Recycling

Well sports fans. You’ve come this far, so why not come a little further. This is it, the last week; the toenails are clipped, the bikes are oiled, the Vaseline has been purchased and we are ready to go.

We had decided on nothing too strenuous for the final weekend so met in Dalwhinnie, which has become the spiritual home of our training lately, and set out to repeat the journey to Culra bothy but this time on bike rather than foot.

Murray’s opening gambit was that he hadn’t been on a bike since the Bike & Hike three years ago, his logic being that he only has two 30 mile cycles in him and he doesn’t want to use them up in training. This said he rocketed off into the distance and left Colum and I to follow the trail of his dust. It wasn’t until we approached the final three miles before Culra, where the Landrover track becomes a rough path, that we finally caught up with him.

Then he was off blazing the trail again and kindly pointing out to Colum and I where the ground was particularly rough by flying over his handlebars and conducting a ditch depth test with his head. ‘Are you alright?’ called I, when he had remounted his bike. ‘What?’ he shouted, turning to hear me more clearly and immediately bouncing the bike off a rock and kissing the ground for the second time. ‘Nothing.’ I called, helpfully.

Colum, meanwhile was able to safely negotiate the whole route. Partly due to the fact that the disc brakes on Neil’s bike, which had kindly been donated for the day, enjoy braking so much that they pay only passing attention to whether or not you are trying to apply them. Still, makes for good training.







On reaching Culra Murray initiated a systematic inspection of the seats of the many bikes that were leant up against the bothy. Enquiry elicited the response that his bike seat bore many of the characteristics of a razor blade. Although closer inspection revealed that it had somehow worked loose and was at almost 45o to the traditional angle favoured by cyclists the world over. Thus, rather than presenting the flat surface that provides at least a passably comfortable accommodation for the buttocks he was perched upon something that resembled the profile presented by an intercontinental ballistic missile poised for take-off. Fortunately it was nothing Neil’s handy Allen keys couldn’t sort and so an embarrassing trip to casualty was averted.

Our pause for a photo provided me with the chance to show off the little used stationary power slide; very cool. General consensus of opinion however was that purple was a bad choice of helmet colour.







Massive thanks to all who have donated and provided encouragement, it means a massive amount to us and more importantly to Maggie’s Centres. Check in next week to see how we get on.