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No, I have a wedding to go to. Thinking of the Denmead on later on, once I've had time to forget what this one made me feel like.

Good work. 400 is a bit of a killer. I prefer 600s as it's generally a more leisurely affair (although I've only done two 600s and one 400).

The Audax people will be round in a couple of days to erase all of the bad memories and you'll soon be looking at the calendar with an eye to 600s...

If anything I'd reckon trackstanding would be slower than a normal start.

It's quite different from a TT/track start where the either the rider is held, or the rear wheel is held in a track start machine; neither of these require the rider to balance or inch back/forth on the pedals.

I seem to pull away much faster from lights by using my unclipped foot to give me a big push, whilst pushing down with the foot that is clipped in, I then clip in the other foot near the top of the pedal stroke ready to push down with that one. There's a small chance I'll fail to clip in on the downstroke, but I can still put quite a bit of power in, and it's easy to ensure the clip in on the way back up. The scoot along the ground with the unclipped foot provides much more speed that I can get purely from one pedal stroke.

From there you've got 10 seconds of sprinting, wrenching the bars and knocking on the door of the vomitorium.

For similarly fit/athletic cyclist and runner:-

<50m: runner

100m: cyclist

Crossover point somewhere inbetween depending on twelfty different variables.

I have one of the Trimetals ones. £450 or so when I got it. Solid, but not impervious. As others have said, it's only held shut with a couple of padlocks. which you could snip with big bolt croppers or cut through the aluminium arms in not much time.

So, the bikes inside are chained to a D-lock that's cemented in the ground (I cut a hole in the wooden floor) and secured with a chain.

Not just any chain, a 2m Almax Immobiliser IV. 19mm thick steel-boron links. £135 quid, plus another £70 for a Squire SS65CS padlock. It weighs about 20kg and has stopped me worrying about bikes being nicked.

(They're also insured on the house insurance, after telling them how it was all secured they were happy to consider it a "secure outbuilding".)

So very glad I wasn't out on a ride last weekend. I have a 400k this weekend and it keeps wavering between wet and windy or quite nice actually.

When I'm volunteering at the Canonbie Control for the LEL this year, should I go out and chalk GREENBANK on the road TdF style?

Enjoy the Plains. Looks like you get to go to sunny Newtown, went through there last Sunday.

HTFU may be a more appropriate chalk mark...

Does this mean that they don't do transfers but ride the distance between stage towns when the next stage doesn't start in the town where the previous stage finished?

Yup, they ride the entire way. It's not quite the exact route that the TdF uses each year, but it's a reasonable approximation. The main objective is to drag you over every single big climb that the TdF goes over. :)

Drugs are bad, mkay

Chemist!

And if you can't be bothered to go to the US:

http://www.ltu-letourultime.nl/

It's the Tour de France route done as a single non-stop race.

It wasn't run in 2008 (not enough interest) but the 2007 solo winner did 4183km in just under 12 days. The other two solo entrants DNF'd.

The two teams (one mixed, one of two blokes) both finished in under 8 days (22kph average).

RAAM is utterly bonkers.

it's not the distance (I'm not afraid of a long ride myself), it's the speed at which they do it.

For a 4800km route I'd be looking at about 15 days solo. As an Audax you'd get 24 days.

Some years down the line I'd be interested in a team version but, again, I'm a relative plodder not a racing snake.

Slight update after the weekend:-

619km from Chepstow to Menai and back, In one go, 2 fifteen minute powernaps, hundreds of place names worth 100+ points in scrabble and plenty of food shoveled in.

5-a-side football tonight is going to hurt.

Get in.

Finished with half an hour to spare (10.45pm on Sunday).

Bit hilly Wales isn't it.

OK. No hiding now. Train to Bristol this evening and the fun starts in Chepstow at 6am Saturday.

Weather looking good for the blast up to Menai, not so good for the return leg. (HTFU, it's only wind and rain).

I just fitted some Diamante Pro 20mm tyres and removed my bottle cages. So, even if I'm slower, it should buy me 30 seconds tomorrow :)

Keep the bottle.

#5 of http://www.socalttseries.com/Training/Top10SpeedTips/tabid/196/Default.aspx

619km, 8300m climbing FIXED..... that is just nuts. That is just amazing, I couldn't do that in 4 days let alone 40 hours with little/no sleep.

Plenty have done that ride before on fixed, and there are some Audaxers who do even more insane stuff than that on fixed.

It all starts with an innocent flat 100km ride. Oooh, shall I take the fixed?

...
...
ouch...

Hard finding a balance isn't it? I mean generally for road rides, not just RP. Surely a 79" gear is out of the question... knee death on the hills...

79" isn't that much over 74" which I used to use (and lap RP on). Not something I'd want to run for a long period, but for a few attempts at fast laps I'm definitely willing to go for it. I did London to Thorne (320km) on 76" into a headwind. The Northern section may be flat but there are a few little snaps coming out of Cheshunt which were interesting with a big gear and 6kg of stuff in a bag (3 day mini-tour).

Putting a bigger gear on to cover the lack of spin-fu is going at it arse about face, and I fell into this trap a while ago. That's partly why I dropped down to 67" in order to get myself spinning. Still got some way to go to get to the magic 200rpm.

I'd drop it to 69" or so if I was heading out to real hilly country - say around Shere.

I usually use a 71" gear for my Surrey Hills loop:- [ame]http://www.bikely.com/maps/bike-path/191165[/ame

[/ame]

Gets me up everything except the top of Sheephouse Lane (Wotton to Friday St turn near Abinger Common) and White Down (from the hairpin onwards).

67" gets me up prolonged 15% climbs, with fresh legs I might be able to do White Down, but not when I've done 60km to get there (or even 30km from Westhumble station).

67" is too low for a RP TT gear. I guess you're just riding what you've got though?

Exactly. 67" is currently fitted to get me spinning for the hilly rides. It's what I used for the Elenith and will be using for the BCM.

I could fit the 16T sprocket and go for a 76" gear, but that involves faffing with the chain too (mudguards mean I have limited capacity in the dropouts). May even fit the 48T chainring and go full whack at it with a 79" gear. Will wait for London-Edinburgh-London to be out of the way first.

Just the first 4 words would have done :)

This is next (3 weeks' time): [ame]http://www.bikely.com/maps/bike-path/Audax-Bryan-Chapman-2004-route[/ame

[/ame]

619km. 8300m climbing.

6am start on the Saturday. Finish by 10pm on the Sunday. Sleep stop at 400km at Kings YH in Dolgellau if I've got any time in hand, otherwise it'll be straight through with a couple of powernaps.

Yes, fixed.

Rar.

[ame="http://www.bikely.com/maps/bike-path/Elenith-Audax-300km"]Elenith[/ame

%22%5DElenith%5B/ame] on fixed. 305km. 4727m climbing.

That was, err, interesting. My legs are aching a bit today.

A few photos: http://www.greenbank.org/audax/elenith_2009/

The ones marked Elan Valley are actually of the valley and lead mines near Cwmystwyth.

So far I'm 4 minutes faster on gears than fixed.

66:25 on gears.
70:05 on 67" fixed.

Weather was better for the geared bike run though.

Comparing the two runs (with a 3km trip to and from the park):

(Pink plot is the geared bike. Blue is the fixed.)

Speed wise: http://www.greenbank.org/misc/rp_comparison_speed.jpg
HR wise: http://www.greenbank.org/misc/rp_comparison_hr.jpg

I slacked off on the first lap on fixed. I also got horrendous cramp on the 3rd lap on fixed on the descent to Ham gate (28.5km on the graph). Had to stop for 30 seconds to stretch it out.

Also, geared bike I can descend faster, and maintain the speed for longer.

Managed 57.3kph (177rpm) on this weekends hilly ride so I'll have to give it another go on fixed soon.

Goal is sub 60-mins on gears. Sub 65-mins on fixed. 3 laps is as near to 20 miles as you'll ever get, so an hour for 3 laps represents the holy grail of a 20mph average.

There's only one longish downhill on DD anyway. Getting a road bike to ride it is a sure sign of weakness and probable impending death from girlsblouseitis.

Exaclty. HTFU and learn to spin. Last week I did 3 laps of Richmond Park on fixed, and 3 laps on the geared bike. My fastest speed was 53.2kph on the fixed compared to 52.5kph on the geared bike. At 200rpm I'd be doing 64.6kph, plenty enough if only I could get my spin-fu going. As for hills:-

Doing this on Saturday: [ame]http://www.bikely.com/maps/bike-path/Elenith-Audax-300km[/ame

[/ame]

Doing this in 3 weeks time: [ame]http://www.bikely.com/maps/bike-path/Audax-Bryan-Chapman-2004-route[/ame

[/ame]

Greenbank wins ;)

Still trumped by Fixedwheelnut as he's done LEL.

Doing the Plains 400k in May which should be fairly gentle and then contemplating the Denmead 600. Then I get to wear my SR badge with pride. Won't be getting too far ahead of myself though. I fell asleep at the wheel on the last 400k and got to scared to carry on at 350k. A victim of psychology more than anything else. Still, waking up at 30mph on a descent isn't something that I would ever like to repeat. Possibly less of a problem on fixed though.

On the SA400 last year I had about 15 minutes sleep on the cafe floor at Membury Services (300km, 1am). That did me ok until about 5am when the sun was coming up and I was struggling to keep my eyes open. I think I did do the "I'll just shut my eyes for 5 seconds" trick a few times before I realised how silly it was. A 5 minute stop to splash my face with water was enough to get me safely to the petrol station at Henley where they had a coffee machine. After a large coffee there I was awake for the rest of the day (11pm wide awake, 11.15pm almost asleep in my pint).

Recognising when you're getting the dozies, and acting on it, is something you just have to learn. I think I'm sorted now. I'll stop and take a pro-plus (usually just a stop and some water is enough) before the stupid eye shutting behaviour starts.

Only managed about 40 mile fixed in a day. Will probably do the DD on fixed though as my first proper long distance journey. After that I might start thinking of doing a flat 300k or something.

Flattest Possible 300 out of Bethersden is a good one for fixed. It was my first fixed 300. It's not completely flat (it does go up to Frant, and also along the B2082 from Rye to Tenterden) but there are long stretches of flat through Romney Marsh and along the A259 by the coast. It's also easy to get to/from on the train (despite the 2am start).

Mine is either a 621km DIY 600 Audax (Putney, Cambridge, Putney, Royal Tunbridge Wells, Bethersden and then the Flattest Possible 300 Audax) in about 38 hours. Longest time off the bike was only about an hour.

Or a 3-day 750km ride from Putney to North Berwick via Cheshunt, Gamlingay, Bourne, Lincoln, Thorne, Coxwold, Middleton Tyas, Yad Moss, Alston, Canonbie, Langholm, Eskdalemuir, Innerleithen, Dalkeith. Did have about 6 hours sleep each evening though.

In May this year it should be a small ride from Chepstow up to Menai and back (it should be just longer than 621km with the ride to/from the start from the hotel).

In July this year I hope to push it up to 1400km by going from London up to Edinburgh and back. :)

Good work!

I read some interesting and varied reports about the HoE elsewhere. One guy finished at 6pm (that's disturbingly quick), someone else had a torrid time and finished at 4.30am.

If you're looking for a good 400 then the Severn Across 400 has a similar amount of climbing (i.e. 1000m per 100km) and it's nice to cycle to Wales and back.

Erm, no. I'm doing Shiela's 300 that weekend. Obviously I'm doing it cus it's nearer to me, not for the reason that it has proabably about 3800 less meters of climbing :s

That is hardcore, especially at BRM speeds, how many hours are you expecting to get off the bike?

Finished in 19h45 last year (15 minutes spare) on the geared bike with about 4 hours off the bike (either at controls or pushing the bike up the really steep bits).

I'd expect to walk the same sections (Pont-Rhyd-Y-Groes, Devil's Staircase and Gamallt) so unless the weather is bad (it was good last year) then I'll expect about the same (I don't seem to be that much slower on fixed over gears) as I'm a fitter this year than last.

Do i have to do an Audax on fixed to brag about it here??

Probably.

Elenith in a couple of weeks?