The Lemon Fool

I tried to help out colleague who was going to start mountain biking, even offering to take him around a couple of local loops.

He finally bought a MTB and told me he went for a small ride just to try it out. Asking him his route, I said that must be approx 50 miles! Just over 60 he said cos I didn't want to go too far.

If that isn't far what do you call a long ride I asked.

Then he told me about RAAM and how he and his team of 4 won. Well x3 really as one was injured crossing a railway and had to drop out.

Some interesting videos of the event. I even volunteered to do a support roll to case the process before trying to have a go myself. Unfortunately events overtook and I suspect my dream is over unless I do it not as a race.

I was crew chief on a solo RAAM attempt in the mid noughties. It was a bit of a nightmare as far as I was concerned. Not well planned, fall outs among the crew, so many things that could have been better but he finished it with 12 minutes to spare before the cut off time of 12 days and 5 hours that would have resulted in a DNF.

I watched the GCN preparation video on youtube here
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ndCW2xAjBWw

It brought back fond memories. In some ways the team/relay attempts are even more complex than the solos. Good luck to them.

John