08/07/2023 – PCR2023 – Day 7

It was a fresh morning and the chatter amongst us was that conveniently, the finish was “only” 400km away. Further than I have ever ridden in a day but once the idea was put out there (just like getting the AM ferry), it captured the imagination.

It was a bit of a ridiculous idea and I couldn’t cycle it in a day (24 hours), but could I do it in one go? Without sleep? Probably not, but who knows, maybe this was a chance to test myself.

I set off a bit earlier than the rest of the group as I was ready earlier and wanted to get on with the day so at 5:11 I headed north out of Abergavenny almost straight into a climb. The start of the morning was essentially a climb all the way until the outskirts of Hay-On-Wye and at this point on fatigued legs and still groggy from the sleep it was much more of a struggle than it’d normally be but it is surprising how you slowly feel stronger the further into the day it gets.

The view from the top was worth the wait though as you looked down over the welsh hills.

The descent was lovely with some swooping corners taking us right into the heart of the town and ideally past a Co-Op which I dove into and stocked up on lots of vegan treats that only Co-Op do.

As I was munching on some food sat outside the shop Laurence rode past, somehow I’d managed to leapfrog him in the evening again but he had his headphones in and was on a mission so there was no chance I’d be able to get ready, hop on the bike and catch him up without a serious effort.

I set off at my own pace anyway, Loz and Raph hadn’t yet come through as I presume the hills were a bit tougher on Fixies than a geared bike so got on the road heading into England into Kington where I got my first puncture of the trip.

It was just a small hole that the tubeless could probably seal but not wanting to have further issues I tried out the Dynaplug for the first time. It had come highly recommended when I had tyre issues on the way back from Barcelona. With the guidance of a YouTube video it was easy enough to do and with a quick top up of air I was straight back on the road again.

The weather was starting to turn a little as I headed up through Knighton so I stopped for a hot breakfast and bumped into some more riders which was nice including Fast Tony and crew.

The roads started to get very steep both up and down which was draining on the legs and the bad weather caused quite a bit of road debris which made the descents a little sketchy.

By the time we got to Montgomery the gods had decided to turn on the taps and open the windows. The strong winds blowing litres of rain into our faces was not on the schedule for a July race but the worst part was the spray off the road soaking my shoes and socks. Taking overshoes seemed like an unnecessary weight and so left them at home but at this point of time there is not much I wouldn’t have done to have a pair.

We all sheltered in Montgomery for a while but I stayed longer due to being a bit wiped out. It ended up being 2 and a half hours which put an end to any hope of riding all the way through to the finish.

The plus side was that Loz and Raph rocked into town just as I was planning on leaving so we had a little catch up but I couldn’t justify staying any longer and needed to get on.

Within minutes I was soaked again but I was 118km into the day so still had a lot of mileage to get done. There was another big hill to overcome not too long after Montgomery which helped warm me up.

I got to 157km in to a village called Llynclys and the rain hadn’t stopped, I was wet, cold, tired, hungry and a bit miserable. I pulled off the road into a pub and asked if they had any rooms. I was prepared to get a room, have a huge sleep, wake early the next morning and finish the ride then.

Unfortunately (or fortunately depending on how you see it), they were fully booked so after a little sit down I decided to plug away at it.

My hesitation to carry on was that there was a long climb into the wilderness up to 500m without any real civilisation in sight so it was either I carried on and made it round another 70km to the next reasonable sized town or I stopped here.

I ran into another rider and we chatted and rode at a steady pace the whole way round which made it far more enjoyable (less unbearable) but were rewarded with some stunning views in return for carrying on.

The descent from the top of the climb was fantastic, swooping roads that had a good surface on them and I could see that Loz and Raph weren’t too far behind either.

I rode at a gentle pace in the valley to allow them to catch up (and to not wear myself out even more than I had to) and we rolled into Llangollen straight to the local pizza/kebab shop.

We gobbled down as much food as we could stomach before we decided on somewhere to stay. There weren’t any churches around and none of us fancied riding any further as we were 230km into a huge day for the legs.

Loz managed to find a graveyard that was close and none of us put up too much of a fight against it. Whilst it wasn’t ideal, it ticked all of the boxes.

We huddled together on the path underneath the trees making sure not to be on or near any graves and set an alarm for 4:30 for the final day of the race