I’ve known Glyn since schooldays, which are now more years ago than either of us would like to admit. We played rugby and cricket together, with some success, learned to drink beer, with more success than our parents would have liked, and chased girls, with relatively little success. I don’t think that the cricket and the beer helped with the last one.
University days and our subsequent working lives have meant that we’ve often lived in different parts of the country. We’ve always kept in touch and our joint love of Cas and Yorkshire ale have been constant touchstones. They came together memorably in January 1994 for the thumping Regal Trophy win over Wigan at Headingley.
For most of my adult life I’ve had a reasonable quality touring bike and some associated kit. They have spent most of their lives leaning against the garage wall and in the bottom of wardrobes. There has been the occasional flurry of riding, usually as part of rehab work on rugby player’s knees, but I regard myself as somewhere between a non-cyclist and a novice.
When Glyn first revealed his Toulouse idea, and there was still the chance that the fixture list would make it impractical, I knew that I would want to support him in some way. With the bike tucked away in the garage, I mooted the idea with my partner, Lynn, that I might offer to join him on the UK leg. The first bit of bad news was when the fixture list was unveiled, it became clear that there was to be no excuse on that front, so my first tentative training runs started on Boxing Day.
In mid-January Glyn let me know that it was all systems go at his end, so I made my offer to accompany him for the UK end of the Tour de Cas. The second bit of bad news was that rather than heroically saying that it was his challenge to face alone, the fool accepted with alacrity. Since then, I’ve ramped up the training and bought a shiny new bike. While my existing bike was good quality, technology has moved on slightly in the 30 years since I bought it. My early training targets are to work up to 2-3 hour rides and to be able to get past the approximate 25 miles of each of the proposed 10 sessions of the actual ride. I’ll also need to improve my power to weight ratio – have I mentioned the fondness for beer?
Despite my description of myself as a novice cyclist I have been on a cycling holiday once, when Lynn and I went to, of all places, Nepal. Spending time with proper cyclists showed me just how little I knew about managing effort and coping with hills – there were one or two. I’m hoping that I can dredge up some of the advice from that trip, if not claw back the fitness (and raven hair) that I had back in 1989.