Another really daft thing on a bike: Please sponsor me

All,

As most of you know I am prone to doing daft things on bikes and after a rest last year I am back again this year dafter than ever – the Cent Col Challenge, starting on September 12^th.

If you want to skip the boring stuff then in summary:

a) It’s stupidly hard

b) I will cry, probably several times and

c) This year I am raising money for Help for Heroes. http://www.helpforheroes.org.uk/

Please dig deep – the deeper you dig the harder I will climb...

Sponsor me here: http://www.justgiving.com/centcol

I will try my best to find a little time each day to update my blog http://centcol2011.blogspot.com/ (else I will do it once I am back home). On there already are a couple of write-ups from a couple of the harder training rides during the year.

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And now the boring stuff:

The challenge, to put it simply, is to climb 100 mountain passes (cols) in 10 days. In those 10 days we cover 2,000km in distance and 43,000 metres of ascent.

Putting the challenge into non-cycling terms, in 10 days you cycle from London to any of Macadonia, Iceland, Morocco or Russia whilst at the same time going from sea level to the tip of everest and back down again. And up and down. And again. And again. And one more for luck, a total climb of 43,000 meters or 26.7 miles – a vertical marathon. That will be “interesting”.

As a comparison to what I have done in the past:

In 2008 I did the “Etape”, the amateur stage of the tour de france. It was 170km long, went up 4 cols and climbed vertically in the region of 2,500m. I cried twice and couldn’t walk for 2 days afterwards. My bike stayed resolutely in it’s box unpacked for 2 weeks afterwards. My cycling shoes went in the bin. The Cent Col Challenge does an Etape a day (plus a bit more) every day for 10 days back to back.

In 2009 I did the “Raid Pyrenean”, a traverse of the Pyrenean mountain range – 740km ride with 11,000m of climb in 5 days. This was *hard*, both mentally and physically, my body was literally eating itself at the end as it’s impossible to replace the calories consumed. The Cent Col Challange by contrast is 10 days not 5 but in those 10 days you do triple the distance and 4 times the climb of the Raid Pyrenean.

The event is described in more detail here http://centcolschallenge.com/challenge/

As always this is not a “charity holiday” event – every pound I raise goes to charity not on the cost of the trip. And as always for every pound I raise I will match it with a pound of my own.