Everesting
I’ve been cycling and have been
watching the Tour de France on TV since I was a kid; I bought a Bianchi bike in
1998 and did the Etape du Tour in 2002 after my dear wife said you can’t do
that!
I then did 6 days in the Alps in
2006 followed by numerous trips abroad to the Alps, Dolomites, Pyrenees and one
awesome climb in Chile, thus fast forward to 2020 and a planned trip to the Dolomites
was cancelled in June due to Covid19.
So months of training and many
miles in the bank were going to waste until I heard of the new craze of
Everesting. I did hear of it last year actually when a mate of mine said that
two cyclists were cycling up and down Stwlan doing an Everest, I thought I
can’t do it - no interest!
Records
But recently it was in the news
with pro cyclists attempting and breaking records, I tentatively went on the
Everesting website and there’s a calculator there to work out how many laps you
have to do. I looked at two local climbs and mentioned to Paul French my
regular cycling buddy and he replied oh I’ve thought about it and thought of
Pen y Pass from Nant Gwynant lakeside.
Now to regular cyclists Pen y
pass isn’t a really tough climb, it has a steep part early on and then it’s
3/4/5% until you turn for the top of the pass, again nothing to steep but a
nice gradual climb, but the calculator came up x30.5 to gain 8848mts or
29,029ft.
I firstly told the wife, again
she said, you’re mad you’re too old etc.... right I’ll prove you wrong again. I
did some research went on the Everest facebook page, contacted some who’d done
it and the overwhelming advice was take it easy and eat enough.
Whatever I attempt it’s always to
finish, at my age time doesn’t bother me but I dreaded being on the bike for 26
hours or more, I did have a time in my head of 20 hours I’ll be happy and advised
Paul to change our start time of 04.00 am to 02.30 to try and avoid finishing
in the dark.
I contacted members of our club
to ask if they fancied doing a few laps, and got my daughter on board to come
to the bottom of the climb with refreshments.
Stress
So the week leading up to the
event I was stressed, really y stressed... I managed to buy all I needed, power
pack to charge the Wahoo (GPS) plenty of water, food, lights, I did 30 minutes
light spinning on the turbo on the Wed , this was after a tough 100 miler the
Sunday before with nearly 8000 ft of elevation.
I stayed away from the climb
leading up to the challenge, I’ve climbed it enough to know it well, it’s
approx 3.8 miles and then I realised that to do the 30.5 laps would be near 240
miles.... oh dear, I did the Mark Cavendish sportive a few years ago which took
me about 10 hours with over 10,000 ft of elevation but this was a serious
challenge and I knew it.
I’ve cycled with Paul for many
years and will admit for many of them years he’s been stronger than me, but
even he was out of his comfort zone as he rarely does big mileage. We have a
laugh but we’re pretty much on the same level.
So 18.00 Fri night I went to bed
after preparing everything , I went to sleep at 19.00, well there was no sleep,
I just tossed and turned until 01.00 am until I couldn’t take anymore, stress
eh.....
I had told Paul. I’m taking it easy;
I’m keeping my heart rate low and we’ll stop every 6 laps. Now we usually go up
this climb on average about 21 minutes, and descend in less than ten, Paul had
said we’ll do two an hour, too optimistic I said, I said we’ll be slower as the
day progresses.
Weather
I ‘d been checking the weather
all week and it looked good but there was a concern of serious traffic on the
climb as travel restrictions into Wales had been lifted, also both of us had
never ridden in the dark. We started at 02.24 and as expected took about 26
minutes up and about 13 down in the dark, even though it was dark it was warm
and clear and we actually enjoyed it, the whole road to ourselves although
whilst descending disaster nearly happened when Paul just missed colliding with
a badger, We could see the lights of the hostel at the top of the pass whilst
climbing which was some sort of target and by 04.00 it was nearly light- it
truly was awesome.
Daylight came and we were making
ok progress, members and friends came along to do some laps, we got 10 out of
the way then halfway 15. I was on the Storck bike which has a triple and I had
been in the middle ring of 39, thus for the rest of the challenge I went down
to the smaller ring of 30 which was comfortable to say the least. There was one
part of the climb which the sun was shining on and I felt hot and vowed to take
the coat I started with off. We finished the 17th and the sight of
seeing my daughter; son and grandson cheered me up no end and certainly gave me
a boost to do the next three with no stops.
So we hit 20, and I knew that I’d
finish although by now the calculator in my head was telling me we would be cycling
in the dark. I had a bad patch on laps 24/5 due to the food etc I’d ingested, I
felt bloated and wanted to puke. I came over it. Our climb now was averaging 30
minutes - it never went to 31, a late helper commented that we looked good and
were climbing ok, I was descending faster due to knowing we weren’t far from
the end and I wanted to limit the amount of night cycling. We came down the 27th and my wife
and daughter and other grandson were there. I gave her the bad news, we had
another 3.5 to go, I’d also insisted no way we were going to the top to do 31, and
we were just going far enough up the climb to cover the 29029 ft we needed.
The end is nigh
By now it was 22.20, it was dark
and colder, the descents were very cold. Also by now I wasn’t eating , somehow
I didn’t want to and I must have take enough on board to keep me going, but I
was drinking a bottle of water with a zero tablet every climb. Climbs 28,29 and
30 went ok, I was climbing better, my speed was up a couple of mph more due to
again seeing the family and wanting to
finish, I was even pushing the last part of the climb. Knowing there was no way
I was going to blow up. We stopped after 30, brief chat and after some friendly
arguing decided on the ice cream van lay by to finish, it would be sufficient,
there were vehicles parked there for the night as well as my family, it was
emotional to finish, Paul and myself exchanged words to say well done to each
other, I came off the bike hugged the family and sunk a bottle of beer – it was
sweet.
I was actually glad to finish,
but was in effect ok, I did think that I
couldn’t walk etc, but the back
pain went, the knee pain lasted for a couple of days and my backside is still
sore a few days later.
Would I do it again – no, ha ha
famous last words, but it has given me the boost that I can do longish rides
and possibly different challenges in the future.
Pennies
A good anecdote is that Paul
decided to keep count of his laps by throwing a penny on the floor at each summit;
he had a bag with 31, so I was always descending before him, whilst throwing
one of his coins he saw someone actually collecting the other pennies and keep
them!
Food/drink
16+bottles of water (with high5
zero tablet)
4 diet coke
1full coke
1 Birra Moretti
Many jam sandwiches
Box of fig rolls
4bananas
Rice cakes
Jelly babies
A few hob knobs
2 Tuna salad rolls
Packet of crisps
Oranges
Jordans cereal bars
10+gels
Last but not least - thanks to all who assisted on the day.
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