And now, a Sunday Ride with a bit of a difference. The Bangor Coastal Challenge 2011 is only a week away and I didn’t want to do anything too strenuous, so when my 6’3″ 21st rugby playing “wee” brother mentioned he wanted to go for a 30 mile cycle today, I thought I’d tag along.
I’ve been lacking in motivation lately, so having a ride arranged helped me drag myself out of bed on Sunday morning at 7am.
A windy and decidedly un-summery morning greeting me as I cycled the 16 miles to my brother’s house, and I was feeling quite stiff and tired as I came to the end of this first leg. A heart rate of 80%+ of max going 12mph on the flat probably attests to the wind being much stronger than I realised though! I hope. I mean, I can’t be that unfit, surely?
Our plan was to travel from Comber, to Donaghadee, then back to Comber again via Bangor and Newtownards. This was quite the challenge for wee bro. He’s only been cycling for a month or so (on a mountain bike I used to use for commuting) and had previously cycled up to 20 miles at most in one trip.
No surprise, and no disrespect (he might eat me), but bro was pretty slow (if he could catch me). Riding a mountain bike on full 2.1″ knobblies, and weighing a good 50Kg more than me, road hills were always going to be a struggle. But he pressed on into the gale as we negotiated the undulating terrain towards Donaghadee.
After a brief visit to a very cold (and slightly smelling of wee) Donaghadee harbour we took the coast road to Bangor, which was thankfully a lot less windy and much flatter, before turning for Newtownards. Due to a lack of padded shorts, Bro was suffering a lot of … erm, “wear and tear”, after what was now three hours in the saddle. This leg to Newtownards was stop-start, and pretty painful.
Made It!
Still, we made it back to home all right. Well done, big lad, and the easy pace suited me today anyway so no complaints.
