroutes. Do you recall approximately how long your 160 miler took you?
16 hours.
And the 230 mile one took 23 hours (well, a bit over 22 really). Some of that was off-road though and there were 2 ferries involved.
http://www.blog.scotroutes.com/2016/09/ncn78-caledonia-way-in-day.html?m=0
A470 end-to-end is basically North-South Wales....