The Big Black Mountain Challenge

There are ideas, and then there are 'ideas'. There are silly ideas, like deciding to get on a train to Penzance one day on a whim and riding from Lands End to John O'Groats; there are stupid ideas, like going off for a ride one afternoon in Northern Californian bear country with no food or water, no map, no idea where you're going and without telling anyone; there are dangerous ideas, like riding up Snowdon in the dark at 4am on a February morning wearing lycra in a snow storm; and then there are those ideas which are just wrong. There's no excuse for them, they're just wrong.

The Big Black Mountain Challenge on Saturday was one such idea. It started off badly and just got worse. I knew it was a stupid idea - having cracked a rib just 6 days before at round 2 of the BMBS in Dalby Forest, the idea of walking 45km over the Black Mountains in South Wales probably wouldn't be high on many peoples list of convalescing activities. But there's a bigger picture to think of here, namely The Great TO DO.

So Tony and I set off on our epic walk at 8am Saturday morning. It started raining. Then it started raining harder. Then the wind picked up. Then the wind almost picked me up! Walking along the first ridge out of Llanthony was made difficult by the 60mph wind and miserable due to the torrential rain. 4 hours later the rain finally stopped - for half an hour, just enough time to dry out before the rain came again. And the wind picked up.

The day continued in this cycle of misery for nine and a half hours until with sore feet, knee pain and an aching rib it finally came to an end. I can't remember ever walking in such horrendous conditions for so long. It really was an epic day and with the exception of Tony's witty tales, comments and then hysterical laughter (see video), not one I particularly enjoyed. But it was a necessary evil for the task ahead. On The Great TO DO I'd have 5 more days of this (well, the mileage, hopefully not the weather. Please God, NOT the weather!)

It was a useful exercise though and I learnt a few important things - one such lesson is that if you have a cracked rib and try and walk 45km up and down the muddy Welsh Mountains in the pouring rain and highs winds carrying a heavy rucksack, it's going to hurt. More importantly though, is it's going to hurt more the following day. But at least I had a whole day free and lots of 8 week old Bernese Mountain Dog pups to cuddle to cheer me up.

If you want to see some great photos of this epic, or a video of just how bad it was, take a look at Tony's blog - Tales From The Rock. Oh, and feel free to buy one of the 178 miles of The Great TO DO (if you want to know more, you'll have to use the link to visit the web page - it's worth it though!)

Go 'Til You Stop

The human body is an amazing thing. The capacity of the mind and body to work together just long enough to get through any given task will never cease to amaze me. The mind tells the body what it needs to do and how long for, gives it the strength to keep going, it even accounts for sleep (or sometimes lack of), factors in the temporary break in physical activity but keeps the body aware it hasn't finished just yet. The consequences of these types of events are never pretty though - often pushing yourself up to or beyond your physical limits.

Such an incident happened at the weekend. I was working on the second round of the British Mountain Bike Series up in Dalby Forest, Yorkshire. It was also a World Cup test event which added a slight bit of extra pressure to get everything spot on. I'd ridden the course first thing Thursday morning to get my bearings in the forest. To say it's the most technical cross-country course of the series is an understatement! Challenging and fun though and I was looking forward to actually racing on Sunday. Another practice ride on Friday on Olive the dekerf had me confident that I could clear all of the sections without a second thought.

The mistake I made though was not actually riding the course on my Ducati race bike that only turned up on Saturday morning. This was a grave error on my part and half way around the first lap on Sunday morning I hit the ground hard on a rooty drop-off section. After a long sit down I limped around to finish the lap, various body parts throbbing, and retreated to the back of my tent in pain. The ever insightful Martyn Salt approached and deduced very quickly from my abrupt single syllable answers to his concerned questions that I was far from alright but all I wanted was to be left alone to sob in peace and privacy.

A while later I reappeared in the arena with very few signs of the race ending dismount - just a graze or two on my legs. The large bruise on my hip, the graze on my backside, my throbbing right thigh and a pain in my ribs were invisible to the world. A limp gave it away slightly, as did the winces of pain every time I laughed or coughed. Still, there was work to be done for the rest of the event and I planned to just keep moving. Once I stopped, that would be it. And the anticipation of the morning after pain was motivation enough to get as much done on the day of the crash as possible.

Copious amounts of red wine helped me sleep on Sunday night. And here's the twist; Monday morning, although being the morning after, wasn't the end of the task. The plan had always been to stay on Monday and finish up. So I woke up a little stiffer than usual with some soreness in my neck, but actually rather surprised at the lack pain and ease of movement. Perhaps the crash hadn't been as bad as first imagined? Monday came and went and all the extra movement and walking hadn't made much of an impact on my aching bones. The task had finished, I had made it through, and made it home.

Tuesday is where it went wrong. Very, very wrong. My mind had finally told my body it could stop, relax and do what it needed to do to get back to normal. The excruciating pain I felt trying to get out of bed set the tone for the day - with every laugh, cough, sneeze and deep breath causing a sharp, almost unbearable pain in my rib. Even taking it easy didn't help as any core movement - getting off the sofa, bending down, standing up - causes a similar pain. I'm thinking cracked rib or muscle damage. Either way, there's no point going to hospital and there's nothing I can do except take it easy for a while. (And try not to laugh, cough, sneeze, breath too deeply or move.)

What a Week or Two

This time last week I was still in Offenburg, Germany, having spent the day watching the second round of the Nissan UCI World Cup cross-country mountain bike racing. There's hope that the UK will have a round next year in Dalby Forest so a BC contingent and a few others, including me, tagged along to have a look and pick up some tips.

As it was a last minute thing, I ended up driving the 500 miles through France on Friday and driving back on Monday. An interesting experience but not one I would want to repeat any time soon. The weekend and the racing was inspiring though - seeing the worlds elite, especially Monsieur Absalon, really is something to behold. And I somehow managed to end up writing a report and taking some photos for XC Racer. Published at last! And there's some more photos up on my flickr account. I think this my favourite one of eventual winner Julien Absalon. (Check out the quad muscles!!)

The rest of the week flew by with me playing at different jobs and trying to get through my long 'To Do' List. I haven't got very far yet.

And today I actually managed to ride Olive the Dekerf (and she was absolutely incredible once again) - I popped down to Swinley Forest for the Gorrick 100(km) enduro. It was the Gorrick 50 for me, just completing 3 laps of the fantastically fun 10 mile course. And incredibly I managed to win, although it wasn't a race, just a challenge. So let's say I was the first female to complete the 3 lap challenge - and received a rather nice trophy and Gore Bikewear cycling jersey for my efforts. At some point I'll write a race report.

Finished!!

Finally! After all these months and months and months of waiting for work to finally finish, it has! And I'm so happy and relieved and excited and cheerful and stress free and I'm really looking forward to my Summer now.

It's been an odd few days though, both before and after the leaving do (obviously, things never go smoothly around here). It started with a shopping trip on Thursday morning with Jodie to get new outfits for the leaving do Friday night. We both hate shopping, I really hate shopping in London, and to top it off it was raining. We were both doing surprisingly well until what will now and forever more be known at 'the Diesel incident'. I was trying on a pair of jeans in Diesel that turned out to be far too tight. Peeling the ridiculous tight pair of trousers back down my legs to my ankles I stumbled... out of the cubicle into the shop, banging my thigh on the handle. The young, male shop assistant looked stunned to say the least - and Jodie burst out laughing. I left in haste. I didn't really want a pair of jeans anyway.

Friday was the last day. I have to wonder how many P45s have been handed out amongst cheers, hugs, rounds of applause and popping champagne corks? Ours were. It was brilliant. Champagne. Lunch. Champagne. Lunch, again(?!) Champagne reception. Pub. Champagne. Champagne. More Champagne. (And I really have to say thanks to the guys at Green Media for a considerable amount of the champagne - there are some true gents out there ;-) I also have to say a really massive thank you to Nick Blackham, one of my managers, for being an absolutely top bloke over the last couple of months, and for some of the champagne on Friday. I couldn't have done it without him.

Not surprisingly, Saturday started with a hangover, and in fact ended with a hangover. (Note to self: don't drink that much champagne again in one day, it's just not worth it.)

Sunday should have been race day but I had a rather niggly shopping injury (see above) which meant my thigh went 'twang' on the first hill of the first practice lap at the first round of the Midlands XC series. So I spent the day soaking up the sun, with the odd bit of roving marshalling and course work.

Tomorrow I start my new life as an unemployed person, or should that be full time event organiser/consultant? Or maybe full time cyclists? Maybe I should call it a sabbatical? I'll have to have a think over the next couple of weeks whilst I'm finishing doing up my first house. It all feels really weird. I've been waiting for this for ages but now I can't get my head around it. Not that I'm going to have too much time to think about with the sheer amount of work I have to do over the next few weeks. I'm sure the time will fly by though. But, that time starts first thing tomorrow morning. Can't wait!!

I Think I'm Gonna Like It Here!

What a lovely weekend: relaxing mornings; fresh coffee; some tidying up; some DIY; tasty lunches; productive afternoons on the computer; freshly cooked, homemade dinners; stress free evenings listening to music answering emails and tidying up the desktop; early nights. This is a life I could get used to, and I so easily slipped into it. I even managed to get an Easter ride in and treat myself to a Cadbury's Buttons Easter Egg.

Just three more days of work left and then I can take it easy for the Summer. I should even have time to work through my things to do list whilst finishing off the house and taking long rides in the sunshine. I'm so excited to finally be finishing this chapter of my life and starting the next one - and I've only got a few days to wait!

Life is already better and care free. There was industrial action on the trains today and though I'd made a special effort to get to the station early, I still had to wait half an hour. I didn't care. The train was packed with Easter day trippers, I couldn't sit down. I didn't care. The exit barriers were too busy and I kept getting rammed in my ankles by pushchairs. But I just didn't care. Traffic in central London was chaos. Oh well, I didn't care. I sat at one set of traffic lights on Shaftsbury Avenue for almost 15 minutes - traffic wasn't moving and an ambulance was trying to get through, even though his lights were flashing and his siren was on, there was one female driver who would rather sit at the front of the queue doing her makeup instead of pulling forward out of the way and lose her hard fought place in traffic. At this point I did care. I wanted to find a large blunt object and throw it through the window, hitting her on the head and scarring her just above the beautifully mascara'ed eyes, so that she would never do her makeup in traffic again, and would pay more attention to the emergency services around her. (Not that I spent every second of the 15 minutes thinking about this you understand, I seem to have a gift for instantaneous creation of mythical scenarios - particularly if they're on the slightly evil side.) The rest of the day was delightful and care free.

Roll on next weekend!
(And yes, I did spend an afternoon on the sofa watching Annie. Admittedly it only just makes it into my Top Ten favourite musicals, mainly because of the annoying little ginger kid, but it has its good points and there are worse things than snuggling up on the sofa with a steaming hot cup of tea, an Easter Egg and a feel good musical.)

11 Bloody Days

11 eventful days. One evening I'm in London trying not to get drunk at what was the official closing down of ITV transmission at the London Studios. It was also the day I got served my redundancy which means I'll officially finish on the 17th of April. Thank God! Finally! I could feel the weight physically lifting from my shoulders and the stress draining from my body. It was fantastic.

Early the following morning I was on a train to Carlisle for a few days pottering about on soon-to-be mountain bike courses in the north. Kielder 100 is coming along nicely. The new Wild Boar 24 course has huge potential and then it was over to Whinlatter to help out at the Whinlatter MTB Challenge. This is where things took an unexpected turn for the worse. I had an accident involving a large, 25kg+ speaker crashing down onto the back of my head. Thinking there must be a bump forming I removed my hat and put my hand to the back of my head. It came back red. That's when the others noticed the blood running down the back of my neck. I've never had a serious head injury before and I have to say there's nothing more unnerving than seeing blood dripping from your own head - it's just not natural and all your instincts seem to be telling you to panic because there's something very wrong. Still, the week of rest probably did me some good.

Then it was off to Sherwood for the first round of the British Mountain Bike Race Series working with Martyn Salt for the first time. (He plays squash ya know.) I raced in the Masters category. I was rubbish. Maybe riding my bike over the winter would have helped. Hindsight is a wonderful thing. Full race report coming soon on the race page.

So, 11 days, hundreds of miles, 4 forests, 3 hotels, 2 mtb events and one very large scar on the back of my head. At least life isn't dull. And the Summer is shaping up rather nicely now I finally have my redundancy.

Majorca!

This time last week I was sitting in the sunshine next to the harbour in Port de Pollenca with a cold beer in my hand. I'd just finished the final ride on my 5 day cycling holiday/training camp to Majorca - a 25mile out and back from the hotel to the lighthouse on the north eastern tip of the island. It turned out to be one of the toughest rides of the week; an undulating coastal road on a rough surface complete with a pitch black tunnel carved out of the rock that sent your eyes funny and has made more than one person lose their balance!


Rewind back to arrival day on Tuesday and I'd picked up my hire bike from one of the many bike shops that have sprung up over the island in the last decade. I'd gone for one of the T-Mobile Giant aluminium road bikes. The rest of the day was spent drinking in the hotel bar.

Wednesday was a wet start - not entirely what I was expecting. I'd been promised warm sunshine and perfect riding conditions, leaving the bitterly cold British winter behind to get some decent mileage in. We'd been told by the bike shop guys that usually the weather was better inland so we should take that option if the weather was bad. Half an hour later it had stopped raining but was still chilly and didn't brighten up all day.

Paul is familiar with the island so was playing guide to our merry band of 7 - Ickle Paul, Big Dave, Big Kev, Ickle Kev, Gaynor, Sally and me. My job for the week was just to hang onto the back of everyone else for as long as possible - I had mixed results but was pleased overall with my performance considering the distinct lack of bike riding I've done this year. I even managed some bursts of speed on the hills (I never knew Majorca was quite so hilly!) and a wee bit of time-trialling shenanigans.

So, four good days of riding and actually feeling like I've done beneficial riding. Evenings were spent stuffing our faces at the hotel buffet trying desperately to replenish some of the thousands of extra calories I was burning every day by riding at ridiculous speeds into headwinds with people far fitter than I. All in all a most enjoyable holiday and a superb way to get fit.


Day 1: 6 hours, 90 miles, 5000kcal
Day 2: 3h11m, 43 miles, 2400kcal, max hr 180bpm.
Day 3: 4h45m, 80 miles, 4000kcal, max hr 180bpm.
Day 4: 2 hours, 25 miles, 1400kcal.

Total for the week: 16 hours, 240 miles. (And my friends say my idea of a holiday is different to theirs - can't possibly imagine how...) More photos available on my flickr gallery as per usual.

Happy (Belated) St David's Day!

Okay, so I'm a week late, but due to my cultural ignorance (and the fact there aren't hundreds of Welsh people pub crawling around London on their national day unlike SOME nationalities, thank god) I wouldn't have realised if it hadn't been for a jovial young walker shouting it to me across a windy hillside last weekend.

I'd decided to pop down to the Crickhowell Walking Festival to drop off some leaflets for the Slick 'n Knobbly Cycling Festival. A three hour drive on a Sunday morning after a night shift is never a brilliant idea but I arrived in the morning sunshine feeling rather spritely. My target for the day was Pen Cerrig-calch at a mere 701m, dropping down back to Crickhowell via Table Mountain. Every time I've been to Glanusk Estate I've seen the Darren Crag looming high on the hillside and I couldn't resist it any longer - I was there, it was there. Why not?

I decided on the indirect route starting at the Information Centre heading out west on the Beacons Way, then going off track turning straight up the hill to the west of the rocky out crop and skirting round to the saddle to join up with the path again. The ponies on the ridge were a nice surprise. The wind wasn't, nor was the exposure. Even though the sun was shining and the sky was blue, snow still lay in hollows on the northern slopes and the biting wind reminded me it was still only March.

Finally I reached the trig point and time for a quick self-timed snap. Then a sharp exit south east to get out of the wind, heading straight for Table Mountain with Sugar Loaf as the oh so familiar landmark in the distance (that one's for another day). Three hours and 8 miles or so later I was back in town, content with my first solo jaunt into the hills in many years. I need to do some more of that. Excellent training for my Summer epic on Offa's Dyke with Tony though - can't wait!

Monday was similar with a gentle 4 mile wander on one of the Festival's organised walks around Grwyne Fawr reservoir with another 20 or so walkers. For £4 we had a guided walk up along one of the old railway lines to the dam and back down the other side, with a brief history lesson at the start about the navvys who lived in the temporary village, the railway lines and the building of the dam. All making for a rather pleasant Monday.

More photos available on my flickr page.

The Buzz of Live TV

Sometimes, I really, really love my job - I get a tingling feeling, butterflies in my stomach and a sense of truly being part of something special. It doesn't happen very often, but tonight was one of those rare occasions. Why? Because of Ant and Dec's Saturday Night Takeaway. Now, you may not like the show or the presenters, but in terms of real life, live studio, quality television production, it doesn't get much better than this!

The building and the studios take on an atmosphere; there's a buzz of excitement in the air, you can feel the magic of television. The "on air" lights flash red in the corridors which are ever so slightly clouded with smoke machine smoke, Studio 1 is in use packed to the rafters with a live audience, the scene dock is frantic with sets and props and costumes being moved, celebrities are being ushered around by an army of crew from dressing rooms, to make up, to green rooms and back again, Chris Akabusi and Jenny Bond are talking to Toyah Wilcox in the Luvvies Cafe and Take That have just wandered past. This is good old fashioned ITV Saturday night entertainment at its best - and some of the best in the business are downstairs in the studio making everything run smoothly. When ITV put their mind to it and tell the accountants and shareholders to sit down and shut up, they can actually produce some fantastic shows, just like the classic family favourites of old when they regularly got 15 million viewers on a Saturday evening.

Very little television is live nowadays, it's too expensive and too risky. But when a show like this happens in the famous London Studios, I'm proud to be part of ITV, you get the feeling you're working with true professionals who are passionate about what they do - this is what television is all about!

Sadly, tonight also marks the end of an era for me, and soon it will be the end of an era for ITV. My department was outsourced a couple of years ago to a company called Technicolor based in Chiswick and though a year overdue, the final channel migration happens in the next couple of weeks. This is the last day shift I will work here - I'm on night shift next week, and then it's all over. ITV's transmission has been here in the heart of ITV for more than a decade and I've been here 7 years. I'll be made redundant very soon and ITV will no longer be a complete television channel; it'll do everything except the thing that actually makes it work - the transmission.

I have to say I'm glad I'm leaving though. Moving the operation to a glass walled call centre on an industrial estate in West London is hardly the same as trundling across Waterloo Bridge every day, passing dozens of London landmarks and walking through the revolving doors of the London Studios (the ITV equivalent of the BBC's Television Centre) on the south bank of the Thames, having lunch in the canteen over looking St Paul's Cathedral. Every now and again pushing my way through the waiting paparazzi or crossing the red carpet of some awards show or other to get to work. It just won't be the same.

These are memories I will never forget. It's been a fantastic 7 years and I've had a great time with everybody I've worked with, I've met some real characters who have taught me a lot. It's been a pleasure to work with all of them (most of the time - working in such close proximity with the same people for so many years has caused the odd argument, think of us as the most disfunctional family you can possibly imagine and times it by 10, throw in some long hours, tiredness, PMT and some stress and you can just about imagine how tempers have flared.)

So good luck to everyone who's staying on at Chiswick, and good luck to everyone who will soon be joining the ranks of the unemployed during the worst economic crisis in living memory. I'm sure we'll all bump into each other again some day, TV is rather a small world after all...

More Snow!

This is the view out of my living room window at the moment:

And it's snowing quite heavily again. Most of the roads around here are closed, including the A41 and the A5.

We had another few inches of snow overnight, which is now sitting on top of all the ice and compacted slippery stuff. Not surprising nobody is trying to drive.

Can't wait to go out for a ride later!!