11/7 HSLCC Fri Night Ride- Strength In Numbers

Muddy conditions at Bewl helped boost the Friday night ride count to a much more respectable nine riders including prospective new young (Andy Schleck lookalike) member Michael M. It had been raining most of the day and there was still a little dampness in the air but it was pleasantly warm as we headed off down battery hill. Malcolm went unusually slowly down the descent using his 'air brake' system of legs wide apart although John V just thought he was using this to cool his balls down. Our progress through the reserve was initially hampered by dozens of runners taking part in some sort of race . They were heading in both directions so we had to carefully weave our way between them . I know we sometimes suffer for our sport but judging by the amount of groaning and ragged deep breathing, some of these runners suffer more! On starting the Broad Oak drag, progress was temporarily halted by Kie picking up a puncture, but this was soon fixed with a carbon dioxide cylinder.Most of the riders soon disappeared into the distance but Malcolm was content to take it easy to save his legs for the 50 mile TT on Sunday and John V wanted to help me up the drag , so following in their draft I had  soon managed to reel in Steve D. With it being unusually dark I

Super first ever ascent for young Michael!

missed a small but deep pothole ( despite a warning from Steve) , and rode straight into it. No damage was done to man or machine but the dreaded hissing sound informed us I had given myself a nice pinch puncture.I soon had a replacement tube installed but couldn't get the tyre inflated, it turned out to be a dud tube. Picking out another from my saddle bag I noticed a split , luckily Malcolm had a spare for me to use and at last we were back on the road to catch up with most of the others who were left wondering what was was going on. There was no time for explanations so I shot off down the descent wishing I had put  a little more air into the squishy front tyre. On passing through Westfield at some speed, Kie and myself had a heart stopping moment went a car began pulling out of a blind drive way into our path. As we we moving at about 25mph at the time, this would have been a catastrophe, fortunately he must have seen the flash of our lights and quickly stopped moving forward (lesson to be learnt here, make sure you ride with powerful lights on this ride even in the summer and keep them on flashing mode as long as possible). Despite the squishy front tyre the adrenalin of our near miss must have given me a boost as I managed my second fastest ever 'stonestile approach' although this was nowhere near enough to keep me in plain sight of young Michael and the other fast ones as they accelerated up the initial slopes of our beloved stonestile . This was a first ever ascent for Michael who is bound to rapidly move up the stonestile rankings for this climb. Stu had better get ready to lose his fifth all-time place?