The Fred is popular and sold out quickly. On the 8th May three LP members started in torrential weather and all finished with gold standards despite cramp (Rauf), broken freehubs (me) and broken derailleurs (Neal).

Neal Mackintosh – 7h37m
Paul O’ Sullivan – 7h 50m
Rauf Dean – 7h52m

“The hardest ride that I have ever done. I had puddles in my shoes after 2 minutes….there was literally waves running down the first climb. I wore out my brake pads, crapped myself on every descent, got a jammed freehub half-way up Honister and then twanged something in my knee with 60km to go and rode one-legged for 20km until it settled down….not to mention the horizontal hail after whinlater (mostly avoided through hiding behind Rauf).

But I really enjoyed the first 80km….despite not finding a single wheel so basically time-trialled it. Absolutely loved the climbs…..all of them. The last 100km was absolute murder though ….. every km was interminable. I distinctly remember kilometre 112 lasting at least half-an-hour.

And then you hit hard knott after 155km….its simply insane. Survivable, but un-rideable in my state at least from a style point-of-view.

Like all the best rides, there were times when I really thought I was stuffed and wouldn’t make it. But managed to duck under the 1st class standard of 8 hours in the end. My immediate instincts were to retire from cycling……I chucked my carbon beauty randomly against some wall somewhere…covered in crap, indexing knackered, dodgy freehub somehow miraculously curing itself.

But now I’m thinking….next year, i can do better. I climbed like a dream….if i can sort out those descents…not basically bonk so early with a few more training miles in the legs……….7 hours is do-able!”

Paul O’Sullivan