An Overgrown Hill

Did you ever ride up a really tough climb? You know the one, where you were hanging over your bars chewing tape watching your front wheel come to a near standstill at the top of every crank stroke. Meanwhile you felt like you were drowning due to the amount of sweat in your eyes and the lack of oxygen reaching your lungs (is this a bit like waterboarding?).

Yep, you don’t forget those ones so easily. In my case it was the last time I climbed Hardknott Pass in the Lake District, 90 miles into the Fred Whitton Challenge. I remember my head hanging over the bars, mouth wide open gasping for air whilst my legs burned, occasionally glancing upwards to the top of the pass to be reminded that I was nowhere near. I wasn’t moving much faster that those who attempted to walk up pushing their bikes, road cleats skating south with every step. 

That memory was not going to fade for decades and whenever Hardknott came up in conversation I had no hesitation in saying “done it once, never again!”. Is that fear? It festered, I don’t like to fear. 

The Fred Whitton memory mutated, the hill became Alpine in dimensions, it had taken hours to climb, there was no way I could ride it again. 

With time though I realised that it wasn’t that I’d had a bad time climbing it, it was just hard. And hard isn’t bad, it’s good. 

It’s going to hurt, isn’t it. 

I plan the ride.

This time I decide to pad out the excitement of ‘that climb’ with a 100 mile ride in, and a 100 mile back making the challenge to ride it without going so hard that I’m unable to get home. A good forecast, a Thursday off work and a new 931 steel frame to test warrants a 4.30AM alarm. Quiet roads weave between meadows of freshly cut hay out through the Trough of Bowland. I’m delayed by sheep moving fields near Lancaster and then I skirt Morecambe Bay to reach the eastern Lakes, the air now thick with cut grass and new bracken growth. Through Broughton in Furness to a 25% climb over Birks Fell and I’m on with it. There’s a group of junior school kids walking up the road at the bottom of Hardknott. One boy looks at me with a confused expression, the teacher reminds me that the worst is further up, despite this section's 33% rippled tarmac hairpins. But, I’m talking, and I’m still seated. The lower gear on this bike has transformed this from an ordeal to a steep climb with fantastic views. Straight over the top, overtake a motorbike on the descent and I’m buzzing.