Fri Night Ride 1/11-Wet, Wet Wet (aka Metin, Marcus and Nigel)

Despite heavy rain forecast for 8pm I left home just after 7pm and
headed for Fairlight lodge. I accepted that there might be rain
somewhere at 8pm, but my hopeless optimism assured me that not a drop
would fall in the Fairlight/ Rye/ Broad Oak area.
I was the only cyclist when I arrived at the lodge. As I waited I
watched small specks of rain passing though my light's beam, “it's not
raining - it'll pass” I told myself.
At 29 minutes past and still alone I was contemplating that maybe the
forecast was correct and everyone had more sense. Then Marcus turned up,
shortly followed by Metin. Read into that what you will.
As the roads were damp and it was only the three of us we decided to do
the usual route, but take it easy and stick together.
Marcus was up front as we crossed the brow of Battery Hill, but with
Metin and myself making use of our brakes for a cautious descent Marcus
soon disappeared into the distance. I pondered if Marcus had the best
tyres; failing brakes; or the biggest balls ? Once we'd regrouped on the
Pett Level Road I asked and Marcus explained his “brake aversion“ as
wasted energy (which I interpreted as bigger balls as wasting energy or
not I was too much of a wimp to go any faster on a wet descent).
Thanks to Steve's earlier email we knew the path through the nature
reserve was still covered in stones from the recent bad weather, so we
took the main road to Rye.
Although I was still ignoring the rain and in denial I could tell that
Metin, as he donned his waterproofs in Rye, was accepting the cold wet
truth. “He'll get too hot in those”, I told myself.
Minutes later on the Udimore road, like the Vietnam scene from Forest
Gump, it began to rain, “stinging rain...and big old fat rain. Rain that
flew in sideways. And sometimes rain even seemed to come straight up
from underneath”
Layers of water flowed over the road, pot holes hid in puddles, and one
of these bit Metin's front tube resulting in a pinch puncture. While
Metin changed the tube in particularly cold sideways rain any warmth
Marcus and myself had generated so far on the ride disappeared, I
suspected Metin was substantially warmer in his waterproofs.
Keen to try out my new Lezyne pump and warm myself up (and like a true
gent) I offered to inflate Metin's tyre, delaying us even further as
after inflation I let all the air out again by inadvertently unscrewing
the valve core from the stem when removing the pump.
Marcus and I were cold and wet by the time the ride resumed, and we used
opposite tactics to generate heat, Marcus pulling a high gear to get the
blood pumping, myself in a low gear to spin some heat into myself. I
noted Metin cycling normally, warm (and smug?) in his waterproofs.
Any heat we'd regenerated by the time we reached the Broad Oak cross
roads was lost during the descent. I formed an aerodynamic shape, not to
speed my descent but to minimise exposure to the cold air blowing
through my wet clothes.
The monsoon eased a little but the water from it still flowed off the
fields and across the road in centimetre thick sheets, so we skipped the
Doleham lane cut though and stuck to the main river (formerly known as
the A28).
I usually dread Stonestile but as a heat generating opportunity I was
keen to get there on this ride, there were a few impromptu fords to
negotiate on the approach but once we were above the water table we
blasted up the main climb.
We may have got cold and very wet but the feeling at the top of
Stonestile, while we gasped for breath and emitted steam, was strangely
and immensely satisfying - it felt like we'd taken on Nature and won.
Marcus summed up the ride up in two words, “character building”.

Nigel