With a few on holiday, some in North Yorkshire doing the Ard rock, many in training for the South Downs way 100 and ride London 100, only five of us left Warlingham Green in The smallest turnout I’ve ever known on a Saturday morning ride.
Was it something I said? Or maybe the risk of showers stopping the fair weather riders from pulling back the curtains.
Out of the magnificent five we had Stuart and Dave, two newcomers on their first ride with the club with Si and Graham making up the numbers!
The benefits of a small group meant a good pace with fewer stops; this meant I could throw in a sneaky little loop round Croham Hurst not yet experienced on a club ride!
After taking in the views at the top of Croham Hurst and Si giving the newcomers a quick Q&A session on the benefits of joining the club, we made our way over to Addington Hills to test the newcomers on their skills over technical rooty sections.
Even with Graham trying to stop the flow over “Roots to all evil” a section that few complete without a dab, all made it without to many 5sec penalties.
Even though we had thrown in the extra 2 mile loop around Croham Hurst we were making good time. That was until we took the short cut through Coney Hall Recreation Ground and with a scatter of broken bottles “Hissssssss”! Dave was the victim! A piece of glass slicing straight through his rear tyre!
With Dave not packing a spare tube that morning! He was on the scrounge and with no Graham Brash in the group with his Poligrip or old toothpaste tube to repair the tyre, Si had to consume an energy gel and the empty packet used as a tyre boot.
After the climb up to Keston we arrived at our tea stop Fiona’s Pantry and with the small group we could sit out the front and enjoy the sunshine whilst Dave went off in search of a new tyre!
With Dave unsuccessful in finding a suitable tyre we set off back to Warlingham promising Dave that there were no flinty rocky sections ahead.
After passing Keston Lakes we hit our fist flinty rocky section!!!! This took us to the long climb to Jewels Wood.
Passing the White Bear with the Gardens packed with customers enjoying the warm weather we turned into our second flinty rocky section! A steep descent with a gully in the middle carved out by the heavy winter rain that if entered was only one way out! This followed by a steep climb up to Farleigh Green.
At Farleigh Green where I would normally drop back down towards Featherbed Lane I decided to head back towards Chelsham and not push our luck on Dave’s tyre holding out. We reached Warlingham with all tyres intact covering about 25 miles and 2000ft of climbing.
Thanks to Graham and Si for their regular appearance and nice to see new comers Stuart and Dave hope to see you both out again soon but next time Dave, don’t forget a tube!!