As you may be aware however, it wasn't 100 miles. The weather forecast had looked horrendous all week and we were all waiting with baited breath to see what would happen. On Saturday, a beautifully sunny day of course, an email arrived saying one of the contingency plans was to remove Box and Leith Hill, shortening the route to 86 miles.
I was too nervous on Saturday night to really pay much heed to this. I have to admit I was seriously, seriously nervous on Saturday night. I was worried about getting there in the morning and what it would be like. Needless to say I didn't sleep terribly well. I think I got between 4 and 5 hours sleep.
The alarm went off bright and early and we got dressed and ready to go. I'd prepared all my food etc. the night before so all I really needed to do was get dressed.
We got to the drop off zone in good time and I said my goodbyes to Ant and Ellie. It wasn't immediately obvious where to go from the drop off but the stewards directed another participant and myself and we set off.
I knew there was approximately 5 miles to the start point but for some reason it hadn't occurred to me that I would need to ride through London traffic! It wasn't too bad as it was really early, but nonetheless, I found it a bit hairy, especially the buses!
I reached the start point and made my way to the blue start zone and waited with everyone else.
Spirits were high at this point. It wasn't raining much and we were all pretty happy. A quick glance on my phone confirmed that the route had indeed been shortened. Generally people seemed ok with this. The organizers had decided it was just going to be too dangerous to descend the big hills and I've since found out they were pretty close to canceling the whole event.
After a while we started riding in earnest along the empty roads of East London.
Many, many people overtook me in the beginning but I knew I was doing the speed I wanted to so decided not to let it bother me. The rain started but it wasn't too bad and I was making good time. I felt happy and confident. It was great fun riding through London and seeing the sites and hearing loads of people shouting encouragement.
As we left Central London the weather took a turn for the worse. By the time we got to Richmond Park the rain was torrential. We came to grinding halt and all had to stand and wait. There had been a small crash up ahead and the road was flooded. We were up to our ankles at this point and I was personally already wet through. After walking through the park which took at least half an hour we managed to get cycling again. This included cycling through extremely deep puddles.
After Richmond Park we were riding again but through some really horrendous rain and floods. The worse of which involved getting off our bikes to push them through a foot of water under the bridge in Kingston. At this point my lovely new shoes covers proved quite useless as the water flooded over the top of them! It was also fairly depressing, but amusing to see competitors that had started much early and were almost finished, going in the opposite direction!
Not long after this I made it to the first hub where I stopped for some food and to update the family. It was still raining heavily which made it difficult to get the food out without soaking it all. As it turned out I didn't feel very hungry anyway. I spent the time regrouping and fiddling about with my handlebar bag which was determined to sink forward and hit my front wheel.
After a while I set off again. I found the next section unfeasibly hard work. I was wet, the peloton as was was really strung out so I was essentially on my own and the supporters at the side of the road were few and far between. In addition my front brake had started to rub my wheel.
I stopped for a while in a village and wasted about 15 minutes trying to fix it and generally acting weird. I couldn't fix the brake and decided to push on to the next hub.
I felt really low at this point but I don't think I was alone. I was only doing 10mph but was surrounded by people doing similar times. Everyone's shoulders seemed to have dropped and I would say morale was low.
At this point we hit a hill. I didn't actually realize that this was going to be the only real climb on the route. I thought the hub came before the hill climb and as such I decided, like many others, I would need to walk up the hill as I was shattered and seriously fed up. I rode up as much as I could, probably about a third, walked up a third or so, turn rode the last bit into the hub. It's a bit hard to remember the order of things but I'm pretty certain that that's the order of things!
Anyway, at the next hub I had a sit down on a bench and pulled myself together. I fueled up as far as I could (I was still remarkably un-hungry), went to the loo and had a good drink. I also texted Ant to say how very hard I was finding it.
The Surrey Hills
After the hub I decided I needed to go for it and improve. As I've said, it's really hard to remember everything but after the 50 mile mark I knew I only had 36 miles to go which was a big confidence booster.
I got my head down and sped along. I hit all the hills effectively and consistently overtook both men and women on the ascent. Nearly all these people then overtook me on the descent as I was finding them pretty scary as it was so wet!! There were more and more people out cheering us on which was a huge boost. It's crazy but the spectators really made it easier. People were shouting so much encouragement. The shouts of 'keep going, you CAN do this', 'do it for the girls', 'you are amazing, just keep going' and my favorite from a small boy, 'you are a CHAMPION, keep doing the hard cycling work' really, really kept me going. If anyone reading this was a spectator I thank you from the bottom of my heart - you got me through it. I also discovered I'm a bit of a show off and wanted to look good in front of the crowds!
Due to the removal of the big hills I got to the next hub pretty quickly. I decided I would have a coffee here and updated the family on my new found confidence.
After a nice chat with another participant and some lively volunteers I set off on the final leg.
I intended to do the lot and not stop again. I was still feeling really good and definitely was full of energy. I whizzed past lots of people and before too long found myself back in London.
Once again the crowds spurred us on. I had to get off once more due to another flood but the weather was now much better. The final challenge was Wimbledon Hill but I managed that (again partly due to the spectators' encouragement and promises that it was the last hill!).
Before I knew it I was just a couple of miles from the end. A huge gust of wind almost took me off my bike at Milbank but luckily I survived it.
I began to feel exceptionally emotional as I came under Admiralty Arch. I could see the finish line ahead and knew the moment I'd been thinking about for months was about to happen. I had almost finished.
As the finish line got closer I pedaled as hard as I could and then heard my name. On my left were Ant and Ellie shouting and screaming for me, as was everyone else watching. I lifted my hand and waved and shouted to them and that was it, I was done. I slowed down and was given my medal and goodie bag and dismounted.
And that was it. Sixteen weeks of my life thinking of nothing else was finally over. I'd done it, I'd survived. I was not too tired, I wasn't in agony and I felt great. Filthy, but great.
My official time was 8 hours, 1 minute and 40 seconds. That includes breaks and all things considered (the weather, the wait in Richmond), I'm happy with it.
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