“A butterfly flaps its wings” - An experiment in Chaos Theory. (Polaris Challenge Autumn 2004)

It was never going to be the best prepared of events. Katy had only been in the country 3 weeks, having moved to Leeds from Edmonton, Alberta and was still just settling in to the British Fresher (read: drunken) way of life. I’d sprained my ankle at Rat Race and therefore had been almost entirely inactive for the whole of the summer. I’d got out on odd trips on my bike, but nothing like the kind of duration or distance I’d been riding before, say, the Heb. Not even the distance I’d been riding in my ‘normal’ life when I wasn’t supposed to be training for something. Add to that the fact I was due to change jobs around the same time, not quite knowing to what or where I’d be going. So, basically, we were winging it...

I’d met Katy twice. We’d talked over the Internet quite a lot, via my kayak club message board. We met vaguely and briefly during Freshers week while I was working for the Union, and then, about a week and a half later, we’d managed to get out for a bike ride together. 2 hours later, I was confident she’d survive the Polaris Challenge pretty well. Wasn’t sure I would, though...

Just getting to the race caused it’s own headaches. I’d just moved to another Youth Hostel, this time Stainforth, near Settle, without half of my kit, as I don’t own a car in which to transport the accumulated junk of 6 months at Dentdale. So, I had to knock off early on Friday lunchtime, dash up to Carlisle on the train, grab the car off Mum, drive back to Dent, pick up the more essential bits of kit, then dash back to Stainforth to work evening shift, cook dinner for 45, wash up, dash down to Settle on my break to meet Katy, back to Stainforth to finish shift, then throw the last bits of kit (and Sleipnir) into the car then drive to Hawkshead. The event centre was in Coniston, but having only finished shift at about 9:30pm we were pushing it if we’d tried to get to HQ, register and still get into the Youth Hostel before they locked us out.

After at least getting a decent nights sleep and sorting the kit out (had all the essential bits. Phew...), we headed down to registration and got ourselves sorted, then over to Wilf’s for a cuppa. Of course, in all the repacking, tea drinking and generic faff we were late for the start. Oh well, it was a punching start so we were okay...

Coniston as a base would potentially give some cracking riding. The Walna Scar road leads over into the Duddon, the Langdales were well within reach, and the Greythwaite Estate and Grizedale forest in very close proximity to the start. We set off over the grind up through the forest, before turning off onto some gorgeous ‘first smooth and fast, then slow, tight and technical’ singletrack across the fell. The weather was absolutely superb, and our slightly later start (first starts at 8, last at 10. We started about 9:50) had meant it was a little warmer for us than the earlier folks.

The day went on fairly smoothly, bits of great riding, bits of dull road hack, some beautiful descents and then... flats. Katy’s rear tyre had ‘snakebited’ on a descent, so we stopped to put in one of our spare tubes. Then, as we made to head off, I realised I’d flatted as well. We’d wasted 15 minutes that we really needed, and the campsite, being at Kentmere, seemed an awful long way away. We opted to stick to the road and head for the overnight camp as quickly as possible. Then I hit the wall (not a real one fortunately). So, pushing up hills, cramming as much food down as possible, feeling lousy for slowing Katy down, as she was going so well and generally being miserable for about half an hour. Then the food kicked in and I felt better so we picked the pace back up a bit. In the end, we managed to pick up one more CP and head into camp with 4 minutes to spare.

After a gourmet dinner of couscous, smoked mackerel, brie and hot chocolate and a pretty good nights sleep, we set off at 9:45, reversing the end of Saturday’s route, before heading south, past Ings and away down the lanes to the east of the lake, to get the ferry across Windermere (and buying Mars bars and ice cream at the pier), then heading away along the shore road. The route we’d decided on had the flaw of taking in a road that we’d missed as being on the ‘out of bounds’ areas, but being the road through Greythwaite Estate, it was gated shut anyway. So, after some more faff, food and a bit of a detour along the road we arrived at our last checkpoint with 15 minutes and about 8km to go.

We pushed hard through Grizedale, making for the road into Coniston, but a long sustained climb, a very nasty descent (complete with oncoming motocrossers) and general fatigue put paid to a full strength charge. As we reached the road, 1.5km to go, Katy noticed her rear tyre was looking a little soft. As was mine. But we didn’t have time to stop, so we pushed on towards the finish line. We finished tired, hungry, but fairly happy.

While we hadn’t done as well as we would have liked, I reckon we did as well as we could have in the circumstances, and finished 13th out of 22 mixed pairs. We gratefully flopped off for Wilf’s and a cuppa, then headed to Settle to drop Katy for the train. Maybe next time we’ll both be in shape and there won’t be so much chaos involved, but I’m not placing any bets on the latter...