7 of us on the Sunday bun run and weather wise it was warm but very windy, with most of the wind being cross wind đŦ Usual route this morning down to Stirling Mills cafe for coffee and cake đ On the way back I think the wind picked up a little bit which made for some interesting cycling but overall a good day’s ride. 50 miles clocked up at an avg pace of 17 mph, not bad for a windy day đ
7 of us on the early bun run and weather wise it’s overcast but dry, warm and little wind. It was the usual route to the cafe stop for the usual fueling options, but afterwards since I have now finished the hill climb races I didn’t need to go up Cleish hill climb this week so I decided to join the rest of the group by heading up to Milnathort and doing a loop around loch Leven, before heading for Cowdenbeath and home. So, 65 miles clocked up at an avg speed of 19 mph, which is quite fast for a bun run ride but not too stressful for me, so I’m calling that a win đ
Me, myself and I on the bun run this morning and weather wise it was a bit of a surprise as yesterday it said it would be raining, it was not. What it was, was sunny and quite warm with a little wind. Sometimes it’s nice to ride on your own, as you can go at your own pace rather than at the group pace, and you can set your own course. I decided to start with the usual Sunday bun run route over Knockhill, down to Dollar and Tillicoultry for the usual cafe stop, where I had coffee and cake. But it was from this point I changed the route to go back over Knockhill, tracing the route I had just ridden down. As I got to the top of Knockhill I rode back down again but only to the turn off to Cleish where I headed to do the Cleish hill climb. Once over Cleish it was to Kelty and Hill of Beath I rode to, before heading back home again. So I clocked up 60 miles at just under 17 mph but with a good amount of climbing for the day which is what I was after đ
7 of us on the early bun run this morning and weather wise it’s overcast, little wind but a bit chilly to start with, but it would warm up a little bit as the day went on. Usual route to start with before we hit the cafe and my usual little effort from Alva to Tillicoultry đ At the cafe stop I had my usual roll with hash browns and sausage with orange juice before we headed back home again. Like the past couple of weeks I stayed with the group until we got to Yetts before I split from the group and headed for the hill climb at Cleish. I did a couple of reps up that before heading down to townhill and Dunfermline and then onto home. So 61 miles locked up at an avg speed of just under 18 mph which puts me in good stead for my hill climb race up Cleish hill next week đ
12 of us on the bun run today and what a glorious day for cycling, hot and sunny, just the way I like it đ We were doing a different, longer route today which would take us over Knockhill, through the Ochil Hills and down to Dunblane and Bridge of Allan before heading back home through Stirling and Alloa and along the coastal road back to Crossgates. It was a fairly easy ride, not a lot of climbing, at a fairly sedate pace, but I kept it interesting with a few sprints and efforts here and there. We would be having our cafe stop at Braco Coffee shop, where I had soup, strawberry milkshake and chocolate muffin đ We then proceeded down to Dunblane and along to Alloa before we would split up at Cairneyhill. I followed the guys along to Inverkeithing before we headed back up to Crossgates and our finish line. So, overall I clocked up 76 miles at an avg speed of 16 mph and what a nice ride it was đ
6 of us on the early bun run and weather wise it was warm, overcast with little wind, although it would get sunny after lunchtime. Usual route to the cafe stop this week with a little dig into Tillicoultry as per usual đ Coffee and cake were had before heading back home. I was going to be going over Cleish again this week so I stayed with the group until we got to Yetts before I soloed off on my own towards the Cleish hill climb. I did a couple of reps up that before heading into Townhill and home via Cowdenbeath to bump the mileage up to my target of 60 miles. So 63 miles clocked up at an avg speed of 18 mph, which with the hill reps I’ll take as a win đ
Ride 10/08/2025 Aug Randonee Pitlochry
Forgot to post this yesterday.
Today’s ride was the Aug Randonee up to Pitlochry and back. 5 of us doing this today and weather wise it’s warm, little wind but a little overcast here and there. This is the longest Randonee I’ve organised this year, since I’ve never actually ridden up to Pitlochry, but one well worth doing on a ‘good’ weather day đ Not exactly a flat route, which does make it a little harder with the distance, but not an insurmountable one either. We would start off by heading over Cleish and along and down to Milnathort before heading over Wicks O’Baiglie and Glenfarg and down to Bridge of Earn. From here we would head into Perth for our first stop of the day, which for me was just a cup of coffee, I was carrying a lot of energy gels/bars just for this occasion. Once out of Perth we would be cycling quieter roads on our way to Dunkeld, over a still lumpy route, although most of the big stuff was behind us, and of course would need to be traversed again on the way back đŦ Once at Dunkeld we would then be using mostly cycle track (route 77/7) which was because at this point we were paralleling the dreaded A9 which at points we would have to cross, and unfortunately this is where my routing skills would let me down âšī¸ it pays to ride this route myself just to iron out the kinks, but I just don’t have time for that. One of the A9 cosses was right across the A9 itself, which wasn’t too bad the first time since it was still morning, the other times were via the cycle path which was fine, but on the way back this would cause some issues. Anyway we got to Pitlochry without incident and stopped for our second cafe stop at Escape Route cafe (formally Jessie’s) for some much needed food. Soup, coke and pancakes were had for the day and most welcome it was, although I may have over done it on the pancakes, I ordered 5 but could only manage 3, the guys picked up the leftovers đ We then headed back the way we came back to Dunfermline. It was on this part of our journey we had to do a little detour, as said crossing the A9 was an issue if you weren’t using a path or bridge and we did try to cross the road itself on the way back, at the same place we came in on, but by this time the road was just too busy to cross so we detoured back a little bit to use a underpass to get across but other than that the route back was identical as the route up, next time I’ll amed this to take the A9 into better consideration. Anyway on the way back we stopped in Perth again to fill up on water and food as required before heading back to Bridge of Earn and up to Milnathort. Of course we would now have to do a lot of climbing on very tired legs, especially over Wicks O’Baiglie and Cleish đ but we hadn’t gone too fast today and I had fuelled well, so the climb, although slower than usual was fine. From here it was mostly downhill to Dunfermline although I didn’t go into town but rather along to Kingseat and Cowdenbeath and home that way. So, 132 miles clocked up, over 7500 feet of climbing đĢŖ at an avg speed of 16 mph, which equates to a tough but great ride to do đđ
Just little me on my own for the early bun run this morning and given it was pissing it down and blowing a gale, I decided to potter around the town to await for the 09:00 group and join them instead. 2 groups for this ride and I joined the slower second group, I’m doing a big ride tomorrow so don’t want to hard one today. Given it’s the 09:00 group the route is slightly shorter and slower which was fine with me in the wake of tomorrows ride. Cake and coffee were had at the cafe stop before heading home with a wind assisted normal route over Knockhill thus clocking up 50 miles at an avg speed of 15 mph.
8 of us on the Sunday bun run and weather wise it was a little damp to begin with but pretty warm to start and windy too. AS the day went on the sun came out and dried pretty much everything up and it became a glorious day, albeit still windy a bit, especially with the headwind out to the cafe stop to start with. We did the usual route over Knockhill to begin with and down to Dollar and along to Tillicoultry for our cafes stop of coffee and cake. We of course now had the tail wind all the way home đ so the pace picked up a little bit and for the last section of the course I lead a small train of me, Ken, Mark and Chris back to Rosyth before I split on my own for the rest of the way. I was looking for about 60 miles today so I carried on to Dalgety Bay before turning north for Mossmorran and Cowdenbeath. From here it was back to Crossgates and home for 60 miles at an avg speed of 17 mph đ
4 of us on the early bun run today and weather wise it’s warm, sunny and not too windy đ Again the usual route to the cafe stop, for roll with hash browns and sausage before heading back home again. Like last week I was going to go up Cleish hill so I followed the group up to Yetts before departing along the Aldi road this time to head towards the Cleish road. I didn’t bother doing reps this week, wasn’t really in the mood but I did do a little bit extra once past Townhill by heading into Kingseat and along the Cuddyhouse road and into Hill of Beath before heading back to Crossgates. So I was still 60 miles for the day at an avg speed of 18 mph đ
4 of us on the bun run today and it was a wet one. From the get go it was raining, so I had my wet gear on but on the summer bike with no mud guards, so wet arse it was đ The planned route went out the window due to the weather so we opted to do a loop around Loch Leven instead. We stopped at Lochend Farm shop for our cafe stop where soup, coffee and strawberry tart were had for food đ before carrying on. It was then over Benarty hill and down to Cowdenbeath before heading to Crossgates. I decided to carry on with the guys as I had only done about 45 miles and was looking for a bit more, so I continued on into Dunfermline and along to Cairneyhill before returning back the way I came to home. So, 61 miles clocked up at a easy pace of 15 mph and thankfully the rain stopped by the time we had climbed the hill so I was starting to dry out a bit by the time I got back home.
5 of us on the early bun run and weather wise, it’s overcast, not much wind and warm. Usual route to the cafe stop but about the last 2 miles from the cafe stop I upped the pace to TT speed and eventually ended up on my own đ It had been fairly easy going up to that point and I had taken Friday off the bike to recover to Thursday beating… For the ride home I followed everyone up to Yetts but rather than going over Knockhill I was looking to do some hill reps up Cleish, since the hill climb race is in 4 weeks and I need to train for that. So 4 reps up Cleish was enough to tire me out and head back home again. So 67 miles clocked up at an avg speed of 17 mph, which isn’t to shabby when you include the hill reps in it đ