An early start to get to the Olympic Stadium for the start of the inaugural Prudential Ride London 100 event but well worth the 5am get up! The whole event was awesome!!! I was utterly bowled over with the day, the exceptional organisation, marshalling and opportunity to ride on over a hundred miles of closed roads through our capital city, London... A once in a lifetime experience! I was also very proud once again to be raising funds for the Isaiah Trust!
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| Cycling out through London |
The first 20miles or so of the ride passed in the blink of an eye! I was that busy trying to remain aware of the riders around me that I almost missed riding past the sights of the Tower of London and Harrods riding down Knightsbridge!
It was a fast journey out of London... I didn’t drop below 19mph average on my bike computer until about 45miles where the first of the big climbs at Newlands Corner in Surrey kicked in which slowed me up a little (my best previous average event speed was 18.8mph on the Tri bars at Capesthorne Tri earlier this year over only 13miles so to maintain such a speed over 45miles was a shock!)
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| Summit of Box Hill! |
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| Cycling the closed roads in London! |
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| Houses of Parliament on the run in to the finish line |
Other than a few seconds photo stops at the 50mile marker and top of box hill I didn’t stop until the drinks station at about 83miles to restock on drinks. A few moments off the bike on wobbly legs to get the most awful powdered drink I’ve ever tasted!
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| Pall Mall, Approaching the Finish Line! |
The ride back in to London was great and probably about that time I really felt the benefit of drafting and wished I’d cottoned on to that tactic sooner! I tailed a group in from about 85miles in and just seemed to find new legs in their slipstream!?
The finish on Pall Mall was awesome! I felt just like Mark Cavendish on the sprint finish of the Tour de France! ;-)
And then the realisation that the ride was over and photo opportunities outside Buckingham Palace before meeting up with my family for a rest and gorgeous picnic in Green Park... What could possibly be better!... All in all it made for an unforgettable day!
With the cycle ride to and from the start line, I covered a whopping 118miles on the day!!!
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| At the finish outside Buckingham Palace! |
For those interested you can see the full breakdown of my ride from the data uploaded from my Garmin GPS watch here ~ http://connect.garmin.com/activity/354315908
The most important thing of the day though was the invaluable funds raised for the continuing work of the Isaiah Trust! Almost £700! A massive thanks to Julie Jones at EGL for all her hard work baking and running the cake stall and raffle and huge thanks to everyone for their well wishes, donations and general support!
When sending out requests for donations I do often feel anxious and uncomfortable about pestering folks but the rewards are worth it and made worthwhile by some of the comments I got back such as "Thanks for an opportunity to retain some life perspective with the work challenges..." and "There are too few people on this planet that take time out to do things for others .My concern with many modern charities is that the funding ends up going to pay a Chief Exec or worse indirectly funding a conflict. Yours seems very focussed....it is not too much to ask that we support your efforts"... Very humbling!
Nicky and Tim who run the charity cover all their own expenses at enormous costs to themselves so you can rest assured that EVERY penny donated goes direct to helping some of the most under privileged kids on the planet!
Thanks!
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