It’s been a hectic month so far. At the end of February we disappeared over to Paris to help escort Mr John Bishop ride from Paris to Calais as part of his Arc to Arch Challenge for the BBC Comic Relief event. Andy Cook Cycling were asked to identify a suitable safe route and risk assess the roads prior to the event itself. We set off on Monday 27th Feb after a live interview with Chris Moyles, accompanied by Chris Boardman. We finally arrived into Calais at around 4am on the Tuesday morning. The route had been broken down into 30 mile stages to allow for some recovery time. The second stop at Beauvais allowed us to refuel with a 3 course lunch at a “Buffalo Grill”….! The following stop at Amiens as dusk arrived allowed John’s four cycling buddies to join the event and ride with us the rest of the way. It was slightly surreal taking over a typically French restaurant late on Monday evening with 70 odd people as the rest of the village were safely tucked up in bed. Upon arriving in Calais at 4am we went straight to our hotel for the night(morning!) where there was cold pizza and beer awaiting! We got up again at 7am to watch John, Denise Lewis, Freddie Flintoff and Davina McCall get ready to row across the English Channel……!
I returned to the UK as I was leaving for Mallorca on Thursday 1st along with Jacqui in preparation for our annual two week bike camp. Many regular attendees and new guests began to arrive on Friday 2nd. With good weather over the opening weekend, we relaxed into the week with a couple of rides to Petra on day 1 and followed up by the Colobra ride on the Sunday. The following day’s mountain ride was shortened and kept flat due to slightly inclement conditions…! The following day’s forecast also necessitated us moving our rest day forward to Tuesday. Wednesday dawned dry so we completed the Valldemosa and Puig Major climbs but it wasn’t warm enough to hang around in the mountains. Thursday’s ride to Randa started out bright and sunny but a sudden change in the weather at lunchtime introduced very strong northerly winds for a couple of days. Week two dawned bright and sunny again with strong winds to begin with that eased by Saturday evening. The Petra ride repeated and the following days Colobra ride renamed the “Dave Wastle Memorial ride” were conducted in glorious cycling weather. Monday we rode up to Valldemosa and the Puig Major and introduced the “rest day” into Tuesday by riding out to the Formentor lighthouse and back.
This ride was an old favourite and the fantastic weather made it one of the most popular rides of the week with one rider saying that “mile for mile it’s probably the most scenic ride he’s ever completed”. We then rode our old Mountain ride the wrong way round going up Puig Major from Pollenca prior to going over Soller and then the Orient. 
The hottest day of the week dawned on Thursday and we rode out to Randa in quick time which meant that we decided over a coffee that the old favourite century ride was a must to ensure maximum time out in the sun on our last official day. A last stop at Petra ensured the majority of participants managed 100 miles for the day and around 500 miles for the week.
A great group of riders and a real pleasurable camp made all the better by the wonderful weather but most importantly by the people taking part. Thank you all for your continued support.
