Another Wednesday. Another windy Wednesday. Another windy, wimps Wednesday! Another day of not really wanting to go out!
Thankfully, with plenty of banter flying around on the forum, it somehow makes “not going out”, not an option, as you fast gain the reputation of being a wimp! With this in mind, I reluctantly got ready and set off for the Downs. Parked at the bottom of Firle, for reasons that will become clear later, I set off. I got to the bottom of the climb, discovering I was already in bottom gear and set off-not a good sign. I hadn’t gone far when a torrent of blood started running out of my nose-a problem I suffer with from time to time. I continued on, but ploughing up the side of Firle, offroad, was not helping the flow of blood! Halfway up, I was struggling to breath properly and I had to stop. My bike was covered in blood, along with everything else and having stopped, the resulting pool of blood on the ground looked like the scene of a murder! Oh well, might as well carry on now, the blood bath was not going to stop and I was well and truly covered.
Finally I reached the top and saw a single light twinkling in the carpark. Rob was on his lonesome; Pete had punctured, but was on his way. Rob kindly described my new look as something out of a zombie movie, or the fact I had been eating road kill without cutlery. With the wind biting as well, we dropped over the brow to shelter from the bitter chill whilst we waited for Pete. Upon his arrival, we got going and I decided it was going to be one of those rides as we set off towards Bo Peep. My mind and sole were elsewhere, I was already on the limit and I thought about calling it quits before the inevitable happened-“don’t be stupid you wimp”, I carried on in silent suffering!
Once at Bo Peep, we headed for Seaford. As usual, once things start going down, I found myself on the front, but I was struggling to ride uphill. Some of these tracks I haven’t done for years, so in some ways it was quite nice to do them again. As we got round Seaford, I was now on new turf. Pete took us along the cliff tops before dropping down to the seafront and onto Bishopstone-somewhere else I had forgotten about. The boys were giving me a good work over and unfortunately for me, I already knew which way Pete was taking us back to Firle-not one of my favourites when you’re not on form.
We had a brief pit stop whilst trying to find South Heighton before the long haul up to Firle and finally it felt like the wind wasn’t trying to push you backwards. We hit the track going up, which is just a long haul grass climb. I actually didn’t feel too bad and tucked in to try and save myself, then my chain came off-Pete and Rob kept going. It was a very quick fix and I was off, chasing after a set of lights. It’s hard to tell, but I was slowly gaining on Rob, whilst Pete had shot off ahead, then my chain came off again! Rather demoralised, I set off, the lights were now a long way off and the will to chase had gone-my chain came off again, fight lost!
Waiting at a gate to let me through, with my wimp badge plastered across my forehead, Pete said we were nearly at the top, which was great news because it meant heading back into the now howling wind. It was a job to stay on track down to the carpark and no one wanted to hang about. With thanks said to Pete, we headed off in different directions, Rob having accepted a lift home with me-wimp (only joking!). The next bit was the whole reason for wanting to do wimps Wednesday. I warned Rob about the first bit of down hill before I dropped over a steep bank and disappeared. I heard a few mutterings in the wind about not following me; so I slowed down to let him catch up. I love this bit off of Firle so it’s hard for me to go slow ,and the only reason for parking at the bottom, but I knew Rob might have a job keeping up. All things considered, he did pretty well and popped out the bottom of the track seconds behind me with a large grin on his face-gotcha, he enjoyed it! He was even more impressed with the fact I had ridden up it at the start, losing copious amounts of blood, which you couldn’t see at speed on the way down!
All in all a good ride, thanks Pete. Hopefully I might feel a bit better next week and maybe lose my “wimp” badge I earnt this week.
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