Ride 29/09/2019 Falkirk Grand Fondo
Another good day at the Falkirk Grand Fondo, 80 miles clocked up with over 5800 feet of climbing Poor Graeme (my cycling buddy for the day and in the same club as me) had a tough time with all the hills but completed the course at the same time as me so well done him So thats all the events over for this year, I think there are still a couple of club events but thats about all until next year.
So this is the last ride before I do the Falkirk Gran Fondo next Sunday and although the weather wasn’t bad I was still the only one to turn up for this morning club run. I decided to do a smaller alternate route, it was starting to rain and there was still some wind around which would mean a head wind on the way home. I wasn’t going to do a cafe stop as it was only a 35 mile ride but I did keep my foot down so I managed to clock up an avg 17 mph for the ride.
It’s a fine day for some cycling Sunny warm and little wind, so with that in mind we decided to take a different route than the normal bun run one. It would start with the bun run but divert to dollar for the cafe stop. After food we went over the Ochils and down to Dunning with a sharp right turn to go back over the Ochils via the Dragon This road gets pretty steep up to 20% near the top with a few more undulations as we head along the Path of Condie. I’ve done this route in the opposite direction but not the direction we went today, so I got a good workout this morning Once down to Milnathort it was a flat ride back to Cowdenbeth and home. 65 miles clocked up with just shy of 4000 feet of climbing all in a good days ridding
It was back to the usual bun run this morning and with the weather the same as yesterday we were into a head wind most of the way to the cafe stop. After cake and coffee it was back to Dunfermline with a tailwind assist which helped to increase my avg speed to 16 mph
When I look at the map of this route it looks like a Mushroom to me so I’m going to call this the Mushroom route So it’s a overcast slightly windy day which meant I was in the winter gear for cycling, no more short it’s on with the cycling trousers and wind jacket. Today we did a slightly different ride as some people were looking to do a longer ride which was fine with me. We did the normal bun run up to the cafe stop but after that we headed into Stirling and back around via the Kincardine bridge, almost following my old stomping ground when I lived in Falkirk. It was then back via the coastal route to Dunfirmline and home, clocking up 66 miles at a steady pace of 15 mph.
Well it was another nice day to be riding, some sun around with little wind but still a bit on the chilly side thus resulting with me wearing a base layer and jacket. Again a good ride today although only 8 of us were out today but we still managed a good time and speed Just shy of 17 mph so I’m happy with that although I was leading a big chunk of the ride so I was keeping the pace high
Yes I did forget to post this yesterday but I’m only a day late So it was a pleasant day if a bit on the cold side to start with. We had sun and little wind but it was 10 °C to begin with but thankfully after the cafe stop it started to warm up a bit. The usual bun run route but in 2 groups as there were quite a lot of us today but given the sun was out that was predictable.
As predicted there were a lot more riders today 10 of us in total and even though it was sunny we were facing a heading on the outbound leg. We even didn’t get a chance to go up Knockhill due to an accident which meant we had to detour round to Saline and miss out Dollar all together. After the cafe stop we had a tail wind assist so the ride back home was a lot faster which is why my avg was 17 mph and it’s always very satisfying to do 50 miles in under 3 hours