By the time I arrived at the night circuit HQ at 9pm, our riders had already been cycling for the best part of 8 hours. In the car on the way down my temperature gauge had read a steady 26 degrees which would undoubtedly be making it even more difficult for all the competitors. You could tell where the KPRC 'pits' were as we had by far the most stuff, mainly food, taking up the best part of two car parking bays and while our boys and girl would be slugging it out during the night I would take it upon myself to enter my own endurance event and see how much snack food I could eat in my 12 hour stint as a KPRC helper. Mini sausage rolls? Not a problem. Home made flap jacks? Easy. Simon Waller's rubbery poached eggs with bacon and ham? Even I had to draw the line somewhere.
I have to say that Brian had everything in hand and was our commander for the event. Everything had its place in a box. Lights, food, drink, clothes, more food, spares, more food, buckets of sponges, even more food. Buckets of sponges? If Brian was expecting us to clean his car while we were hanging around he was sorely mistaken. I never did find out what the sponges were for. I then proceeded to spend the next few hours putting things back in the wrong box and generally ruining Brian's finely honed system. Sorry Brian.
So a gentle enquiry about how our riders were doing. The group parted and there was Simon T slumped in a deck chair, silently trying to force more quiche into his body (the normal way; he wasn't doing anything rude) while he shivered uncontrollably. Ah, so it's going well then? Eight hours in the sun had obviously taken its toll. I had read somewhere once that cycling in those conditions wearing an aero helmet with minimal ventilation is akin to trying to headbutt a comet. I now see what they meant. He looked a bit like raspberry ripple ice cream; bright pink and bright white all at the same time. My first duty as a helper was to be handed Simon's skinsuit that he had been wearing for the past 8 hours. I have seen more hygienic petri dishes in a dermatology lab. I found an old carrier bag for it to fester in and proceeded to put it into the wrong box. Sorry again Brian.
After this, Simon W came over, in jeans and a t-shirt. Simon is a very cool chap. He calls people 'dude' a lot and walks around in bare feet and has one of the most genuinely positive outlooks on life of anyone I have ever met, but even I could tell that this wasn't standard cycling kit for a 24 hour attempt and his usual happy demeanour was not quite all there. After 9 months of solid training, his race had come to an end before it had barely begun (if you can call 8 hours on a bike 'barely beginning'). A swollen knee, that kept swelling, despite Simon attempting to 'cycle through it' and Jules' best attempts on the massage table, put paid to his chances and his disappointment was palpable. He then proceeded to offer everything he had to the other riders to help them through to the end; lights, food, clothing; you name it, Simon W had it. A top, top bloke. He says that's it for a 24 hour tt but lets hope that Brian can persuaded him otherwise in a year or two.
So we got Simon T wrapped up and after 30 minutes or so he was back out, wearing mainly other people's clothing, ready to start the night circuit. In an effort to be useful I had tried to put some of Simon's lights on for him and promptly got it completely wrong. So while Simon was having another shivering fit trying not to bring all his food up, he was also left with the task of sorting out the rear light I had put on his bike wrongly. Sorry Simon.
I know Simon very well and how determined he is, but as he ever so slightly wobbled up the hill to start his first 24 mile loop of the night circuit, I thought his chances of finishing would be 50/50 at best. Just goes to show how much I know.
So myself, Ian Davies and Brian settled in for the night at the HQ while Jake went round to the other side of the night circuit with , Dave Brentnall and Joe Bertorelli to support from there. Pretty soon after, both Mike and Paul rolled in. Paul was truly amazing. He'd been cycling for 9 hours but you would think he'd just popped down the shops for a pint of milk. Every time we saw him he put himself in one of Brian's garden chairs and proceeded to demolish about 500 calories of food, all the time chatting away without a care in the world. I saw Mike for the first time as well, around then, and while he was his usual talkative self, he was obviously starting to feel the effects of a long day in the saddle and his hip was already starting to let him know that it was there. It didn't stop him virtually bunny hopping the kerb in the car park in order to find Philip, who was Mike's main support for the day. After stopping for a rest and finding out where his food was, Mike was back out too, and with Ann Bath, our four remaining riders were now orbiting the night circuit.
Ah yes, the night circuit. Apparently, think Syrian roads, but worse. Quite a few of the riders were mentioning in fruity language the lack of road lighting and the pot holes (two of which were so bad they had cones in them to stop riders breaking their bikes and themselves). This would merely add to the challenge of the night phase, along with a pop up set of temporary traffic lights. Ian, Brian and myself settled into a routine of copious tea drinking, endurance chatting and extreme lavatory visiting, deftly timed like the Red Arrows to the gaps when we were not looking after the riders. The tactics of the different riders was interesting to observe. Simon would do two laps at a time without a break before coming in, Mike would do one lap while Paul would stop pretty much every half lap or so.
Around 1.30-2.00am Mike came in and seemed in a bit of trouble. Ian and I had to help him from his bike and get him inside the HQ. It was in there that miracles were being worked with tea, fragranced oils and kiniesio tape. The lovely Jules was working away on tired muscles and limbs (she even offered to rub me down but the effects of endurance sausage roll eating were yet to kick in, so I politely declined) and our riders had her massage table to get a couple of hours' kip. So Mike shuffled in and after a good sleep, some food and a massage he was back out again after a couple of hours. Mike has been very hard on himself about not finishing this but it was a truly heroic effort by him to get back on his bike at that point and keep going for another 7 hours or so.
While waiting for our riders to appear I was with Ian standing by the road at the entrance to the HQ car park. I should point out that to exit the car park the riders had to climb a short and quite steep rise, which seemed particularly cruel. One rider from another club came towards us and let out a real cry of pain, complaining of not being able to breathe. Yikes. Ian and I got the rider off his bike and sat him down to try to regulate his breathing and we were within a whisker of phoning for an ambulance. After a while we got him into my fold up chair and his support crew arrived (in a dinner jacket; I kid you not!) and gradually he got better over an hour or so. It was genuinely scary at the time, but nowhere near as scary as it would have been to explain to Mrs Kew that someone had died in her favourite garden chair. Ian and I saw him again a few hours later, chatting to Brian and I think he took the wise decision to call it quits then, but I'm not entirely sure.
By about 3.30am I was starting to feel it a bit myself so got my head down along 3 plastic chairs for half an hour or so and around this time Ann came in. I had not seen her at all so far. With her camelback she was quite self sufficient, getting top ups from her support and turning the cranks at her own pace. She was still her bubbly self but stated that she needed a lie down, so Jules's massage table was pressed into service again. I think Ann had about 40 minutes' sleep, tops, before emerging re-vitalised, ready to push on through to the morning. She just seemed completely unflappable and not overawed by it at all. I know that she's done it before but even so, it was really inspiring to see.
Between approximately 5-7am all our riders arrived to have their bottles topped up, have a feed and get stripped off ready to head towards the finishing circuit. At one point, Simon and Paul were sat side by side, trying to work out how many laps they had done. It was like watching and listening to two drunks trying to understand how the Higgs Boson particle works; they just couldn't work it out because of sheer effort and tiredness. So we plied them with food and sent them on their way.
As Ian and I drove over to the finishing circuit we saw all our riders looking strong and we were confident they would all finish. An hour or so later we were set up to receive them and Paul arrived first. When I asked him how he was it was the first time that he showed any negative emotions and even then it was "I'm starting to feel it a little bit." Surely the understatement of the season so far. This was over 20 hours into the ride by now and the sun and heat was getting up again. 30 minutes later, Simon rolled in and was looking better. He had got stronger as the night had gone on as he had managed to keep his food down despite some truly monumental burps. We applied liberal amounts of sun cream and it was now only another 3 hours' riding to finish. Just a normal Sunday training ride and they would be home.
Well done to all our five riders. It takes a lot of courage to even attempt this event which obviously puts a great strain on the body and mind. The fact that they rode with such good humour and grace despite how difficult it got for them is a testament to the wonderful members we have in this club. I know Simon has mentioned it already but it is worth saying again how great Brian was in getting the club involved with members riding and a good deal more out supporting, but I am sure that without Brian's organisation the riders' chances of success would have been greatly reduced.
So, who's in next year?
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