Wednesday 10 October 2012

It might not rain

About the best weather prediction for riding I've heard in a while. Busy weekend, I was hungover saturday, mrs on sunday so no riding, eager to do a decent night ride then. Johnnie had checked the weather and also convinced Danny to come out. Not ridden with Danny in yonks and this would be the first bona fide night ride (you know darkness, lights needed, mild hypothermia) so I was looking forward to it. Dragged my bike out of the cupboard and the cranks would barely turn whoops no time to change bearings so set off, climbing up barrow bridge was interesting, legs and lungs still not up to full working order. The light was fading as I rode up winterhill and had to put my lights on for 2 lads, bit of faffage to get light position sorted and I still struggled, I'm not used to nightride tunnel vision. Down wildes getting darker, dropped into the trees and whoosh total blackout, proper night riding. Pinged my way down there then headed for the barn, we met up, danny on his new 5 with some proper bling bits nice! Up to the pike pretty damn cold up top, we all struggled a bit in the ruts off the pike and met a slightly eccentric guy at the bottom. He said he was just up there star gazing, we reckoned the bag he had was probably contained his trusty axe and the heads of of some lone unfortunate ramblers/bikers. You know the mad axe murderer who chases you when you're out on your own in the dark? This was him. Puncture stop on george's as johnnie had picked up a massive thorn, got pretty cold waiting, set off again but within minutes his tyre was flat again, he'd pinched the tube with his tyre lever, oops. New tube, tyre fitted by hand this time, we set off up winterhill all of us freezing by this time but the climb soon warmed us up. At the top of 2 lads we compared lights, Johnnie has a new trouty number, not as futuristic looking and at first wasn't the "turn night into day" effect that I expected. However once we did a direct comparison it was obvious it was atleast twice as bright as my hope 4s, jealous! The downhill was despatched easily enough, a bit quicker for me this time, danny managed to get well off course somehow, ended up missing the gulley and came round the very top of the hill at the bottom. Next we hit ICR, I got a bit sketchy on the last corner, I had to dab then couldn't get clipped in as i was getting bounced around, but I survived. We split then, I rode back up AICR to george's lane, I'd forgotten my MP3 player and it was eerie riding up on my own in the silence, fortunately the axeman had gone. I was shattered by the time I hit chorley old road so took the easy route back home on road, quick bite to eat then off to bed and out like a light. Sleep of the righteous (righteously knackered)

1 comment:

Junkyard said...

no sleep of the righteous but it was a cracking ride