Clifton CC

Saturday looks like being chilly (but above zero) and breezy - hopefully no snow, no ice, no rain. As previously trailed, let's do the westerly route. Depending on the flood situation we may need to tweak the route, but we'll check the road reports on Friday. 9am in the Square, if you can all remember where that is!

Ooh, I'm meant to be in Leeds by 10:30 Saturday morning. Don't laugh if I turn up with a Carradice!

Met office has it at 0 at 9:00am but dry. Looking forward to it after the lay off. Darren will have the opportunity to give us that kickin' he threatened which is a bit of a worry!

Looks like they'll be a few people racing up at Croft so numbers might be reduced.

See you Saturday

Martin

I'll be up at Croft.

I've got the reliability ride on Sunday so may see some of you there.

Andy

May be a tad late so will join you on route

Reliability on Sunday so no show for me.

I always love the response when I say "Okay:- a brisker group and a steadier group" and everyone bar Reuben and I heads off in the brisker group, with the exception of a couple of blokes who realised we look a bit lonely on our own. And so it was this morning - and a good ride followed - after the decision had been made to head north and avoid injury and mayhem on the icy roads of the westerly route.

Six of us in the "steady" group, including a newcomer who peeled off on the way up the A168 (and I'm sorry I forgot your name - keep coming back though as each week you'll find it easier until you're safely there for the duration) and occasional Saturday visitor Ewan who was taking increasingly long and punishing turns on the front. I eventually asked "doing much competitive at the moment?" "Fair bit of fell running." Fell running?! I've read Feet In The Clouds and know what they get up to! They're nutcases!

Anyway, steady is as steady does and the group steadily shrank due to headwind on the way up and speed on the way back. Hopefully a good dose of winter miles though for everyone - thanks folks. Fifty-five miles, and pretty much bang on 19mph average and 215W for the out-of-town bit.

8 of us in 1st group including young Pete - who is more used to downhill mountain biking - the mad fool . Andy M took an early bath after an hour. I punctured early on the A168. Then we thru and offed... which was 'challenging'.. into that headwind. Another burst of thru and offing on the Sutton circuit opened the pipes a bit more. Don't know what the average mph was but there were a few teethmarks on my handlebars when I got home so, all in all, a good ride. Well done to Pete for sticking in there and no doubt will be kicking our backsides in a year or so

Good ride today with the slightly faster group.

After a delay with the puncture some quite tidy through and off given the headwind. The pace increased as we got closer to home. I think it has to around this time of year. Hard work and must admit I found it tough going towards the end.

Hopefully I'll have fitted a new cassette by next week. My chain was slipping all over the place and seemed to always settle about two gears higher than I wanted. I ended the ride with an average cadence of 81, which is about 10 less than usual, and aching knees!

ps - if the fell runner in Phil's group was anything like the Bingley Boys from Feet in the Clouds, his bidons were probably filled with John Smiths Extra Smooth.

I bet they don't call a water bottle a bidon in Bingley

Is a water bottle still a water bottle if it's filled with beer? Or is it a beer bottle?

Enjoyed my first taste of a training ride for 2013, even though it was short-lived. Should probably start riding a bit harder now shouldn't I really! Cheers guys.

Its been quite a few weeks since I was out on a training ride and I've had some passed on kids illnesses in January which have kept me off the bike. So opted for the steady group this morning which I found pretty hard - seems that everyone has upped their pace while mine has fallen back a bit! We started as 6 but down to 5 quite quickly and we ground up the A168 at 14 to 16mph only to return at 25mph to 30mph courtesy of that strong wind. I dropped off after a couple of hours and had a leisurely trip back to York.

Anyway, good training and really glad to be out there again. Thanks all.