Track Sand to Sea Live on MotionX!

Thanks to the guys at Apple and some clever developers at MotionX, you will be able to follow the progress of our ride across The Gambia live on the Web with only a browser.
We'll be using the MotionX-GPS iPhone app, which will broadcast our position every five minutes all the way, and you can follow us by going to the MotionX-GPS Live Position Updates page.
http://gps.motionx.com/iphone/liveupdates/
You will need to key in our Channel Number, which is 21470, and this will display a little orange 'Sand to Sea' marker on the map.
Tracking will start when we set off for Basse on Friday morning and will continue all the way to Soma on Saturday, and then on to Fajara on Sunday – all being well, or Insha'Allah.

Fame at Last!

We had a great write-up in the Daily Observer today. Headlined 'Charity set to raise £10,000 to tackle heart disease in Gambia', the first paragraph reads:

A United Kingdom based international charity, called the ‘Chain of Hope’ is poised to raise a staggering  £10,000 (ten thousand British pound sterling), approximately D 510,000, to support the treatment of Gambian children suffering from life-threatening heart disease.

This is the result of some visits I made with Mr Abdoulie Cham, the Press and Community Relations Officer at the MRC, who is quoted as describing the Sand to Sea Ride initiative as a ‘blessing’ to Gambians, saying that, every day, there are Gambians who need health attention and support.
We had a very sympathetic and supportive reception at all the newspapers and radio stations we visited, which is a good sign for the broader aim of the ride in raising awareness among Gambian parents and medical staff of the urgent need to improve medical services for children living with cardiac diseases in The Gambia.
It should also provide a little extra motivation for our final long preparatory rides at the weekend – around 130 km on Saturday, we reckon....

Terrified

Julie Balen writes:
It's time to voice my fears…
Three years ago, I had never ridden more than a short commute to work and back. I didn't own any lycra and I had never fixed a bike puncture. I was living in Thailand and coming to the end of a post-doctoral contract, followed by six weeks of free time before the start of a three-year fellowship at Imperial College in London. I was desperate for a personal challenge of a sporting/adventurous nature, before starting my new life back in the UK. A bunch of things happened – it's hard to explain without simply saying that the Universe had a plan in store. Before I knew it, I owned a bike and was hatching the plan – a solo ride down the East coast of Thailand, taking me from Bangkok to Krabi province, where I planned to live on the beach for a month, rock climbing. ‘Why fly or take the train, when you can cycle there?’, I thought.
With almost no training, I invested a small fortune into my adventure and spent the evenings either reading cycle-touring websites or speaking to cycling friends (old and new), desperate to learn every piece of information I could. A good friend who was about to depart on an Asia-Europe ride showed me how to change an inner tube; I practiced twice in my living room (it was HARD!). He also went shopping with me: I bought waterproof panniers, a bike-mountable GPS, riding gloves, helmet, padded bike shorts, spare brake and gear cables, handlebars with extended ends on them, etc. I took advice from a British-Thai couple who had ridden the route previously, as well as others. And then I set off.
The first 25 km were very hard. I wondered what I was doing and why on Earth I was doing it. From nowhere, a bunch of road cyclists appeared, overtook me, raced on ahead – I tried to keep up for a few kilometres and eventually couldn't. I let them go faster but, with that, I got a sudden enthusiasm and sense of community (‘Hey look, I'm not the only mad cyclist in Thailand’). I took a left turn and came face to face with the ocean. Here, 30 km into a 650 km challenge, I thought for the first time: ‘I may, just may, be able to pull this one off…’.
That day I rode 36 km before reaching my planned stop. I felt great!
On my riding days I woke at 5.45 am, ate breakfast, packed the panniers and set off by 6.30 am, riding until about 10.30 am. Then I ate a second breakfast (delicious Thai street food) and rode until 1.00 pm or until I reached a hostel/guesthouse. On the longer days I would hide from the sun between 1.00 pm and 2.00 pm and then continue riding. One day it took 110 km before I found a guesthouse. I don't think I could have made another kilometre on the road that day, and I cannot explain in words the feeling of relief when I checked in. This was made even sweeter by the view of the ocean from the hammock as I drifted off to sleep feeling very content with myself.
My bike (named Greta) performed exceptionally – I had no injuries, remarkably no pain (!) and not even a single puncture! The ride was by far the best challenge I had ever set myself, and a remarkable growth-inducing experience.

Post-110km amazingness in Thailand.

And now, a ride of a very different sort. Matched up with some of Gambia's best athletes and MRC's most dedicated sports men and women, I’m worried that my total lack of training will show. (In fact, I know it will show). I have never yet ridden more than 110 km in a day. Yes, it's true I won't have heavy panniers and I have a newer, sleeker bike. Santa even brought me SPD pedals and cleats (though I am yet to test them out). For sure the support team/vehicle and strong team spirit will help. At my ‘comfortable’ riding speed (18 km/h) it would take far too long and the remaining riders will expect more from me. Will I burn out? Or worse, collapse?. How far can I get? What if I get trapped by the cleats, can't unclip in time and fall over? I've never ridden in a ‘peloton’ – and I even had to Google search the term (typing in: ‘bikes riding in line name’]. Will I be a ‘squirre’? (NB: squirrel: ‘a nervous or unstable rider who can't be trusted to maintain a steady line.’) Can I even ride in that strong Gambian sun now that I‘m not so used to it? Will my new bike (named Suchin, a Thai name meaning ‘beautiful thought’) be as fantastic as Greta? Will beautiful thoughts be enough to get me through it????

Training in Thailand, with Suchin.

The only thing I am sure of is that I’m getting on a plane from London to Banjul on Tuesday 21 January. I will come with a lot of work, my bike, an open mind and a team spirit. I am also happy to bring along any spares you would like from the UK, so please send me a list asap and I will buy things this/next weekend! And… lastly, I should pass along the best piece of advice I had before setting off on the Thai challenge: invest in some butt lube and apply it before each ride.

Double-Booked!

Peter Dukes writes:
Sunday: This is diary mismanagement night. Look at the month ahead first, and then week. Create time for important tasks, urgent tasks, and urgent and important tasks – and then juggle all those clashes. Get depressed when last week’s ‘didn’t get around to’s’ crowd out the coming days. Realisation: less than three weeks to go and I did no training at all last week, except for the Munich beer festival.
Monday:: Diary shock. Have double-booked interviews for Friday 24 January, the day that we travel to Basse for the start of the great ride. What to do?
Tuesday: Nana, Musa and I take a dawn spin down to Banjul and back. The potholes loom up fast and I have no front light. I ride mostly sandwiched between Nana and Musa: I am the flabby pale luncheon meat filling between two athletically wholesome slices of rye. For Nana has clearly cheated by training all through Christmas and Musa is nothing but ultra fit. As we return to the MRC gates, Nana satisfied concludes, ‘... an excellent pace!’ I think, ‘I’ll die.’
Wednesday: Recovered. So to Wiggle, the cyclists’ Internet store, for last-minute purchases, especially better lights. And, having discovered a previously unknown bodyplace called the perineum, for some exceedingly high-tech, moisture-dispersing ultra-padded lycra shorts. Am swept away by the thought of the ‘Top-level Tour Air Elastic Interface cycling pad from CyTech for serious sessions in the saddle’. With ‘Moisture management Field Sensor fabric’.... Phew, that’s what 400km in two days will need.
And to be doubly protective, a flash new saddle: the Selle Italia Max Flite Gel Flow. The name, with its sequence of must-have adjectives, evokes the image of a swift, sleek peloton, eating up the dusty miles. Am particularly taken by the promise of the ‘extra padding and specific soft-tissue-relief design that reduces the pressure where needed most. So many words without commas! But nice to know that manufacturers are so sympathetic to one’s most intimate cycling needs.
Thursday: Haven’t yet dealt with my diary malfunction. Stupid-boy thought: could I ride my bike to Basse through Friday night? Well, I do have the shorts and the saddle. Help!

While the Cat's Away...

Happy New Year!
Our little band of riders has been largely dispersed over the holiday period. Quite a few are in UK and Europe, probably struggling to get out at all in the face of gales and downpours. Nana is there as well, so several others have been happily having the odd lie-in rather than rising (much too) early for some more training.
We will almost certainly all be found out when our taskmaster returns – and even more so in just over three weeks' time. But there have been a few goody-goodies who have persevered in spite of the weather in London...

Owen 'hot-biking' under cover in London. Anna's turn next...

Punctures, Pumps and Padding

Peter Dukes writes:
This Sunday, our leader Nana had decided, was the four-hour day. ‘Getting your body used to the idea of a long time in the saddle,’ he said. ‘Not till those padded shorts arrive from UK’, I thought.
We were passed on today’s 92 km spin by a donkey hauling six bags of cement and two full-grown passengers. Our average speed over the journey was 21 km/h and the average when moving was 27 km/h. The donkey’s we didn’t measure. These are the trip data that today’s leader Nana and I exchanged over our end-of-training coffees at La Parisienne, Fajara. ‘GPS bores!’
We were hardly out of Sanyang, travelling south along the open coast-road to Gunjur, when rumbling in the cycle frame announced ‘flat tyre’. This was my third puncture since starting this new cycling fad a month ago. Our leader seemed to think it was rather too many: I was either being greedy or something was wrong - perhaps in the rim? As four bikers examined the rim and tyre in forensic detail, the donkey and cart passed by. Two cultures fleetingly in the same frame. Eventually, after Captain Nana had prised out a tiny sliver of glass from the tyre, and the inner-tube had been replaced, we raced on - leaving the donkey and its load far behind.
No falls today. Yesterday we had two – both caused by wheels in the close pack touching, unbalancing the rear rider. Terry says, ‘Focus on the small of the back of the person in front.’ But ‘in front’ measures only half a metre, and barely a second. So much concentration needed!
Most of the regular Sand-to-Sea riders are away now for Christmas. They’ll be too busy with Christmas traditions and feasting to be out on four-hour training spins. Personally, I’m looking forward to padded shorts and a new pump in my Christmas stocking.

Winding Down for the Holidays?

A bit flexible with the programme this week, but with a similar outcome and slightly ahead of the schedule. We rode for 8 h 15 m and covered 208 km.
Some of us are travelling for the next two weeks but there will be some of us left in The Gambia who will keep riding.

• Ride 27: (17 Dec13) Riders: Peter, Musa, Lamin and Nana.
• Ride 28: (19 Dec13) Riders: Peter, Musa, David and Nana.
• Ride 29: (21 Dec13) Riders: Peter, Musa, Suzanne, Terry, Lamin, Amadou and Nana. A couple of minor crashes on this one, but no lasting damage. 
• Ride 30: (22 Dec13) Riders: Peter, Musa, Amadou, Nana and one other.