Making Cycling Fun!!!!!

Word has reached me that Gary is feeling a bit down following our punishing and exhaustive breakfast-eating/cycling training so this weekend I am going to make an extra special effort to cast aside my "that bloke looks like he's just been given a week to live... and he's spending it in Tipton" demeanour and make everything a lot more fun this week! (look I'm even using exclamation marks and everything).

Firstly there will be constant high-fiving, air-punching and whooping as we mount our bikes and head up Cubbington road, I've also got us both dayglo Wham T-shirts with CHOOSE LIFE written on and have rigged up a stereo on my handlebars to play a constant medley of the Theme From Rocky, Walking On Sunshine and Alright by Supergrass.

In case of any tough sections I've got a selection of motivational phrases to trot out, including "Push it big man, push it!!", "No pain, no gain" and "YOU. THE. MAN!!". Any rest stops will be met with a firm, manly slap on the arse, an invigorating shoulder rub and the constant mantra of "You are just doing a GREAT JOB TODAY!".

In case this isn't enough - to further lighten the mood I'm also going to be wearing massive trousers with a hula-hoop for a waist-band, big floppy shoes and a flower that squirts water in unsuspecting people faces. Plus I've put square wheels on my bike and rigged it so that every time I stop the pedals will fall off, steam will come out of the axles and the saddle will shoot up while making the noise of a swanee whistle.

If that doesn't do the trick, then I will have to concede that maybe I am just a bit miserable and in a final attempt to cheer things up might have to let him off the bet he lost when the mighty CCFC crushed Brum the other weekend. Only as a last resort though.

Project: Lard - in association with PCM

In honour of the extremely generous pledge of a marvellous £100.00 from Gordon of Proctor and Chester Measurement Limited, in just one week we will be launching Project: Lard, or "Can Jim lose some weight in order to get up a load of Irish hills without requiring medical assistance?" (Project: Lard seemed snappier).

At the start of March, some sort of weigh in will take place, probably using some scales rather than any of PCM's first class load cells or their strain gauging service. But you never know.

Over the month we will see if any of the clean living tactics I will be adopting (no booze, eating properly, 800 press ups every morning) have made any impact at all. There will be some sort of graph involved so you can point and laugh at me in the street.

I'm already off the beer and the only minor physical difference I can detect is that MY EVERY WAKING MOMENT IS CONSUMED BY OBSESSIVE FANTASIES INVOLVING LAGER - as opposed to the usual ones involving breasts (and lager).

It's all gone a bit Zoo Magazine. I can only apologise.

Training Update

This weekend's training was a barn-storming, groin-ruining run around the Ettington and Stratford area, highlights included:

• No-one else turning up. You lightweights.
• Me moaning about my legs hurting, probably because for the first time on a Saturday morning I didn't have a hangover to distract me.
• A big bloody hill.
• Slightly homo-erotic conversation about the relative development of thigh muscles on a roundabout near Stratford.
• Gary noticing that you get a far better class of chav kid in south Warwickshire.
• Back for a sausage sandwich in Moo.
• An average speed of about 14mph, which will do us nicely cheers.

Next weekend is looking like an odyssey to the east, which I imagine may be the first time anyone has compared a bike ride to Rugby with a classic of ancient greek literature.

9am at the Star and Garter if you're interested.

Duffy on board

The dashing looking chap to the right is Mr Ray Duffy: Gentleman of business, renowned Leamington bon-viveur, Rafa Benitez impersonator and most importantly a man who has both time on his hands and a car that we can put a bike rack on.

Ray will be driving what I feel we should designate "Support Vehicle One" during our week on the road - providing much needed assistance in a number of critical areas:

1. Nutrition: Getting drunk on our behalf every evening and stealing my breakfast.

2. Preparation: Laughing at us from his bed as we set off each morning.

3. Motivation: Driving past us and shouting abuse at key points of the journey.

4. Technical Support: Carrying key equipment such as replacement brake cables, inner tubes and bribe money.

5. Meteorology: Making cruel, cruel jokes about the weather forecast.

6. Localisation: Translating for us with his encyclopaedic knowledge of Irish accents and customs.

Ray is kindly joining us despite the fact that his innovative enterprise Mask-arade, The UK's Number one personalised and celebrity mask company stands on the brink of multi-national ubiquity. If you want to know more - and who in their right mind wouldn't? - drop them a line on info@maskarade.com.

Thank you

Thanks to all who have sponsored us so far, the first £100 is now raised, just a further £9900 to go to reach our target. Please forward our page to as many people as possible to help us achieve this.

Media Frenzy

Good news, the Leamington Courier have secured the bragging rights to publish our much anticipated tour of Ireland. More to follow...

Training this saturday

As per the last few weekends we will be heading off for what we are choosing to term "training" this usually involves a morning's cycling in order to justify an incredibly unhealthy all-day breakfast at the end.

Tomorrow we will be setting off at midday and doing 40-50 miles at a fairly leisurely pace, so the breakfast is out - an equally healthy and nutritious substitute will no doubt be found.

Will probably be meeting up at The Star and Garter at 12 in case anyone wants to join in. See you there.

The nature of the beast

Although we haven't finalised the route yet - here is a quick map to give you an idea of the nature of the beast we intend to tame.

The plan is to start at Malin Head right up at the top and then spend 6 days getting down to Mizen Head, right down at the bottom. 

Conventional wisdom states that you really should do it the other way round due to some reason involving likely prevailing winds. However we are doing it north to south due to three carefully considered reasons:

1. The weather is going to be absolutely shocking either way

2. Surely the natural slope of the Earth is in our favour

3. We fancy getting hammered/cremated in Cork at the end.

In exciting technological news there is also a dynamic Google Map that you can peruse which (once we have sorted it) will have the route on it, as well as points of local interest such as nature reserves, historical landmarks and hospitals.

Training

Nice one Jim, this looks great.

Went to the gym last night and set the bike to level 20 (out of 25) and on a steep hill, managed half an hour but now cannot walk, I sought on mince instead!!

And so it began...

... like so many things in my life - in a pub. Somehow it all seemed like such a good idea at the time; we jump on our bikes and have a bit of an international jaunt, sinking plenty of booze, effortlessly charming the local barmaids, raising stacks of cash for charity and getting supremely fit all at once. Piece of piss.

Fast forward to a freezing Saturday morning in January, wheezing as I drag my fat arse up an embarrassingly gentle slope, not really worthy of the name "hill", hands and feet bitterly cold and my groin feeling like it is undergoing a particularly reckless sandpapering.

"How long have we been going for?" I gasp at a reasonably fresh looking Gary. "Only about an hour" he says, before adding "I'm so cold can't feel my feet".

I realise that this whole enterprise is going to take a much more serious approach than I was hoping.