Today was the day for a ride around the Ards Peninsula, with 1,000 other similarly inclined cyclists (or not, as it turned out). Today was the day of the 2011 NDCC Bangor Coastal Challenge.
For one reason or another my usual cycling buddies couldn’t make it. However, with only a few days to go, Adrian stepped up despite only having been cycling for a little while and never having ridden anything like 100Km before. Good man.
Yours truly, ready to go.
The weather was overcast, with the sun threatening to break through for most of the day. Winds were light to begin with but picked up towards the end.
We set off quite early, long before the mass start, and were pretty much alone for most of the ride. Looking back, I kinda wish we had waited. It felt like I was just out for a normal ride, not part of a large event.
Anyway, the mostly flat first leg flew in and we were eating lunch in Portaferry before we knew it. At least there were no queues at the cafe!
Lunch at Portaferry
Stew and Mars Bars consumed, we hit the road again and took it easy to let lunch digest. The terrain took a turn for the hillier and the wind picked up, which slowed our pace a bit. Adrian had been doing well, but at the 45 mile point his lack of endurance training showed itself and he cracked. No bother, we just slowed right down to 10-12 mph for the run back to Newtownards and kept the pedals turning.
There were a couple of moderate climbs from Newtownards to Bangor and I did leave my buddy behind for a bit as I went for a few sprints for the craic. I did wait for him again at the top though!
Pure pr0n. With Adrian in the foreground.
We ground out the last couple of miles and made it back to the Bangor Sportsplex in around 4h15m. Challenge Completed! Burgers and tea consumed! Big back-slaps to Adrian for making it round. I think he’s addicted. He’s already talking about Lap The Lough.
I really enjoyed the Bangor Coastal- a real improvement on the Marie Curie and not just for the weather. I started near the middle of the pack on the mass start and it fragmented quite quickly- after a bit of panic that I was going to be on my own again I got my head down and caught up with a big group of maybe 50 people- it was great riding with them. I tried to latch on to a group of about 10 from Dromara who went flying past us but I could only keep up for 1k!
The home leg up Strangford Lough with that head wind was pretty tough but I got a good thing going with a couple of other guys- all taking turns at the front. Finished in 3hr 10mins and was well pleased- it took me 4hrs to do the same run back in April.
Next stop- Etape and Alpe D’Huez!