Broken Chains and the Rhigos mountain

11th June 2016

It’s 6am on a Saturday morning and as usual I am off for an early morning ride. My plan for today’s ride is to head to Lisvane then down the lanes to Old St Mellons from their head down to Cefn Mably and onto Rudry then head back to Lisvane and go to Rhiwbina and back home. The ride is quite hilly but a really enjoyable one.

The weather wasn’t great when I set off, it was drizzling but not windy. Everything was fine until I got to Lisvane and I had a gear that kept slipping, didn’t really think too much about it and just missed that gear out. The gears seemed to be slipping a little more as I left St Mellons and as I headed through Cefn Mably and the first real hill of the day my chain snapped.

I was half way up the hill when my chain snapped and my pedals just spun round, I was lucky not to fall off my bike. Not good stalling half way up a hill when you are clipped into your pedals. I managed to put the chain back together on the side of the road but not before calling for help.

As I was on a hill I was able to free wheel down to find a safe place to wait for Jo (my girlfriend) to come and rescue me. I found a place to wait and lent my bike against a gate and after about 5 mins I was surrounded by honey bees, seems I had disturbed a bee’s nest. After a quick move across the road Jo came and rescued me and drove me home.

Well the bike is now in for repair and it turns out that I need a new chain and cassette, I was going to have my bike serviced anyway before the challenge it has just happened a little earlier.

12th June 2016

Lara’s blog (with a little help from Andy)

It was only Andy and myself who set out on Sunday as Mike’s bike was in the bike shop getting a new chain and cassette – clearly we are training so hard that it just couldn’t cope.

The weather was miserable but our moods weren’t as we headed up the Rhondda valley towards the famous Rhigos mountain. It was pretty straightforward getting there, then we hit the climb – a couple of switch backs that made me feel like I was in the Tour de France, then one mighty long drag to the summit. Every time we thought we had reached the top, we went round another corner only to find a whole lot more climbing awaiting. It’s a long one and I am sure that the views are superb, but were completely obscured by cloud.

What goes up must come down though and there was a lovely fast descent to reward us for our climbing effort. Then it was all downhill back to Cardiff. There were no mishaps although there were a number of cars that passed so close that we must have been riding magic invisibility bikes for the drivers not to see us.

Andy commented: Lara declared that she didn’t know the way (again) even though it was a straight road (which is a handy way of her avoiding the wind).

No cycling for me next weekend as I’ll be enjoying myself at a wedding.

With only 94 days to go until our September riding challenge from North to South Wales we have set up a couple of giving pages and if you would like to support us the pages can be accessed via the following links:

Andy is raising funds for the MS Society and his Just giving page can be accessed via https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/Andy-Lloyd10

I (Mike) am raising funds for Mind and my Virgin Money Giving page can be accessed via http://uk.virginmoneygiving.com/MikeShevyn

All donations to either Andy or myself are appreciated and you will be helping two very worthy causes.

In the next blog look out for our training ride reports and the adventures that go with them ........................

#Chains #Repairs