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A for Anglezarke, B for Brinscall, C for Cafe Calamity

Neon Red's picture
on Sun, 05/01/2020 - 15:34
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It was a new day, a new dawn and a new decade today at the Bicycle Lounge as we got around 45 riders for the 9am start. Steve Depport, fresh from a scare of seeing a yellow helmet swing off at the roundabout to nab a vegan flapjack, took a Race group to Southport, Matt took the B's to Rainford and Shevington and the C and D groups combined for a sightseeing tour. That left just eight in John Pout's A group to do a fair bit of climbing around Anglezarke without ever quite getting there. Maybe it was the comments about getting CHINOOK'D on the descent that did it. Anyway the A group was third to leave, beginning with Dark Lane.

NOT SEEING RED NOW ARE WE, JC?

I set off on the back of Row 4 next to Cameron who has only recently returned from his seemingly decade long travels. At fire wasn't sure if it was him as there are quite a few people who have blue and white Giant bikes as their winter steed (have you seen the new 105 Advanced with discs) but we got a good rhythm together approaching speeds of over 20mph before a sharp braking point into the usual left-left-right at the Hoscar Moss. Jonathan Collins was with us for the first time in a while and had chosen his favourite colour to match the bike (as well as my "best look" colour, let's leave out the football for now, oh and a JC wearing blue, hmm) so naturally I'm off to scour the usual places for Castelli booms during halftime. But how many X's before the "S" I wonder? Well, we were spinning along nicely only to get momentarily stopped at the railway line but at least we had a chance to survey the crater situation which never really gets fixed hwre, before turning towards the Eagle and Child for the first bit of "who's got the fattest (spare) tyres" Apparently the main distinction between the Race and A groups was all about whether people had eaten too much over the festive period, and indeed I knew today would be a pointer of things to come for the remainder of winter, but how to improve once everyone is down to fighting weight? We at least made light work of Cedar Farm and the back road approach to Eccleston despite a slightly late call to go left, before the humpback bridge and the right turn for Midge Hall had us in hot pursuit of Pinarello Man who seemed most bemused as we rolled past him just as he wanted to take the same route. He wouldn't be the last "extra" on today's show either (no I didn't know they all rode Pinarello bikes in Culcheth, must be a perk of working at an agency there, was this guy lost) but for our part we primed ourselves for SMHBYWI time as I took the front with Cameron for the next stanza through Whittle le Woods.

ORANGES AND LEMONS SAY THE BELLS OF ST CLEMENTS - OR IS IT NELSONS?

This was what we'd all been waiting for; the return of our legend from north of the border with the nut job who paraphrased SMHBYWI (Show Me How Bad You Want It) from Beachbody and Autumn Calabrese. Now I no longer have anything to do with any network marketing after my 2018 experience with a different company, but that one liner from She Who Is Divorced always gets the troops going, as does seeing the lemon coloured helmet out front powered by the cheapest and best option for photogenic skin - orange coloured foods, especially carrots! No wonder the Denver Broncos are firing on all cylinders again (2020 is their year, they're going to win the division, Patrick Mahomes you have been warned). So with our Scottish Samurai and the face of the St Helens Tri coaching team now pounding out big watts (per kilogram) we reached Shaw Brow pretty quickly only to get blocked by a Jaguar but me and Colin then started giving it big licks through the reservoir road to Top O' the Hill Lane as MTB Man came barrelling down the other way. The "Cara's Carrots and Lemons" fuelling strategy paid dividends despite a few short stabs from heavier, higher wattage riders and for once even the descent went well though I kind of messed up the attempt to get the banana out from under the bullet proof vest style gilet, much to the amusement of some guy in green coming towards the junction - for a moment I thought it was Stephen Nelson! Turns out the church is actually called St James' but for now the talk was about how come we were down to seven riders. Apparently He Who Talks About Anything was to blame but that probably speaks volumes about how little I ask of my suspect heart, and the values of near-daily strength training always followed by a vegan protein shake. For now we started counting the 4,000 holes in Blackburn Lancashire but in reality we never quite reached the home of that fine cathedral I visited with the Liverpool Philharmonic last July, instead swinging right at Riley Green then down the hill past the Gastropub and up the climb to the M65 roundabout. I was still feeling pretty good as we took the road for Bolton but shortly after the quaint selection of terraced houses we went right just as Jaguar Man turned for Brinscall with us, only to stop immediately after forcing his nose in! Lemon Helmet is Not Amused (actually she's called NEON NAOMI as in Flavio Briatore's ex) and the red/orange/lemon colour mist remained through Brinscall where a mad effort to get an UPSET SPECIAL (Tennessee Titans/Vegans style) finally allowed me to down the offending banana. With the peel dumped in the back of the bullet proof vest we descended to the A674 and prepared for White Coppice, as close as possible to Anglezarke without actually reaching it.

NOW WE DON'T SEE YOU, NOW WE DO (DE-MISTER FOR GLASSES, THERE'S AN IDEA)

The first hold-up came as two horses had to be given space on the downhill before the pub where we spotted two MTB'ers out for a leisurely jaunt. Next, we passed the turn off for Top Locks and came out at the Rivington end of Chorley. Here, something vague was heard about going to the Piano Bar and as such the pack spread out according to who had the greatest stamina. Colin was always going to be chased by The Faz here but me and Jonathan were having a good two man team TT only for an interloper on a Specialized ALLEZ ALLEZ ALLEZ to join us. Now surely if you've been swallowed alive by someone who, let's be honest, is no help when he's in front of you, it's Game Over, but matey-boy glued himself to my rear Pirelli 25mm, and then went past me and JC as we waited for Stephen and John Pout to give us further instructions. A first turn off for some phantom cafe at the foot of the climb came to naught so we carried on up to the usual haunt of the Piano Bar and set about perusing the menu.

LICHFIELD DAIRY BUTTER? WHAT KIND OF SORCERY IS THIS

The first signs of trouble came when we touched base at the front of the queue and realised there was no vegan milk option. As such I had to settle for a black Americano which at least came with two Lichfield brown sugars, but they obviously don't listen. I asked for two rounds of toast, with jam, but NO butter. Thank God they didn't spread it on but they wasted four sachets of cow produce by bringing it anyway and, worse still, one of the jam sachets had already been partly used! John Faz did suggest the butter could be used as a facial treatment option (obviously he can't believe a skinny little vegan has nabbed his modelling job while Rob Macleod proof reads the MSA website for the 94th time) but it was good to hear his plans for Mountain Slayer Adventures because he's already had several interested parties up for a jaunt around the Alps. After setting up our own chain gang for the loo (who needs a code when you can just have Chinook the Doorman, imagine if Kevin Murphy had turned up) we could set off for home, beginning with the reservoir road.

IN BUBBLE CARS WE TRUST, MORE MONEY FOR MOUNTAIN ADVENTURES

We set off through a maze of Mini drivers and dropped kerbs to get back on the Gauntlet, or as Stephen Graham pointed out, the stretch where you always worry about a stray car door, before climbing back to Adlington and then the White Horse pub at the roundabout. Next up was the long straight through Coppull and Aspull. In between these two villages a no-mark in a Vauxhall Corsa gave us the middle finger in a bid to beat the Piano Bar food suppliers for the Reject award and some people forgot about the benefits of having a gym membership (pound for pound strength is where it's at). We turned right at the turn off for Standish industrial estate and the giant Lidl, where we began the process of getting back onto more familiar ground with Pepper Lane followed by Hunger Hill and Wrightington. By now I was thinking "get 90 done" far easier than getting Brexit done, as I have to do 90km at the Yorkshireman Half in June. Despite a short holdup at a T-junction when a Range Rover came bombing through at approximately 53.7mph we stayed together past the motorbike workshop and dodged the route towards Hunter's (Jonathan Collins seemed rather disappointed) but it was actually easier to go past Cedar Farm again only to end up in the middle of what looked like a committee meeting between a Peugeot 107 driver and a 4x4 man (the 107 being one of very few cars smaller than an Aygo). Once they'd finished their cup of tea we got to draft the bubble car all the way to the Eagle and Child where Porsche Man was a bit pissed off as the group beat him to the Hoscar Moss. I thought I might hold out here and get a bit of a result but John Faz always knows to put his money where his teeth are - chewing that stem!

WHY STOP AT 56 WHEN YOU CAN HIT THE TREBLE 20 (MILES?)

As expected, he went full TT position and took Colin with him while I slotted in behind in third place, behind but not at all unhappy given how sparodic my 2019 HMCC ride appearances were. The railway line was once again a hold up but we got going rather quicker this time and the group only split when the Faz headed off to Southport via the Booths Booms counter, Stephen took Colin and John Pout through Lathom and me and Jonathan continued down Dark Lane wondering how in the world will anyone finish that 300km gravel sportive without falling off, whether form exhaustion or bad handling skills. Jonathan headed home before Greetby leaving me to scale the proverbial wall solo just as Alan and what looked like Stuart came the other way. I carried on through the big O and down the hill past Morrisons before climbing the side of Ormskirk Hill. I still didn't have the requisite distance of 96km at the turn off for my road so I did one last YOLO loop round the Winifred Lane roundabout to make up the distance and parked the bike at home having done my 90km, plus six more. A great start to the year, let's crack on and get January boxed off!

Now for the results, brought to you by Stephen's favourite brand (and my next target), Morvelo:

Distance: 96.07km
Time: 3:23:43
Average speed: 29.3km/h
Black and Blue Bullets: 1, Jonathan Collins
Extras: 2
Sunday Drivers: 3
Sachets of Dairy Wasted: 4
Post Ride Nutrition: Hummus on French bread with three vegan donuts from the co-op boom counter

REJECT OF THE RIDE: Piano Bar Food Ordering Team

(No soya milk, only white toast, ran out of soup, and wasted dairy produce on a vegan)

See you all next week for another great ride. Would be interesting to hear from the Steve Depport group especially as they have someone on their ranks who recently won the Southport Parkrun - Well Done Tony Harvey!

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