London-Edinburgh-London, 2005 (by John Haste, Mar '06)

LEL does not require qualifying brevets, but I was intending to do them anyway as a 1400 km event in 118 hours still sounded tough to me.

I did the early 200k & 300k brevets locally here in the Houston area thanks to Kay’s newly sanctioned events, then I signed up for Dan’s 400k & 600k in the Dallas area. Dan’s events turned out to be 350 & 300k events for me but that is another story. 

For my basic training I tried to ride a loop of 90-95 miles around Fayetteville, New Ulm & Columbus about 3 to 4 times a month during May, June & July with shorter weekly visits to Memorial park.

That gave me 3,500 miles from Jan. to July, not as much as I’d hoped for but then it never is.

My wife & I stayed with our son in Hackney, London for three weeks in August & he & I managed a 30-mile training ride a before LEL trying to find a cycling friendly route from his front door to the start at Cheshunt. (about 15 miles north).

We got within a few miles of the LEL start using cycle paths & canal tow paths & I’m sure that given a few more days to explore we could have found a suitable route but I decided the easiest & least stressful way on the day would be to arrive at the event by taxi.

Six days before the event we visited our daughter in Rome. It was a fascinating & enjoyable trip but very tiring, I think it was a mistake to do this just before LEL, they say the older you get the smarter…?

We returned to London on Thursday evening a day before the event sign on & I did not feel good. Tired & probably dehydrated my wife took charge & had me eating & drinking “things good for a cyclist” & thankfully by Saturday morning she had me feeling much better.

The start was a pretty casual affair at 8.15 am there was about 30 or 40 riders in the first group. My plan was to follow any group just to get out of the traffic & around the numerous mini roundabouts. ‘Our’ group missed a turn & we had to re-trace our steps but soon it was into the lanes & away from the town. These lanes were very narrow with high hedges & often trees touching overhead giving a tunnel like experience but also quite hilly. After a few hours it was more rural with farmland & quiet rolling roads with patches of brown grass by the roadside & harvesting in full swing. Weather was patchy sun & temperatures in the 70’s.

The stretch onward to Lincoln is pretty flat & I must confess not really exciting. Once out of Lincoln you have the flat lands around Doncaster with numerous power stations dotted all over the landscape one area looks just like another, you could be traveling in circles & you would not know. Which is just what I did when I got lost with Jack Eason who is a legend in AUK UK as he has completed most of the international events (sometimes two or three times) & he is 80 years old. I tried to get some tips from Jack but he only became excited & animated when talking about his garden & his vegetables, cycling? He was not even sure why he was doing it!

Now we were approaching York, the grass became greener the roads more rolling, the temperature a little cooler, this was cycling at its best. Castle Howard with its wonderful arrow straight road running through the castle grounds & its tough sharp climbs caught most of us by surprise but the views were stunning. The villages of North Yorkshire, Richmondshire, Durham, Teesdale & Northumberland all in their turn gave us superb cycling & plenty of hills with the odd castle overlooking the route. 

We were blessed with (un)typical British weather & at times I felt as though we were on a Sunday club run choosing the nicest lanes & most scenic villages. The northern leg is very hilly & the Scottish leg too, I have seen figures of 30,000ft which I think compares with PBP only these hills are concentrated in approx 60% of the ride. Yad Moss the highest point was a good climb & the steep cobblestones at Alston leave you with lasting memories either descending or climbing them. The view of Edinburgh, Dalkeith & the Firth of Fourth estuary from high in the hills was breathtaking as was the climb.

The route sheets which were on 4 double sided 8 ½”x 11” sheets were generally good but there were some confusing parts & I take my hat of to the many riders whose first language is not English & who still managed to finish this event.

I teamed up with two other riders Rod & Mark for the return leg as we were meeting up at each checkpoint anyway, and we felt that three sleepy brains are better than one in deciphering a long distance route sheet.

Once out of Dalkeith & climbing back into the hills the real cycling pleasures returned.

Climb, descend, climb, and descend, moorland, large vistas & sheep roaming the roads. During the daylight hours it was all pleasure, darkness brought on what seemed like climb, climb, climb, it was very hard. I had a triple but found I was struggling & zig zagging on climbs, but so was everyone around me.

Back through Alston which has the highest public house (pub) in England (not open at 2 am.) up over Yad Moss and down the long valley of Teesdale.

The gently rolling hills of Durham & North Yorkshire were again treating us to some sublime cycling, we should finish within the time limit so lets enjoy. We had no pace lines or drafting there was too much to see & take-in, even taking time on a village green to relax & let the world go by, that is until a bunch passes by & you realize this is LEL. Once we got down to Doncaster & Lincoln that’s where we bunched up & got our heads down just to get this boring part over with.

The food at the checkpoints varied from reasonable to excellent, mostly Italian but with meat pasties & British breakfasts, not to mention trifle & cakes, fuelling up for me was never a problem. I slept from 2 to 4 hours each night (but only once in a bed,) this is one advantage of LEL for a slower rider like myself, its lower average speed. In PBP I was hardly able to sleep at all & so suffered more, LEL although longer seemed more relaxed & enjoyable (i.e. not so rushed).

The first four days were now gone, final day, dreams of finishing later in the evening. But this became a long day.

Lovely villages, Good weather, but Marks bike was starting to disintegrate. It was a fairly new entry level ‘Audax’ bike, but it appeared to be nearing the end of its useful life. Shimano (? no markings) gear lever was so stiff that he had lost the feelings in his fingers over the last two days (oil had no effect on the cables). His seat post started to slide down into the seat tube. Rear spokes were breaking & it was now looking as though time could be a problem. Darkness, hills, & more hills, mist, trees arching overhead, we were now riding up into these never ending tree tunnels, weaving all over the road with our lights throwing weird patterns off the trees, Marks rear tire is now flat, I thought that we now had little chance of finishing within the time limit, we were already into the early hours of Thursday time was tight very tight. Mark said he knew the area around Cheshunt so we followed him on his now refurbished ‘Audax’ bike for what seemed like hours until finally we came upon civilization & the miniature roundabouts, maybe six to eight of them & finally the railroad crossing & then the youth hostel finishing with fifteen minutes to spare. 

Very low key finish, 4.30 am, a bottle of Becks & a packet of chips. Fifteen minutes later the heavens opened with a thundering rainstorm our first rain in five days. One hour later my taxi arrived & I was on my way home.

Some Thoughts;

I found it a very satisfying event to finish. I also received a ‘Brevet 1200 et Plus’ medal from Randonneurs Mondiaux with my returned brevet card which was a nice surprise.

When I asked my daughter to read this report one of her comments was that it should start with an explanation of why I did it. I am still trying to put it into words.

London is extremely expensive but it was also one of the trip highlights.

I have been thinking a lot more about what Jack Eason said, & maybe that’s what I need, a garden with vegetables.

http://www.audax.uk.net/el/index.htm This shows the road thro’ Castle Howard.

http://www.freewebs.com/lel-gps/stageprofiles.htm Shows the LEL profile