2017 - A new year, a new challenge, the same old knees.

Being led astray again by Keith

So after 4 years of not doing any silly rides I'm blaming Keith (drinking/cycling partner and all round good guy) for this one.

At New Year he mentioned about us going down to his local pubs (Ring O'Bells, Nailsea) music festival on the last weekend of July and causally I just said "Okay - I'll ride down and I reckon it'll only be abut 200 miles".

So the plan was hatched and a couple of hours later I'd got the route down from 250 miles to 205 miles and with six months to train I was happy. On getting home I split the route into three sections:

• Day 1 Lancaster to Tarporley
• Day 2 Tarporley to Hereford
• Day 3 Hereford to Nailsea

That night I booked accommodation in Tarporley and Hereford and started planning where I could meet up with my wife to swap empty bidons for full ones and felt very organised. Then things started to go a bit pear shaped.

Firstly in January I found out I was losing my job at the end of June which was a bit of a shock but more time for cycling was the positive spin on it plus money for a shiny new bike.

In February the nice spa hotel I had booked for the first night went bust leaving me looking for somewhere else to stay. Now this wasn't really a big issue but we were looking forward for an evening of being pampered so it was a shame.

Along with this I've been having persistent pain in my right knee since June 2016 but being a bloke I thought it would go away (ironically this is my good knee having knackered my left on in a cycling accident in 1998). Kneedless (sorry) to say it hasn't got better and I've been unable to squat or cycling out of the saddle due to the pain but luckily I can ride sat down with no real issues although steep climbs are a bit interesting so all in all my training has been rubbish.

This week the doctor decided I either have tendonitis or its the degeneration of my knee joint that is causing the issue and I've been banned from the bike for a week (a week is 5 days isn't it?) during the best week of weather so far in 2017. All of this left me thinking that I really need the extra motivation when I get back on the bike so why not use this ride to raise a bit of money for a local charity as it will help me get through the pain on my ride.

After floating the idea around a fair few friends suggested a charity local to me here in Lancaster called CancerCare. They are an independent charity dedicated to helping families affected by cancer and other life limiting conditions living in the North Lancashire, South Lakeland and the Barrow and Furness areas.

So there you go - the blog is resurrected and will be updated on a regular basis and I'll soon be hounding you all for money.