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Update from Day 6 to today.
Fish and Chips. Strangely the words that followed never made it onto the blog for Days 4, 5 & 6 which is odd. There must be a word limit to each entry. Anyway, what should have been said is as follows and recounts our travails of the last few days.
It was day 6. Clun to Chester and Tom's legs were not wearing well. In fact it was his knee cap cutting into the muscle that was causing the slow progress. We cycled together for several hours but didn't make very good progress and eventually, around lunchtime Tom took the difficult but correct decision to pull out and seek some medical advice on his knee. I must say, for someone who'd only done a fraction of the training I'd done, Tom had shown remarkable toughness and spirit making it this far. Around 400 miles and much of it in pain.
So Tom headed up to stay with his parents for the weekend and made some quick calls to locate a physio in the nearby area. Meanwhile, I carried on to Chester alone and made it to Chester Backpackers in good time. There doesn't appear to be a single day where the mileage on the C2C guide is even remotely accurate. You can add 10 miles to most of their estimates. :-(
I arrived in Chester around 4.30pm. Roughly 45 mins ahead of the next quickest riders. Sounds good. But in fact, riding at my normal pace was slowly tiring me out. I wasn't to fully understand this until the end of the next day, Day 7 - Saturday.
Saturday I rode alone. 83 miles to Slaidburn and most of the first 50 were reasonably flat. Even so, most people take 2 days to do it. I made great progress for the first 50 but around about that time hit the Yorkshire Dales. Beautiful but very hilly. And relentlessly so. Rather like Cornwall all over again but not as warm! I battled on but hit a "wall" and ran out of energy with 25 miles of hills remaining. When you reach the empty mark, there's no amount of eating that corrects it fully. You've over done it. I'd misjudged my own speed and endurance. I made it to Slaidburn 90 minutes ahead of the following pair of riders. And on arrival I felt ok but it really hit me when I tried to eat dinner and could only manage half of it. My body was effectively in shock and was rejecting food. Still I went to bed and tried my best the next morning to eat breakfast. I managed a bowl of cereal and nothing more. Again, not the way to start and another sign. But what could I do? I was alone. I had to get to Carlisle and I had to cycle North so I did. Another 86 miles (75 in the C2C notes!)
Tom meanwhile was getting some rest and some physio time. So he texted me later on to say he'd be taking the train up to Carlisle to re-join that evening. I certainly appreciated the prospect of having some company again. Even if we didn't ride alongside each other much.
So I worked my way North and hit another energy wall around the 70 mile mark. The last 15 miles to Carlisle were cycled in a bit of a daze. Half of me falling asleep in the saddle and the other half wanting to throw up. But I made it. This time I didn't even have the illusion of feeling elated on arrival. Just exhausted.
Tom arrived and we ate some dinner together and for the first time I contemplated the fact that I wouldn't make it to John O'Groats on this attempt in one go. I needed a rest and we hadn't planned any rest days. The flat riding of London had lulled me into a false sense of capability even with practise rides in the South Downs, from Southampton to London as preparation. Somehow none of that was enough to prepare me for repeating it every single day.
So Monday morning came and I stayed in bed. Tom had had his two days of recuperation and set off for Lanark. Sadly it took 40 odd miles before his knee became bad again and 50 miles before we lost contact. I'm hoping he's ok but I think that's it for the knee.
As for me, I'm supposed to depart Stirling on Wednesday morning, so I have until then to get strong again and regain the strength I'll need for the rest of the ride. I'll be watching the weather. It's one thing to attempt a great challenge it's quite another to recklessly endanger one's self and risk needing to be rescued. By Wednesday morning, I'll know.
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RichardS Keep the faith, Will! What you've done is already beyond the abilities of most of us...