Since I’ve decided to do this British Cyclosportive along the route of Stage 1 of this year’s Tour de France, I thought that I better start getting into shape and putting a few miles (or kilometres) under my belt.
In retrospect, as I sit hear on my sofa with my legs up, going all the way to Cambridge for my first ride in months and months, was probably not the smartest move. The route I ended up taking (which wasn’t quite the one I’d carefully planned out based on the Action 50 London to Cambridge route) was 86 km or about 54 miles.
And as you can see, it wasn’t the flattest route that I could have chosen.

Anquet Maps helpfully tells me that I ascended a cumulative 770m. I don’t mind admitting that towards the end, when every railway station became a massive temptation to stop into, I walked a few of those metres rather than cycling them.
A couple other things also occurred to me in retrospect. It’s probably a good idea to eat a good supper the night before and a healthy breakfast in the morning. Obviously I did neither, and it was energy that I found myself running out of repeatedly. I had to top up with Coke or Lucozade Sport on more than one occassion and it’s scary how few villages still actually have village shops to buy these things from. Mars bars also featured in my diet, and some bananas when I finally reached Cambridge Station – just before darkness fell, which was just as well because I didn’t have any lights with me either. A nice security guard kept an eye on my bike (no heavy lock either) while I stocked up with provisions at Cambridge Station M&S.
Satisfactory that I completed the route, but boy do I need to get used to hills again.