As is traditional, cycled from home down to the start. Didn't sleep
that much last night, managed about two hours, so didn't set off til
4.30. Still on the Galaxy as the new bike won't be ready until next
week. Breakfast was weetabix (3 off) and lashings of milk, and a huge
cappucino.

So I cycled a guesstimate of the reverse of the route once I joined it
(slightly wrong in a couple of respects but generally was correct). It
was about half hour before sunrise so I had the Solidlights dynamo lamp
going, and a second rear lamp.

The most noticable thing about the weather on the way down was quite
thick mist/fog in the Shelfords and on the A1301. Was wondering if the
lights + my reflective top were sufficient. They must have been. At
one point I thought I was about to have a head-on collision with a
large-ish bird that didn't appear to have seen me, but it veered off at
the last moment.

There were lots of rabbits about at this time of day. I also saw a
skwerl, wrong colour of course. I chased it along the road for a bit
before it dived into the hedge. A couple of energy bars were used up
on the trip down.

I had a near miss with a plonker about 10 miles from the start when he
pulled out of his driveway (on the right) turning right, and I almost
ended up going into his rear left side. Foul language was used. Some
other cyclists who had also come down from Cambridge caught me up at
the T junction at the end of the road, and commented on the incident.
They wondered how anyone could fail to see me (long sleeved bright
yellow jersey, and a high viz vest on top of that). They were on
faster bikes, and were probably faster people, and I stayed with them
for a bit whilst we chatted, then got dropped.

It was not long after this I started seeing the first few riders on the
way out, and then there were loads. I whizzed past the point where
they join the road, electing not to try to contra-flow them out of the
park - it's quite narrow - and go round to the proper entrance at the
southern end. By the time I got there (twice around a roundabout
whilst I got my bearings) it was just before 8am, so about 3h30 elapsed
(3h20 moving time) on the way down.

I removed my leggings and changed to a short sleeved top, with the
hi-vis vest still on mainly to act as a place to attach my rider
number. Exchanged a few words with other riders at the start, and set
off about 8.25, taking it easy in the park (about 11-12mph). Once on
the open road again, and climbing, I accelerated past the people in
front, and set about failing to pace myself on the return. I was
passing loads of people, and quite a few were passing me. Got to
Widford in good time and had coffee (which I threw most of away,
disgusting nescafe stuff) and another energy bar, more sun spray, and
set off again.

Avoided stopping again until Langley Lower Green. Couldn't face any
more energy bars, but was slowing down due to lack of feeding, so had a
burger in a bun there. Set off again and felt much more energetic.
Just before Elmdon got a free water bottle off a marshall and stopped
to fill one of my bottles from it. As I was doing so, I heard a shout
of "Mr Proven!" and saw an ex colleague cycling past. Managed to haul
him in on the hill, and he was riding with another ex colleague, so
swapped notes with them for a bit, then dropped them on the descent
after the small post-Elmdon climb. Still feeling energetic, didn't
stop at Ickleton, and got onto the A1301 again - and suddenly felt slow
again, maybe due to the downhill having mostly stopped. Maintained
about 15mph along there until arriving at the Shelfords, made the right
turn and went over the hill down to the A1307 and in towards Cambridge.
Now that I was nearly back, the energy returned, and I twice got to
23mph chasing cars and taxis into town, and arrived about 12.25, having
done 96.7 miles with a moving average of 14.5mph (considerably faster
than my attempts in previous years).

One thing that annoyed me though was the behaviour of a number of
cyclists. On these sort of rides, people should be setting an example,
but quite a few let the side down. Another point: the odd cyclist
filtering is fine. When there's 30 of you in the queue: stay behind
the car. It'll get away from the lights instead of having to be stuck
at the speed of the slowest cyclists and holding up the faster cyclists
behind.

Rant over.

Simon