Decision 3: Do a cycling event that pushes me harder than I've been pushed on a bike.
I've signed up to do the Newcastle to London ride.
"Hey!" I hear you thinking. "That's not further than you've ridden before?"
That's right. It's only about 300 miles (483 kilometres). Lands end to John O'Groats is further. This event however has a target time of 24 hours; Which means I need to average 20 kms an hour over 24 hours. I'll have a couple of hours off the bike and stops every few hours to refill water and snack supplies so my average will need to be nearer 25 kms an hour.
This is a much bigger ride than I've ever managed before. To achieve this I'm going to need to get some progressively bigger distances in between now and August. This is basically the Dunwich Dynamo 2.5 times in one go.
I've got the Velothon in Cardiff which is 50 kms as my first mass participation ride of the year and I'm thinking of the Ride to the Sun as an overnight practise run at about half the distance. In between I think I'm going to have to do some hill based interval training and some London-Brighton-London or London-Cambridge-London weekend rides leading up to it.
There is also the small matter of directions....
