Lots of cycling and no walking (blog)

Hello

Well since the start of the year I have managed to cover 2125 miles on my bike. This puts me in first place in the Merlyn Cup. I have managed this by my commute to work and also some longer rides on my days off. The shortest way to work gives round trip of 17.5 miles, however I have now managed to make it a 32 mile round trip. This I am enjoying doing as I can put in 50
Mins of hard effort and try to get a higher average speed each day. The longer rides that I have done have included two sportives, firstly the Lakeland Loop on 10/04 and then the Bay Dash on 17/04. The Lakeland Loop is a 69 mile route starting and finishing at the New Dungeon Ghyll in the Langdales. The route takes in some great lake district climbs with the hardest climb coming after 58 miles, this being Hardknot Pass. The weather was perfect for the event and meant for a fun day out. My finish time was 5:01:30 which put me about 180th out of 600 so very happy with that for my first ever sportive.
The following Sunday was the Bay Dash, this is a 63 mile ride from Halton army camp out to Cark in Cartmel, coming back over the climb of Tow Top. This ride took me 3:30:45 which was the fourth fastest time of the day so extremely happy.

I finished work this morning and I am now not back in until 4th June. The plan now is the TGO Challenge, I leave for this on Thursday morning on the 9.06 train to Glasgow. I will be walking wit Nat again, this will be our 3rd crossing, and we will meet up with Peter Molenaar in Aviemore and walk to the coast together. I will give a more detailed route from the train on Thursday and try to update a few times on route.
Gear review section
Montane Superfly XT Jacket



I bought this coat back in January from http://www.climbers-shop.com/ . The customer service from these guys was good, keeping me up to date with the progress of the order. The coat itself is a hard shell waterproof jacket made from Event fabric. The coat has two large chest pockets and then two lower pockets at waist height. The problem with these lower pockets is that they are unusable when wearing a rucksack as the hip belt covers them. The hood on the jacket is very good, it is very adjustable for wearing with or without a helmet. Overall I am very happy with this purchase as it performs it's main task, keeping me dry, very well. I would recommend this.

Thanks for reading.

Jayme.

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