Gran Fondo New York

Gran Fondo New York! Yeah baby!

The inaugural ride of what is to be an exciting annual event: 53 countries represented and George Hincapie riding the event and a post-ride party!! Serrrweet!

This ride was not planned. New York was planned. Whilst looking on the Gruyère Tour site, I came across GFNY and, blow me, the dates fitted. Helen was fine about me doing this...lie in and shopping for her :)

I was able to take my own bike. I was within my weight allowance, so I packed my bike into a bike bag and off we went!

With all the rides this year, I'm doing the shorter distances as I'm not confident or strong enough to do the full ride. In this case I was riding 65 miles (with 2 timed hill climbs), not the 100 miles (with 4 timed hill climbs). Still a good challenge though and when you include the 12 mile cycle ride to the start line at the George Washington Bridge and the 16 miles back (via Times Square- what a hoot!), you soon rack up the distance.

There are pictures and some video of the GFNY here. They speak for themselves. Put simply, I had a fantastic ride. The weather was perfect, the views, stunning, the atmosphere, electric- just a great day. I saw parts of New York that I would never see if I'd not done this ride. Beautiful.

at the start 6.30am

elevation of the ride

one of the timed hill climbs

at the finish

The finish was a bit of an anti-climax. Especially as I crashed. Yes, how crap am I. The finish line was at the bottom of a hill, so I'd quite a bit of speed up at this point. No signs to point out that to finish we had to go around a small patch of grass (like a kind of mini roundabout) All of a sudden a marshall sprang out from nowhere yelling and pointing "turn to the right, turn to the right" (my left!!) so I start braking heavily, taking the turn really wide to allow me to slow, get three quarters of the way around (about 10 metres off the finish) and another cyclist is walking across the front of me! MORON! I have to swerve. My front wheel leaves the road and I go over the handlebars.

At this point may I point out how useful helmets and full finger gloves are...

"Oh my god are you okay?! Get this guy a medic!"

imagine that in a thick NY accent...it's actually really funny now! 

"I'm fine, I'm fine"

"Hey buddy, you need to carry your bike over the finish line."

"Sod that, I'm riding over the bloody finish line!"

Us Brits don't carry our bikes over finish lines ffs! 

My chain was off and totally jammed. Luckily there was a Mavic technician to hand and he got my chain guard released so I could put my chain back and finish. On close inspection, the bike was ok but I had badly bruised my right hand and top part of my chest on the left. Could have been worse!

So if you meet anyone who has completed the GF NY and they tell you of a Limey crashing at the finish line...it was me! Hahahaha!!

Anyway, I now needed to get to the Roseland Ballroom for food and the after-race party. No directions, no nothing. I had no idea how to get back to the George Washington Bridge. If I could get there, I'd find my way no problem. So I tagged onto some other riders and off we went.

Good food and company as you can see below(sniggers!) and then I headed back to the hotel for a shower and change of clothes. Helen came back with me to the party. We came away with an armful of giveaways and headed to Applebees for dinner. A great way to end the day.

Christina Marraccini, Miss Italia USA and her...friend! Marvellous!

Raising money for Lincoln ICU

Facebook is the choice of everyone for social media. Twitter's not bad but you can do so much more with Facebook. So creating a page to do this charity thing seemed the logical step.

I have ended up making two pages- one is called a 'page' and it seems you suggest to people that they should 'like' it so they get the updates. The other is a 'group' and I don't really get what the difference is. Anyone know the answer, please post! lol. I think you just add people and it's then up to them if they stay part of the group or not.

So the grand plan for this summer is a mixed bag of cycling and running. The list is prepared (see Summer Tour page) I'm signed up and raring to go. I just need to set up the on-line donations page... you know, Just Giving, Virgin Money Giving etc.. done it before, no problem!

STOP!

Lincolnshire NHS/ ICU has no on-line charity page! If it's not a big cheque that can be photographed and put in the Echo, we have no other way of accepting donations. How retro! How 1970's! How useless.

WHAT AM I GOING TO DO?!

I emailed them. A nice chap called Adrian replied informing me that "we are getting more and more people asking about donating on-line" and he was "trying to bring us into the 21st Century for quite a while now"
OK, got him on-side but next email  I got -"I have got to put together a paper to go to the committee so it can be approved" Unreal!!
Anyway, it's now 6 weeks since I first emailed Adrian and on Friday just gone (27 May) he emails-
"Good news, the Chairman and Director of Finance have given the approval for the Virgin Money Giving online donation service. I will get all the paperwork off today and keep you informed of progress."

RESULT!

Hopefully this week will bring me the on-line charity page. 

WATCH THIS SPACE!

My First Post and an Introduction

Okay, I'm new to this. I've never seen the point in blogging. Until now. That must mean I've something to say right?

Well, sort of.

I'm putting this blog together to support the charity thing I'm doing this year. So I can share some of the fun I'll be having around the country and to pester you to hand over money.

So, for those of you out there that don't know, last year I had a routine operation. The short version of this is that it went wrong and Lincoln Intensive Care Unit (from now on, referred to as ICU) saved my life. No really, they saved my life. Fact. Now when I was told this, it was quite a wake-up call to say the least.

So, I was in ICU for about 4 weeks. I lost 3 stone in weight and could hardly walk. This was followed by another 6 weeks on Shuttleworth Ward. In total I had 4 operations caught MRSA, and had more IV's, blood tests and CT scans than you could shake a stick at. And before you ask, yes the food was pretty grim! It wasn't pleasant BUT bottom line is ICU were fantastic, so I wanted to do something for them.

Once I got out of hospital I needed to set myself some goals.

My body and mind were pretty much fried when I returned home. I was angry. You have no idea how angry I was. Unfortunately, my family knew very well how angry I was because they got it all. I was SO shouty and....well, angry. Angry with everything, snapping here there and everywhere. PLUS I'd cry at the drop of the hat. If I wasn't shouting, I was crying. Jesus, I wouldn't want to live with that! Ergh!!

Anyway, I was telling my 'Lincoln sister' Aggi all about this and she said, had I considered counselling. No, but thank goodness she suggested it. Once I got hold of a Counsellor through my GP, that was it... Cheryl was brill. An hour of ranting, shouting, crying and I could walk away with a spring in my step until the next session- literally just what the doctor ordered!

So, what did I discover... that I was frustrated. Frustrated at what had happened to me, frustrated I could hardly do anything, frustrated at having to rely on everyone, frustrated I couldn't work and frustrated I couldn't run, cycle or swim. Being a dad and a husband and being self-employed, I'm kind of used to being in charge (or allowed to feel like I'm in charge! lol) so I'm used to doing things for myself and for the family. This lounging around was totally alien to me. I hate not doing stuff! More importantly not being able to go for a run to clear my head was really bloody inconvenient! Now though I had a [temporary] outlet rather than blowing up at Helen and the girls.

So much for a short version!

Anyway, by now, I'd set myself two goals: a cyclo-sportive (the Wiggle Cheshire Cat) and a run (Lincoln 10K)- ambitious? Well, that's what alot of people said. But it didn't seem over ambitious at all to me. It just felt.....well, right. You do need to know that I am a stubborn old git and I think it's this stubborn-ness that carried me through everything.

What I forgot to mention is that I was sent home with 3 drains hanging out of my side catching 'gunk' into a colostomy bag. How bloody degrading. 2 months with that plus the holes had to be cauterised as they weren't closing up due to 'over-granulation', before I was 'watertight' again and in any state to start some sort of training.

Next stop, my gym. I spoke to a number of people about what I could and couldn't do and just got on with it. A bit of [light] weights, walking on the running machines, cross trainer and build on that. Within a month I was back to spin classes and loving it.

Next was to get out on the road. My cycling buddies Dale and Gavin have been brilliant as have my running buddies Claire and Nige and I'd like to thank them all for all their patience and encouragement.

The Wiggle Cheshire Cat came. Myself, Dale and Big Al (mate from college) met in darkest Crewe for the shorter of the distances. 45 miles. A cold but dry day, I loved every minute. Dale gave me some advise: "Try and join on a group at a speed you can manage and slip-stream them. You'll save some energy"- this I did...within 10 minutes, I'd lost my mates!! I got to the half way feed station... waited 10 mins (scoffing Soreen!)- still no sign, so I ploughed on- this time, pretty much alone. I crossed the finish line making silver standard. 17 minutes later, Dale and Al finished, collecting bronze standards. How chuffed was I!!!

Next, and the following week, was the Lincoln 10k. I've done this for the last 4 years. A great run and great atmosphere all in the shadow of Lincoln Cathedral. My daughter, Scarlett, ran the secondary schools race then I legged it to the start line for the main event. I came in with and ok time of 1hr 4 mins. Happy with that thank you!

So, confidence and strength building (by now, Cheryl's signed me off saying I'm pretty much sorted and no where near as ranty!), time to set more goals. My usual form is to sign up for Woodhall Spa 10k, the Asics London 10k and that'll do thank you. However, cycling has now started to take centre-stage. I'm loving it what with Spin classes now 3 time a week and a few rides out with the lads, it's all good fun and it is about now I realise something. Life. I'm f**king lucky to be here and I need to be enjoying life. That's it. But this realisation has made a hell of a difference to everything.

So, now I'm searching for cyclo-sportives and I sign up for one here, another there and before long I've quite a schedule. Well, with all this going on, let's use it to raise some cash. Who for though?

Normally I raise money for the Scoliosis Campaign Fund (SCF) and I run in their team at the London 10k every year. This is because Scarlett has scoliosis. She's had two major operations and this is how I try to repay the specialists at Nottingham's QMC for all their fabulous work. This year, though, I want to fundraise for me. And so Lincoln's ICU is the obvious choice. However, this has proved to be a difficult choice as you will read in my next instalment.