A for Anglezarke, B for Badass Baguette, C for Cable Calamity

Despite Stefan taking the 8am ride to the Roman Road we still have over 60 people at the shop for the 9am start. As such four groups formed, with Cathy taking the C’s round local lumps while Ralph took a B ride to Preston and Southport. Another B ride formed at the last minute leaving Neil to take the A ride for those who’d stayed up to watch the boxing, and he would get 14 takers for a ride that was planned to go way out east to some of the most iconic climbs but eventually settled on just one classic. Read on to find out why.

4 MILES IN 30 MINUTES, ME AND DAVE RODGERS RUN FASTER THAN THAT!

We set off on Dark Lane and I was on the right side of Row 4 next to Lynchy. We were talking about tonight’s opening NFL games and the fact that my team have their two easiest opponents first (lose to Seattle and Oakland and I think they’ll pay to fly Vance Joseph out of the country) when the dreaded “PUNCTURE” call was heard. And today’s victim was John on the Kuota. I’d ridden back from Rick’s funeral with him, you can’t miss his Boardman mitts, but here he unloaded the heaviest road inner tube I’ve ever picked up and set about changing for the new one. This job took 11 minutes 59:80 seconds and certainly kept us entertained while I checked the actual width of his Continental Ultra Sport tyre and the serial number of the inner tube (25mm/forgotten already). During this passage of play one of the B groups came past with Charlotte already weighing up her first hashtag SPRINTPOINT and I was thankful for the latest BOOM I acquired from Alf Jones Cycles on Thursday (now for the results brought to you by……..) in the form of a red Mavic Cosmic Elite jersey, was £70 now £49. The irony of me buying Welsh red on the day they whooped ass on Ireland in the first game of the Uefa Nations League shouldn’t be lost on anyone not least David Rodgers, who would have been seriously impressed that we would only complete 4 miles in 30 minutes. That was because no sooner had I taken over on the restart with Mark le Titch on the front (and nearly been taken out by a Sunday driver poking a front bumper onto our patch of road), but we had to stop AGAIN. Guess what? John had another puncture! So we took refuge in the petrol station forecourt while he got ANOTHER tube out and set about using up his remaining latex supplies on fixing the problem; indeed at one point Neil was calling for a patch kit of all things while Daniel recounted the stories of how he was outside the pub last week with his twisted transmission while the Ride of the Roses rattled past, and also why he’d chosen to bring the Trek out today with rain forecast. For the moist part we would stay completely dry, but for now we were concerned with riding over the Hoscar Moss and towards the Eagle and Child. Here, we normally go left for Mawdesley but today we had a traffic jam coming the other way as no doubt Cedar Farm had unveiled their Christmas 2018 range of decorations and the big spenders were out in force to buy the most expensive Advent candles at £90 a go, especially given how many BMW’s and Mercs were coming the other way. They would not be the most expensive cars we would see today either. Our next assignment was the local country club and on to Wrightington, where a bit of shifty moving by John Pout say me and Mark le Titch take over once more, on the downhill run to Heskin Green. See, that’s how you train them up, wait until they’re going downhill and then put the two narrowest people on the front so the others have to work harder against the wind. This would leave us out in front on the Heskin Green switchbacks, which were full of fallen twigs given the autumn leaf fall has started in earnest. We crested the climb together and set about regrouping so we could make our way to the Hinds Head pub, our left-turn for riding to Chorley. This is a really chilled-out place; I particularly like the quaint terraced houses on the road before the dramatic descent. This is where my vision really went bad as a result of too much caffeine and alcohol the day before, but I focused on the road a bit further ahead of me and didn’t lose too many lengths to Mark Titchener as a result. However, we were now on the outskirts of Chorley, with plenty more fun and games just around the corner.

CHICKENS STOPPED PLAY? NO, BUT WATCH OUT FOR THE BABIES

We were stopped at the lights on the road with all the terraced houses and takeaways on it when we spotted two eateries of particular interest. Firstly, a two-part Indian restaurant which looked like a sit-down and takeaway all in one similar to the Fylde in Burscough where I think I might go tonight for another round of chip shop curry sauce before my mate’s 50^th. That’s because he’s more than likely gone to Chesters Chicken (yes you noticed the irony) offering the chance to buy poultry on the cheap. That might have been plausible before April 17^th this year but not any more; indeed I was delighted to read the other day that falafel and houmous is now our national sandwich! With this comforting thoughts in mind, which I’ve certainly needed a few of these past couple of days, we crossed the next roundabout only to be greeted by a couple of BABIES being held rather precariously by the mum, and as a result me and a few others got a handy lead on those who got spooked by the possibility of Babygate (actual name of a scandal but not for the same reasons 25 years ago at the Houston Oilers, look it up you won’t believe it) and now we had a handy bit of track position as Rob and Ian took over on the front. This gave us a bit of a rest as we made our way to Limbrick, through the maze of trees, gravel roads and soiled, slippery back roads. Indeed I was really enjoying this part of the trip with little in te way of crosswind to affect my balance and I was in a surprisingly good mood even when they decided to turn left in situation when right would have taken us to Adlington (with cyclists coming the other way) while left, after dealing with a couple of horses, would send us towards Anglezarke, as it turned out the only big hit-out of the day. And it was a surprisingly neutral affair, as despite Daniel making an early breakaway, he ended up with me, Rob Shirley and Ian cresting the climb pretty much in team formation, before the fun bit; the descent. This is the one where I almost killed Alan Treanor in January 2017 the day my chainset blew up, but today I was descending rather more confidently, at least until I freaked out at the presence of a yellow Ferrari at the bridge. I thought at first that it was a Porsche but in stead it was a fine Italian steed costing about the same as 50 Wilier Cento10 Air bikes. We carried on to the next junction where a few riders were feeling the pressure a bit but one who wasn’t was Ian Hampson, who’s really looking forward to his London to Manchester ride over two days soon. He’ll be perfect for winter training as 60 miles are officially nothing after doing 125 a day, but it will help him if he has two working pedal cleats, because no sooner had we restarted than he had to pull over. I didn’t get to see if it was loose or just full of mud but I noticed that my left cleat wasn’t always staying in either. For now, we would embark on a tour of Wheelton, but notably a version which had us turning right after crossing the main road so that we could do some of last week’s climbs around Brindle. This had the extremely desirable effect of returning me to that infamous haunt where the “F*** THIS” incident happened under my massive 74kg frame from that time, but as an interesting parallel that was another time when I did the ride rather hungover. Today wasn’t really going much better but at least I wasn’t being forced to battle Pain Face on his Cervelo R5 Disc, he can unleash that one next week in Yorkshire. We did the usual descent over the railway line but a little further up the road, Neil had us turn sharp right up a little-known climb. This sent one of us into a tailspin trying to choose the right gear and, for once, it wasn’t me. No, today’s prang came from John Pout who probably ripped 98% of the life out of his rear mech as he scrambled to change enough gears in one go. This was most entertaining as I was able to sneak past and stay reasonably close to the front as we returned to the road we’d turned left off earlier. During this passage of play we did the route through Top Locks and Brindle where my computer head unit flew off last week but it was nowhere to be seen so we had to be content with a blast past the Cavendish Arms. Eventually we returned to within range of the finish, but there was one more prang about to befall one of the recent improvers.

HOW MANY CABLES IS THAT FOR YOU IAN? LET’S JUST SWAP BIKES NEXT WEEK

We battled with around 258 potholes on the road towards Shaw Brow, then on the descent itself a few Little Mix wanabees nearly took the leader out by stepping half on and half off the road, but there must have been some black magic at work because Ian Hampson, who can’t buy any luck with his gearboxes, had his cable snap on him on the climb. I did a 17 point turn to check out the problem and 8 of those 17 turns nearly got me run over because I was constantly in a place where someone just HAD to turn for a driveway or side road, but I was stunned when the other suggested he put the chain in the small ring; what’s wrong with good old 52x11? After a short wait, the four groups got together as one and we set off for Dawson Lane featuring the little rise just before Flag Lane where I never change gear and always strive to stay in touch with the rider in front. The pace quickened here, but no-one was trying to kill everyone else so it was well controlled throughout. Soon we were back at Midge Hall, turning left for Eccleston as we did so, before cresting the humpback bridge and Neil turned off for home leaving us to tackle Tinckler’s Lane, always the start of the hashtag beast mode ride home. However, today we wouldn’t go mad yet, preferring to keep things tight and controlled. This continued all the way through to the Robin Hood pub and into Mawdesley where for once no-one had a mechanical and John Lynch, who had tuned off earlier, didn’t get the opportunity to fly into the nearby field. Instead, four of us went to the café while the others carried on their fat burn all the way home. The select few were me, John Jenkins, Inder and John Pout who put on quite a show despite my head barely staying upright in the crosswind, but JJ timed his run perfectly to take the sprint at the bridge leaving me, John ad Inder to trail in some way adrift.

HOW TO GET 8 OF YOUR 10 A DAY AND INFLUENCE TEAMMATES

We got there just as the C group were finishing off and Megan’s group were contemplating their tandem team ride home. Cream slices and coffee were generally the order of the day, but for a tenner I got a superfood quinoa baguette featuring tons of vegetables and can of Coke which went down a treat, in fact I even found a great use for the Coke by lobbing it into the red bottle and using the remaining water to start a bike clean, the sort of which JJ had two to do this afternoon. Conversation topics included Megan’s bid to become the next Alex and whether I have any more weight to lose given I’ve dropped ten pounds in the last five months since going vegan. I think they were just envious of my taste in food. Either way, I contemplated doing a bit of coaching with three ladies from Team Deane tri club but I didn’t fancy riding down the M58 to take a short cut home from Wigan so instead I joined the rest of the HMCC Fab Four in riding home via the Hoscar Moss.

Inder was on fire after the café and I wonder how hard he might have been to fight all the way up the Beacon; indeed he went straight on before the Hoscar Moss with John Pout leaving me and JJ to battle the crosswind across this most exposed road. JJ turned off at Burscough to raise the bar once more for John Faz to beat, but I was a mess by now and even had to sit down for a few minutes at the bench in Burscough just to recover my senses. Eventually I set off once again, getting some momentum on the way into Ormskirk, which I took on the simplest way as in the A59, before riding past Swanpool Lane in Aughton (my future YOLO point with Tony Harvey) and then past the Royal Oak (my future boozer - oh hang on I’m feeling sick again can’t go in there for Wainwright’s yet) before time-trialling all the way home into a brief downpour at Greens Lane and past a lone house on the prairie which a couple of years ago was selling as a shell for £200k; I wonder how much profit they’ll have made now? I’ll look that one up later, but for now I was concerned with beating the wind back to Formby, which was only doable at 18mph for the most part, even dropping to 16mph at the Causeway. Of course, every ride has to end with a YOLO so I shouted exactly that approaching the miniature garden centre and the bridge, scoring 23mph in the process, before hammering it one final time across Tesco lights and into my drive having covered 70 miles in a pretty destroyed state. At least I know the Team GB bid can only be easy by comparison……….

Now for the results, brought to you by Thursday’s BOOM suppliers, Alf Jones Cycles:

Distance: 112.02km

Time: 4:03:07

Average Speed: 27.65kmh

Dead Inner Tubes: 2

Other Mechanicals: 2

Hors Cat Climbs: 2 including a new one

Horses: 4

Café Stop Rating: 10/10 (best vegan sandwich ever plus Coke pick-me-up)

REJECT OF THE RIDE: Ian Hampson’s Gear Cable

(When your cleats are playing up the last thing you want to do is walk up Shaw Brow)

See you all next week for three in a row. Don’t worry, I can’t get to the pub for the LFC game so it’ll be a one-and-done at most at the rugby club, where the second team are playing Merseyside Police. And will we be back in time for the Singapore Grand Prix? Well, best buy more of those 26p flapjacks from Poundstrecher to get us home, they used to be 29p after all, what a deal………