A women-only sportive? What's not to like?

The internet is buzzing with the news that Victoria Pendleton, the heroine of British Cycling, has launched the Cycletta series of women-only rides. The write up on road.cc sent me racing to the website to see what all the fuss was about, since "Cycletta North" is only down the road from me, so it seems silly to miss it.

The idea is a good one, and I wholeheartedly support the sentiment behind the rides. I guess they're supposed to be like the Race for Life running series minus the charity element, which is no bad thing because it means you just pay your entry fee and turn up to ride, without having to spend weeks before nagging friends and family for sponsorship and weeks after feeling crap about only raising a tenner. Saying that, you can ride for charity if you want (it's optional, thankfully).

So here's what I think about the whole thing:

The good things: 40km of traffic free riding. Whoo-hoo!! And no blokes -- hopefully that means fewer club riders and more space when they overtake (which was a bit stressful in traffic on the Manchester 100k)
Oh, and Miranda is one of the ambassadors and Davina McCall isn't. Miranda was a real asset to the Comic Relief team, and I really enjoyed watching her; plus she's hilarious. Davina, on the other hand, is just a bit too loud and naggy for my liking. She has her own series of rides to promote anyway, as she's fronting the women-only Action for Medical Research series of rides -- Davina's Divas (ugggh to the name, yay to the idea though.)

The bad things: It's £45 to enter, yes you read that right, which seems a bit steep. Okay, so it will be traffic free, so on the day you'll probably feel like you're getting your money's worth. I could grumble about the fact that for your £45 there's only the one route length - 40k - ("only 40k") - and no mention of cake stops. Free Gatorade doesn't haven't the same effecct on my saliva glands as an offer of free tea and cake, sorry.

The wierd things: A free copy of Grazia? Well, I suppose they had to get sponsorship from somewhere, but Grazia!? I'll happily trade my free copy for a discount on the entry fee, and to be honest am not too fussed about Cycling Active magazine. I wonder whether they'll take £40? At least the hair clinic is an optional extra, It's easy too look on and make sarky remarks about that, but I'm sure I'll be tempted along on the day -- sometimes I get quite freaky helmet hair and, frankly, need all the help I can get.

And now a quick grumble..

Charity entry: I just had a quick look on Just Giving, and it doesn't appear to be in their events listing. Maybe I'm too quick off the mark. Either way, it would be good if they could add it, because I'd be happy to pay £45 for the event if I thought I could raise my usual tenner on top for the MS Society (my charity of choice owing to fact that I seem to know so many MS sufferers).

Sign up: Well, it would help boost the numbers if the sign up page actually worked, but again, maybe the site's a bit too new and somewhere in a room without natural light a web developer is burning the midnight oil to get it working.

Follow up: It's hard to tell from the write up whether there'll be anything like this at the event or not, but at the Sky Rides one of the great things was access to the various stalls with info about campaigns, rides, etc. so that people could channel their enthusiasm from the day into future events. Maybe we could have a SheCycles stall, or maybe there'll be some independent retailers there, like Minx or BeOutdoors -- both great online stores supplying quality clothes for women. I'm sure there are other great women-specific sites/groups that would benefit from being represented on the day. It would a shame for just the usual suspects (i.e., the Big Boys, like Evans and British Cycling, to have a spot and for there not to be any representation from smaller clubs and companies run by women for women.

Only three things to whinge about? Not bad then. Will I be going? Possibly not for £45. But hopefully some true novices out there will be tempted. In cycling terms 40k really isn't far, so it's within the range of most new riders, and the traffic free aspect does sound appealing. I did miss out on my VP signature at the Sky Ride ven in Manchester, so maybe I'll ride over to soak up the atmosphere? If I can swap my magazines for a massage, Gatorade for tea and cake, and do a second loop for free, I'm in :-)

To race or not to race?

It's that time of year again, when the competition calendars start appearing along with information on training plans, gear advice, calls for teams, and so on -- oh, and glossy fliers. Since getting into mountain biking I've tried to steer away from any competition, stressing I ride for fun and that's all. But I have to say that lately I've been more and more tempted. Maybe it's because I'm getting fitter, and the thought of pushing myself harder feels appropriate whereas for most the time I was finding my feet it just seemed to out of reach? I know I don't really want to race anyone else, so I won't be joining any teams that are all hotted up and brimming over with the thrill of competition; if I do sign up it will be between me, me, and me -- to prove that I can, to look back and say that I did (the competition will come the next time.

That's what happened with the Manchester 100(k) last year. I signed up because a few friends were doing it. I figured it would be a (huge) challenge, a fun ride with friends (although I ended up doing it on my own, but hey), and just a great day out on the bike with organised stops on the way and not much to worry about. It probably helped that the sun shone all day, but I thoroughly enjoyed it and I'd sign up for another one tomorrow. Ask me about an off-road event though and it's a different story. I'm just not sure. Maybe it's the macho bullshit element of it, the boo-rah comraderie that seems to accompany talk of an event? I don't know.

The MTB marathon series might be a good place to start. I'll think about it some more. On a cold, wintry day the thought of 50k off-road somewhere in Wales doesn't appeal. But somehow it does. At least I have the training plan, although who on earth has time for 3-5 bike sessions a week!?

Biking is always better

Without my bike, today would have been a wreck. I'm now only 4 weeks away from my dissertation deadline, so what I really needed to be doing today was working on it with 100% attention. Now, I'm quite easily distracted, so my approach has been to barricade myself into the University library, where I am cut off from the world: just me and my mission to produce 15,000 coherent words (I have 12,500 incoherent ones at the moment) by the deadline. After faffing about this morning, I decided to go into the library again, but with the heavy laptop would be coming with me the plan was to bike-train-bike it rather than ride all the way. Oh, what a foolish idea! I arrived at the station, 2 minutes too late for my train. Then I missed the next train (on the wrong platform!) and finally, 1 hour and 20 minutes from leaving home, I was on the train -- still 30 minutes away from the library! I could have ridden there in under an hour, so now I was rattled.

So, I arrive in Manchester, tootle off to the library, get totally intimidated on a short section of dual carriageway so miss my turning, so another delay, arriving at the library at 6.15pm to see this sign: The library closes at 6pm today. Oh what an idiot! After briefly toying with the idea of riding back then deciding that 6.30pm on a Friday is probably not going to be the most relaxing bike commute home, I headed back to the station, and luckily hopped on a train straight away, heading home again!

Anyway, the point of this mindless ranting is to praise my bike. After an entirely pointless trip into the closed library and back, I got off the train a stop early and decided on a nice round-about detour to get me home. It was dark, the roads were quiet, my lights were blinking away, there was drizzle in the air and a slick glisten to my tyres from the rain. Perfect.