todays isle of wight randonnee ride

[jonnyboy666]

so, some of you will have seen my training log, see link

http://www.retrobike.co.uk/forum/viewto ... highlight=

the whole reason for the training log was this island ride, to get fit enough to be on the bike for that length of time and for that milage on those hills!! :shock:

bear with me aswel, my laptop/internet has been crap since i got in so i might post in sections to avoid losing an essay again!!! :x :evil:

anyway, i dragged my arse out of bed at 6.45am to catch the 8am ferry :shock: now there is a wake up call as this is the last of my 26 days off!! got to lymington and there were loads of cyclists!!! :shock: found out i had to register for the ride at a school 50 metres from the ferry on the other side. by the time we had crossed the solent and stood in a queue for an eternity it was about 9.15am. people went off as and when they got their little randonnee card so not a group thing, just go when you are ready. i set off in a bunch of 30 or so riders, we headed for freshwater bay, knowing this end of the island quite well i knew what was to come, a steep initial climb followed by a long drwn out climb with no run up. we turned onto the climb, everyone went backwards!! except me strangley!! i seemed to go up the climb pretty well, next there was an awsome decsent with a right hand sweeping bend into a short sharp climb followed by a fast descent onto military road, the wind was behind me, have to say, by my stndards i was flying!! the downhill gave me 41.8mph max, gotta be happy with that

here's the start of the pics, in no particular order, remember i'm doing this in sections due to dodgy internet!! :roll:

 

[jonnyboy666]

the 2nd major climb was "blackgang chine", i remebered this as being a sod and i wasn't wrong, i got up there ok but it was hard, i stopped for a couple of pics and then hit the nice downhill after it. the road then carried on into ventnor, it has some little hairpin bends that remind me of the alps and then it has an exit road that is lifted straight fromalp d'huez itself :shock: god it hurt!! but all the training would have been irrelavent if i get off and walk on any hill regardless of how long or steep so i made myself "suffer" as roadies do. wished i had put the 12-27 cassette on, but last night i just couldn't be arsed so i was running 39/53-11-23, not the easiest of ratios on hilly courses!

i come out of ventnor and follow the road around the edge of the island towards shanklin, good decsent but rough as hell, followed through the centre of that little town and on towards bembridge, then it all started to go wrong.

 

[jonnyboy666]

basically i came to a junction, left or right, the sign for the randonee said right but i was sure it was left. i followed the sign. WRONG!! :roll:

i don't know this end of the island very well as i usually ride the freshwater end mostly offroad but somehow i ended up going back on myself by a different route and by this time i had done maybe 40miles ish.

by the time i realised what had happened i thought sod it! i know where i am right now but i don't know how to get back on the correct route. the proper route was supposed to around the edge of the island, anti clockwise, i had done about 2/3 of the island and ended up at the bottom of culver cliff just outside of sandown. i just thought i'd go back towards shanklin-ventnor- blackgang-freshwater. i knew this would give me a good ride and in real terms the backside of the island is way harder than the frontside. so basically i did a point to point ride with a loop at one end.

i had forgotton just how hard the climb out of shanklin is though, just seems to go on forever and it saps the power from your legs, my speedo was reading 6.6mph but going this way meant i was gonna get the ventnor descent that i had gone up earlier

i came out of ventnor in to some generally uphill rolling hills, bugger.then i noticed i was starting to feel crappy, at 52 miles i had to stop, niton was the place, a little tearoom, 1 x chocolate cake and 1 x marsbar and 1 x can of cola + 2 bottles of water for the bike. that food was gone so quick!!

got back on the bike and headed up the climb towards the top of blackgang chine, started to see loads of riders, these guys must have started at fishbourne, basically depending which ferry you get onto the island there were different start points, i felt a little sorry for them as i knew i had around 14-16 miles left to do and they had atleast 30! then i changed my mind and thought tough titty!!!! the descent after this climb is great, sweeping left hand dowhill straight into a roundabout where you turn right, loads of leaning!!

 

[jonnyboy666]

next section was into the wind :x and again mostly rolling uphills and false flats :x i didn't want to blow so i kept the speed comfortable. i knew at this point i had only 2 more climbs to go, after about 8 miles out of niton i came to the compton climb, i hate it as you can see it looming on the horizon, by the time i got to it i was a little pissed off but somehow i seemed to spin up it quite quickley, unfortunately after the short downhill after it there is the long climb back into freshwater. i couldn't attack it so i just tried to spin up it as best as i could and again, weirdly it seemed to go quite quickley, thank god!! i turned back towards yarmouth, a couple of rolling hills and i was back to the ferry, unfortunately the ferry had just left :x i had to wait for the next one, almost an hour, so the time was right for coffee and doughnut!!

one of the best rides i have done for a long time and i'm chuffed that the training paid off! i'll keep it going for mayhem now

the stats

68miles
16.1 average
41.8 max
time? forgot to reset that, but i worked it out as just over 4 hours actual riding and with those hills i'm chuffed as nuts!

 

[jonnyboy666]

last couple of pics

 

[jonnyboy666]

here's a very basic map!

follow the red line then a loop, then back the same way, if you don't know the shape of the island this will give you a very basic idea!!!

i'm sorry, i am really shit with this stuff!!

 

[barry2017]

Well done!

 

[Pickle]

Cool

I love the IOW

 

[tintin40]

:shock: :shock: I feel tired already. I think my old body wont make it next Sunday. We will be riding off road ???

 

[jonnyboy666]

don't worry tintin, you'll be fine! what we are doing is nothing like that and nearly all off road!