CYCLING ADVENTURES
Strangely, I don’t remember when I learnt to ride a bike.
The first bike I remember having was from around the age of 8 to 15. There was nothing sleek and sexy about the Raleigh Shopper (apologies to Raleigh for saying so).
I lived at the top of a steep hill and my route home from any direction was up. Hard work on a bike with small wheels and with that tartan bag filled with anything from tennis kit to picnics to newspapers for the deliveries I did on it from the age of 13. In those days, children were free to roam and me and my Raleigh Shopper travelled to and from the nearest town 5 miles away and beyond on a series of adventures.
At age 15, with the help of a mail-order catalogue and my paper round money, I bought myself my first road bike. Of course, then they were known as racing bikes. It opened up a whole new world of adventure as I could ride faster and further. No one I knew rode bikes, so these were usually solo rides to random places in neighbouring counties chosen only for their everincreasing distance from home as I clocked up the miles.
At 16, I got my provisional licence and bought a moped (a much-loved FS1E, for those interested) and later passed my test and bought a bigger bike (a VF400 for those same interested readers). These took me on different adventures, and my road bike languished unloved and forgotten.
At some point in my early 20s, I became aware of the adventures to be had on the newly available mountain bikes. I bought a shiny new Scott Sawtooth. I was involved in teaching climbing by this point and loved that I could literally ride to work on my bike. My love of cycling was revived in an entirely new form. The challenge of increasing the distance of my early riding was replaced by new challenges, such as descending down steep slopes (occasionally flights of stairs) or negotiating the twisting trails around some of the sandstone outcrops where I was working.
For a few years, that same bike was my entire means of transport. I had moved to a city and commuted several hundred miles a week. Most of my journeys were along a seafront and the bike was the quickest way to get from A to B without being in the traffic. For me, there is something like going out to play about a mountain bike even when riding on the tarmac. It’s a robust bike, which enables you to go anywhere (albeit not necessarily fast). It reminded me of the adventures I had enjoyed in my teens. Then I hit another of those life junctions, where something you love doing can so easily get put to one side and forgotten about. I became not just a parent but a single parent. I had no wider family support, so it was just me and my very lovely son. For a couple of years, my bike lay unused again as I coped with the daily care and tiredness which comes with being a single parent. Then I discovered the joy of bike trailers. That trailer enabled a new world of adventure. By now I was living on the edge of Dartmoor. There were regular rides out on the moor. My son was protected from any weathers and had a small stash of toys and books in the trailer with him. We could stop for picnics in relatively remote locations.
Our greatest adventure at that time was riding Route 27, which runs South to North (other directions are available!) through Devon. We lived on the route, so picked it up from home and took a little detour at the end to stay near a beach, so my boy could have a ‘normal’ holiday for a few days.
If you look closely at the photo, you will see that in the trailer with him was our entire camping kit and clothes for the trip. The icing on the cake for him was that we also had a selection of inflatable toys which we could play with at each of the camp-sites we stayed at along the way. In personal and cycling development terms, that trip for me was the point when I realised I could
combine being a mother with getting out and having adventures. Those adventures were also a great bonding time with my son. I had evolved into a new type of cyclist.
Those adventures with the trailer continued until my son was too big for it. At that point, I bought a tag-along bike. This initially limited the distance we could travel, especially in poor weather, but did enable us to continue getting out together. He used to sit on the back telling me he was being my second engine!
Due to some health problems and surgeries he had over a few years, cycling became impossible for him and limited for me. I was around 40 at the time, which I and many see as another of those life junctions when it is easy to let some things slide into your past. I did manage to continue cycling, but it was occasional, mostly commuting to work, and without the sense of adventure I had found when younger. I should say that some of those commuting journeys were to my yoga studio on the edge of Dartmoor, to my home in Princetown in the centre of the moor, and also the highest point in southern England, so not short of physical challenge.
Then I met Ian, now my husband. He had been competing in cycling and triathlon events for years. He introduced me to the world of cycling competitively and also to the concept of training specifically for an event. My first triathlon was on Lanzarote. The challenge for me on that event had (I thought) been the swim as I had spent the previous 6 months going from being the sort of swimmer who breathed in as much water as air in each length, to being able to effectively swim 750m in the sea. I thought I was a competent cyclist and runner, so it hadn’t occurred to me that that might be a challenge on the day.
As it happened, there was a big storm prior to the event. The swim had to be cancelled and was replaced by an extra run. I learnt that cycling
10km up a volcano after running and then descending with Lanzarote’s notoriously strong wind blowing from the side was a big challenge. The final run was a relief as it meant I was no longer terrified of being blown off the bike.
I was hooked though, and the next
stage of my evolution as a cyclist was started. I have since raced in numerous events on and off road. My favourites so far have been the XTERRA off-road triathlons. I have raced in Switzerland, France, Spain, Malta, and Cyprus.
The mountain biking in each XTERRA event has offered a different technical and physical challenge according to the topography of the location and the number of athletes racing.
Cycling has continued to take higher priority in my life and be a significant part of my work. I have spent a few years working as a Bikeability instructor delivering safe road cycling courses in primary and secondary schools and teaching non-riders to ride. I furthered this qualification to take part in a scheme to educate professional drivers such as lorry drivers how to keep cyclists and other vulnerable road users safe on the road.
I am now qualified as a British Cycling coach and a British Triathlon coach. Initially coaching sessions at a local club, I am now primarily delivering online coaching plans for athletes of varying ages and abilities, helping them to achieve their sporting and life goals by fitting effective training into their lives around all their other commitments. We also have people stay with us in Portugal, enjoying cycling and other training with us.
I am now (well) into my 50s and my cycling aspirations have evolved again. I am still loving the challenge of triathlon, though last year’s planned events didn’t happen. I hope to race a 70.3 in October of this year. This is a ‘middle distance’ triathlon with a 90km bike section (after the 1.9km swim and before the 21km run). My husband surprised me a few months ago with the gift of a second-hand Quintana Roo. If that’s not an evolution from my original Raleigh Shopper I don’t know what is!
I am spending increasing amounts of time at our training venue in central Portugal where the cycling is amazing. I have a bike-packing journey planned for this summer with my husband to ride from North to South on the N2, Portugal’s long road which runs down the centre of the country as a recce for a charity challenge ride we are planning for next year. I am holding in my mind the words of Joe Friel in his book Fast After Fifty that you are not old until you use age as an excuse not to do something.
The message I hope to pass on to others is that cycling is an activity that can fit in all stages of your life, in different ways, at different intensities. You get to choose the type of cyclist you want to be. There is something for everyone. Just keep pedalling.
I coach alongside my husband, also a coach, delivering bespoke online coaching plans for cyclists and triathletes, and running small training camps at our venue in Portugal.