OK, so it's well over a week since I did the ride and some of you have been waiting ever-so-patiently to hear all about it. Of course some of you have asked this week when it is, so clearly weren't paying attention in the first place... As it turned out I had the timing all wrong, so it was just as well I checked on Saturday evening before the ride and discovered that I was, in fact, starting at 8:30am and not 7:30am as I'd been telling anyone who would sit still enough to listen during the week before. I had become slightly cocky about it. 'Yeah, no problem at all. I'm sure I'll make the distance, it's just a question of how quick, and even then I'm starting to revise my estimate downwards', was the sort of thing you might have heard had you been unlucky enough to get stuck in a room with me during the week prior to the ride. My original target time was four and a half hours, with a hopeful eye on the four hour mark if I felt particularly good on the day. I turned up at Clapham Common for the start and couldn't believe the number of people that were there. I knew that there were 27,000 entrants, but I also knew that they were starting from 6am and that I was in one of the last three starting slots (8:30, 9 and 9:30am are the last three). The scene was almost unreal, and the number of people saying things like, 'what time did you manage last year?' and 'yeah, I asked for a 7am start and got stuck with this - started at 6am last year and it was just too early' was mildly alarming. I felt like I was the only first-timer. My 8:30 start time turned out to be an estimate anyway and I finally passed the start line just after 9am. Five minutes later frustration kicked in. The average speed was just a couple of miles per hour due, mostly, to the volume of riders, but also to the number of sets of traffic lights. Now call me a winger if you like, but if the roads are closed to allow a massive cycle ride through, why are the riders forced to stop at the red lights by three armed (I kid you not) police per set of lights?! After about an hour, which somehow equated to about 12 miles in, we stopped. By we I mean every single cyclist as far as the eye could see in front and behind. Every last one of them. Stationary. This lasted for something like half an hour and was caused by an 'incident'. No idea what the incident was, but I was by now beginning to doubt that four and a half hours was achievable, never mind the four hours that I'd started wondering about. After this little hiccough it was plain sailing for the next not-quite-40 miles or so. I did all sorts of fun things like keeping up with a couple of people who clearly cycle a lot more than me - slipstreaming is definitely the easiest way to cycle at 32mph. I also had a nearly-accident at just over 30mph - I passed a car coming in the opposite direction, pulled out to overtake a bike that I'd been closing in on at a scarey rate and bounced off the guy beside me. Just think about that for a moment - I'd just passed within inches of a car, so there wasn't anyone there and then when I moved sideways there was. How close must he have been behind me, and what was his speed like?! Anyhoo, he bounced off me and carried on up the road at what can only be described and an unachievable-by-me type of pace. Those of you counting the miles will note that at this point in the tale we are about 50 miles in, and therefore not far from Brighton. I was, surprisingly, feeling pretty good at this stage, although a little thirsty and wondering how much a bag of chips would cost me on the pier. It was time to tackle Ditchling Beacon. I'd looked this up a couple of times and the prospect of a mile long one-in-four hill after 50 miles of riding didn't fill me with warm happy thoughts. I paused in Ditchling village to top up with water, start my camera recording and stretch my muscles (they weren't quite stretched enough by this stage). Then there was no delaying any more and off I rode. At first I wondered what the fuss was about, and then I realised that I was not really in what you could call a high gear and wasn't going all that fast. I decided as it got steeper to drop down to a lower gear and broke the gear change. I was not happy. I lost all momentum, got off the bike a kicked it several times. I managed to get it into the lowest possible gear and set off again. The noise was terrible - it was kind of trying to change seven gears and kept jumping, so I couldn't ride it. I got off and kicked it again - harder this time. Got back on and thought it was better. Then the chain fell off. I spent a few minutes cursing the bike and then got the chain back on, got it in the lowest possible gear and started off. Two stops later, and after a lot of puffing I reached the top. I was a bit miffed that I hadn't managed to get up in one go, but I didn't walk any of it, so I figured that was better than nothing. Now, if you ever do this ride yourself don't listen to the commentary as you reach the 'top' of Ditchling Beacon. It's all lies. They keep telling you that you're at the top and it's all downhill to the sea front. Utter bollocks. There are two more hills. Not large ones, but hills all the same. At the top of the hill, believing I was at the top, I sorted the gears a little and managed to get the bike working for the top seven gears only. This seemed sensible for a downhill sprint into Brighton. The downhill was almost as terrifying as the climb was knackering. When the downhill finally got going I ran out of gears and simply freewheeled with my chin tucked down on the handlebars - I set a new record for my personal best top speed on two wheels at 41.something mph. Then I saw a tiny little problem - the first traffic light for 30+ miles. And it was red. The rest of the ride into Brighton was as uneventful as the first 10 miles out from Clapham. It was lovely to be greeted by such a large crowd of people as we rolled through the town and onto Madeira Drive to the finish line. At this point I seriously believed I could have turned round and gone back to Clapham, and probably would have done had I not had Claire and the girls waiting with Tim to drive me home... next year maybe. Speaking of which, who's up for it next year? One final word on the sponsorship. Many, many thanks to all those who donated. I think my final total is in the region of £800, but I'm still collecting the last of it. If you do want to add to the pot retrospectively then please do - send a cheque payable to British Heart Foundation to me (ask for the address) or go to http://www.justgiving.com/jamesadane/ which will be active until about September.

I suspect most of those who read this are already aware of this request, but on the off chance that there are readers who are not a) on Facebook or b) in my email address book I thought I should post something here.

I have been granted a place on the annual London to Brighton Cycle Ride which is organised by the British Heart Foundation.

So on June 15th I will join 26,999 other lunatics at Clapham Common, point my bicycle in an approximately southerly direction and peddle hell-for-leather until I either reach Brighton or fall off, whichever is sooner. Since it's organised by the BHF they ask that participants raise sponsorship for them, hence this post. There are three ways you can donate if you would like to sponsor me:

1. I have a JustGiving page. If you use this then the money doesn't come anywhere near me and goes directly to the BHF, and please don't forget to tick the 'Gift Aid' box if you pay income tax in the UK as this will add 20% to your donation at no extra cost to you.
2. You can email me via my comments page and I'll add you to my paper sponsorship form. You can then post the money (cheques payable to British Heart Foundation, address on request), or I'll pester you after the ride for money. Please include your name, home address & postcode and either an amount per mile or a total amount you wish to sponsor. Again your donation can be Gift Aided, so if you're a UK tax payer let me know and I'll tick that box on the form as well.

My target on this is £1,000, which I don't think is unreasonable - I know a lot of people and I'm already approaching half that total. For those of you who are on Facebook, I've setup a group so you can get updates on training(!) and a review of the ride afterwards.

One last thing; if you know anyone who you think would be willing to support the BHF by sponsoring me, even if I don't know them and they don't know me, please feel free to point them at this page.

Thanks for reading!

Dragon Mama reported a conversation she had with our eldest this morning regarding school yesterday:

Teacher: Who can tell me an 'ing' word
Alix raises hand
Teacher: Alix?
Alix: Minging

DM thinks I should think a little more before adding to the children's vocabulary in future. I, on the other hand, am still laughing about it. And I think she should get extra points for picking a word with two ings!

So Fernando Alonso has defended his countrymen over the racist abuse showered upon Lewis Hamilton last month. Fair enough. I suspect that the 'fans' who were at the centre of the incident are a small minority, but there was still a missed opportunity here. Couldn't he have said something like, 'the racist abuse directed towards my former teammate was abhorent, but please understand that the culprits are a very small minority voice in my country'? Surely his PR people will be rueing the missed opportunity to show Alonso as an ambassador for both Formula 1 and Spain too.

While we're on the subject both Alonso and The Dictator have declared that an anti-racism programme is unnecessary in Formula 1 because 'this was a one-off incident.' This, I would argue, makes it precisely the right time to kick off an anti-racism campaign; stopping it before it gets a foothold will be far, far easier than stopping it once it's an integral part of the sport.

And yet strangely believable. One of my [Portuguese] colleagues is still puzzling over my anger at him this morning after he dripped espresso (please note the lack of a letter 'x' and learn to pronounce it correctly) into my tea. He couldn't understand why I poured the tea away and made a fresh cup. The dozy pillock.

You may recall that I recently announced my intention to take part in the London to Brighton Cycle Ride this year. Well my application is now in the hands of Royal Mail, so here's hoping that a place is given and I get to join in the fun. Watch this space for more details.

It's often been said that I am not quite all there. In celebration of this I have decided to match insanity with the only form of exercise I undertake¹: cycling. So, on June 15^th 2008 I intend to join a relatively large group of other insane individuals on Clapham Common and cycle from there to Madeira Drive, Brighton. It is, I grant you, a bit of a distance, but I think I'm up to it. The question is, are any of you? If you would like to join me please let me know asap as I will be sending off my form. If any of you would like to ride as well we can setup a team which gives a better chance of getting a place.

On another note, it's a sponsored ride for the British Heart Foundation, so at some point after my place is confirmed I'll be bugging everyone I know for pledges. You have been warned.

¹ Other than lifting the children and pinning them to the ceiling that is.

I've been slightly remiss this year, but today I've been inspired to have my annual rant about idiots on the road.

This morning it's been, and remains, a little misty. The visibility is such that lights are required, but not so bad that high intensity rear lights are needed. For the record, if you are driving today please use dipped headlights, not parking lights (or as they are sometimes wrongly termed sidelights), not front fog lights, not no-lights-at-all-because-you-ca-see-fine-without-them - the point is that other people need to be able to see you as you drive at them from the fog in your silver car, you pillock.

This message also applies to my fellow cyclists - put your lights on, or you will be driven into by the muppet with no lights on.

Thanks for listening, and Merry Christmas!

Sitting watching TV this evening Claire and I heard the unmistakable sound of a mobile telephone ringing on silent - vibrating in other words. Having checked our collection of portable telephonic equipment and found none of them on silent or ringing we were stumped. The penny then dropped. It was Alix snoring. Sometimes I pity Tiphaine.

We got our first Christmas card this morning. Can anyone top that? Does anyone else want to admit that they've sent any cards out yet?