Fred Whitton Challenge Sunday 8th May 2011

I started this blog two years ago with the FWC 2009 with no inkling that events would turn me into what the media types that contact me call 'a cycling campaigner' and this a correspondingly campaigning site.  It is refreshing to get several hundred miles away from the stressed out competition between roadusers in the London commuter belt, to an event where everybody is at least aiming to enjoy a long ride in idyllic lakeland countryside.

My club had a team of 6 (down from 7 due to a nasty crash in the Masters' Race at Hillingdon a few days before).  We had come ready for the hills but possibly not the weather.  There was steady rain in the morning but by the time I started at 8am it looked as though there may be some respite from the worst of it.  However I got the torrential downpour of hail with high wind as I was tackling the first really steep climb at Honister.  The wind was still howling and the rain lashing down as I tackled the first really steep descent off the same hill when I found to my alarm that my newly fitted Bonti tyres, while virtually puncture proof, were not well suited to these conditions.  The rider behind thought I was gone and it is true I more skied than cycled down much of this slope.

I left my two clubmates I was with to recover at the Buttermere feed; they would both have come in with much better times than I, had not both their chains broken; another indication of the taxing conditions of the day.  I cautiously picked my way around the hills losing control on several more occasions before the rain dried up in the early afternoon and the roads started to dry, thankfully before I reached the monsters of Hardknott and Wrynose passes.

Time did not really matter after all this but I came in at seconds over 8 hours, establishing a trend of a slower time for each of the past three years.

An equipment review for these harsh conditions: 
 - The Ribble winter bike was perhaps a little heavier than ideal for all these climbs but I really had no option as I have moved my triple chainset from my carbon (so as not to look quite so daft racing).  I had taken the trouble to remove the mudguards but it may have been better to leave them on.  Ideally I would have a light bike with a triple or compact chainset.
-  A chain tool.  I always carry a multitool that contains one.  I did not need it but two of my clubmates could have done with one!
-  Tyres.  Go for something grippy.  I nearly came a cropper as a consequence of my unwise tyre choice.
-  Good raingear.  Fortunately my club rainjacket is excellent and proved worth its (insubstantial) weight in gold.

Will I be back?  I am always doubtful soon after completing it but a clubmate and I have already made our hotel booking for 2012, and of course we do need to secure ourselves those sought after entries.

All credit again to the organisers.  They do a fantastic job even in challenging conditions.

Lomas Court Date

Scott Lomas has been summonsed to attend a Magistrates' Court on 25th May to answer a charge that he used threatening abusive or insulting words or behaviour or disorderly behaviour within the hearing or sight of a person likely to cause harassment, alarm or distress on 04th November 2010

Claim for damages against Timothy Denman

I have today sent a pre-action letter to Timothy Denman of Charvil claiming damages for the assault in Twyford on 12th December last year.  I have given him 28 days to respond before I sue.

Cycling Infrastructure

Here is an interesting arrangement that I discovered cycling down the A30 in Hampshire between Camberley and Basingstoke.  This piece of road used to be an important trunk road.  I can just remember being driven up and down it to and from Dorset as a young child.  However since the M3 was constructed running parallel and only a mile or so to the south then, like a lot of old trunk roads, it lost its importance along with most of its traffic.
What a great opportunity to use some of this space for long distance cycle routes.  You could easily use one carriageway for bicycles and one for motor vehicles; alternatively one lane in each direction could be a high quality wide cycle lane.
However cyclists were obviously the last thing on the mind of the Highway Engineer who designed this.  I was cycling down here with a lorry behind.  I had no wish to hold him up but the 'blanking off' of one lane with projecting keep left traffic islands meant there was no way he could get by.  To give the driver his due he was not a road rage moron and he waited patiently until the end of the previously dual section before he could get by.
This scene to me just typifies want of thought and wasted opportunity.  Useful cycling infrastructure could be set up here and on roads like it at minimal cost.  It is not that we do not have the space for infrastructure; we do not have the will.
Further up the A30 east of Staines, money has been wasted painting a cycle lane onto the pavement with give way markings at every junction and crossing point.  Nobody will use it and motorists will wonder why not.
You can glimpse some of this exciting new infrastructure (and maybe some of the reasons I will not be making use of it) on the left in this footage.

Hounslow 'Roadrage' Incident 04.11.10. Driver to be summonsed.

I have learnt today that a man is to be summonsed for an offence contrary to section 5 of the Public Order Act arising out of the incident recorded on my helmet camera near Hounslow last 4th November.
I have removed references to this incident from this site and from youtube pending his trial.

Hounslow Roadrage Helmet Camera Incident Update

The ping-pong continues with the ball being batted many times between the CPS and the police with each in turn knocking the ball out of play then, following a complaint from me, batting it back.  The lastest is that a senior metropolitan police officer has now reversed the decision taken earlier that no prosecution should take place and has instead referred it back to the CPS to decide.  It is now for the CPS to consider whether the account given by my protagonist is remotely credible in the light of the video evidence.
A decision one way or the other will have to be made before 4th May, the six month anniversary of the incident.

Greater Manchester Helmet Camera Incident

Michael Stewart, aged 47, of Daven Road, Congleton, has been charged with common assault and dangerous driving.  He is due to appear at Manchester City Magistrates' Court on 14 April 2011. (More here though the link to the press release does not currently work for me).