This site is in the process of being transmogrified into a more general title and coverage. Although I am still the Guinness World Record holder for the Oldest To Cycle from Land’s End to John o’ Groats, I would like to post some thoughts about exercise for more mature people, those in their 70’s 80’s and 90’s. I am now 89 and still cycling 30 or 40 km, or putting in an hour on the spin bike if the weather is naff, 5 days a week whenever possible. I am also aware of at least two men older than me who have completed LEJoG but not submitted the proof required by Guinness World Records. I am sure to be knocked off my perch fairly soon! I hope someone manages to push the age record well past 85. That is really what GWR is all about for me – giving someone the motivation to beat the current record.
There is a mounting body of evidence that exercising as hard as you can for as long as you can keeps the body in the best condition possible. I find it does the head good as well. After 80-odd, I found running became very hard to keep up. I wasn’t lifting my feet off the ground enough, so trips and stumbles became very frequent. A serious fall in one’s 80’s is not good news! Luckily, I found a Cycling Club with an enthusiastic group of people well into their 70’s and 80’s, which kept the hard exercise going to substitute for running.
Having moved away from Darlington, I have managed to keep the cycling going by myself, exploring the South Lakes. The addition of an electric bike, a Ribble SLe, to the fleet enables me to tackle steeper hills and survive. I hope to report in this blog on my thoughts and progress into even older age!
24th February, 2022
Anti-cycling weather continues un-interrupted, with high winds and wintry showers. Looks like another day on the spin bike.
The Spin rotine is settling down at 1 hour at a heart rate averaging 105 beats per minute. That’s about 80% of my maximum (using 220 – age). Hopefully, this is keeping my general fitness level up for when outside cycling become possible.
One problem exercising the mind at present is keeping the e-bike battery above the minimum recommended of 10 degress Centigrade; some sites reckon 5 deg C should be ok. Anyway, the temperature in the garage, where the bike is kept, is usually too low. In fact is is usually colder than the fridge. So I bought a reptile heater of 40 watts. With this under the battery and a little tent made with towels, the temperature can be kept between 5 and 10 C. Overnight I bring the bike into the scullery, which is warm enough. The battery is holding it’s charge, so I assume all is well. As always mowadays, there is an app for monitoring the battery charge level, as well as all sorts of other data, whci I haven’t used yet.
My web-site advisor, Fred Booker, is looking into designing another site to move away from the “oldest to cycle LEJoG” theme of this one. We can leave this one as a record for posterity. .
Blogging Again, February 22nd, 2022
After a long period lying fallow, this blog is becoming alive again. The intention is to report on my latest cycling and keeping fit exploits. But first to fill in some of the missing time. About a year after riding the second LEJoG, in November, 2019, I moved to Ulverston in the South Lakes. Leaving Darlington after 40 years was quite hard and I especially missed Darlington Cycling Club. However, it was new territory, much hillier than the Darlington area, and it was very enjoyable exploring new routes, even by myself. The Covid shutdowns were quite pleasant for cycling, with much less motor traffic and a particularly nice route by the side of Coniston was closed to traffic. So, I maintained reasonable fitness although doing much shorter routes than before (30 to 50 km, rather than 80 to 100km) – the additional climbing required in South Lakeland was quite good for the climbing legs/lungs. I now have an electric bike, a Ribble SLe, and learing to operate this new toy. Fears of losing fitness, even when helped by a electric drive, have been dispelled – you can put in as much effort as you wish and go faster!!
A Visit to Middle England
. . . but where is Middle England? Coton in the Elms is furthest from the sea. Meriden, near Coventry, has been the traditional centre of England for a long time. However, the Ordnance Survey has now calculated the exact geographical centre, defined as the centroid of a flat outline of England. I don’t know if, or which, islands are included. Anyhow, the OS say it is in a field at Lindley Hall Farm, in Fenny Drayton, Leicestershire, 10 miles from Meriden, OS Grid Reference: SP 3503 9685, Latitude/Longitude: 52.56840134,-1.48453446. So we were about 15 miles north of the exact middle of England. I claim I was in “Middle England”.
It was my great good fortune to be in Ashby de la Zouch and New Swannington, both in Leicestershire, on Thursday, May 23rd and Friday, May 24th. The reason for the visit was to meet the children of New Swannington Primary School and ride our bikes together. Mrs Carr, the class teacher, and I had been trying to find a suitable date and the end of half term was considered to be a Good Idea. So daughter Beth and I booked into the Clockmaker’s House B+B in Ashby de la Zouch for the Thursday night. Now Mrs Carr is Bethany and my daughter Beth is Elizabeth. I feared total confusion but I was mistaken; all was clear on the day.
If you have read earlier entries in this blog, you will know Mrs Carr had used Land’s End to John o’ Groats as an inspired way of pointing out the counties of UK in the teaching of Geography. She had contacted our website and asked if the class could write me letters asking about my recent LEJoG cycle trip. I was delighted to receive 20 beautifully written letters on special notepaper, asking me a variety of questions on training and difficulties and why, etc. Naturally, I had to write individual letters back. I was so overwhelmed by all of this – what a privilege to make contact with young people and to receive real letters, not emails or texts, but written by the human hand, eye and brain. Very rare nowadays, I guess. I conceived the idea of visiting the School, meeting the Class and their very on-the-ball teacher.
On arriving in AdlZ, Beth (daughter) and I unloaded the bikes, changed into biking gear and had a tour of some of the interesting-looking places I had looked up on the web and the OS maps. Ashby and New Swannington are on different OS sheets, of course, so I had to buy two maps to cover the ground. (Why is everywhere on the corner of four OS maps?). First visit – Ashby Castle, in the middle of the town. Looks more like an abbey then a castle to me. Maybe it was both? It was a last stronghold of the Royalists in the Civil War and was “sleighted” (ie partially demolished) by Parliament after the War. We then cycled to Hick’s Lodge Forest Cycle Centre; the routes of which definitely need grit bikes, not the road bikes we were on. I thought it might be worth recommending to the School, if they wanted to do some biking at the weekends. Nearby was a village called Moira. Had to go and take some pictures to send to my Edinburgh friend, Moira! Moira Furnace is a very early iron-making blast furnace on the banks of the Ashby-de-la-Zouch Canal. It was built in 1804, a formative period of the Industrial Revolution. The building is now a museum featuring lime kilns and craft workshops. I learned why pig-iron was so called from the information display. (I’m not telling you why pig-iron, find out for yourself!) From there, we cycled over to Calke Abbey and parklands. We couldn’t find the official entrance, so we cycled against the tide of exiting traffic, taking to the grass when necessary. It is a cross between an abbey and a baronial hall, really. Then back to Ashby. I thought Leicestershire would be as flat as a pancake but some of the climbs were real testers!
Beth, Beth and I had dinner in Ashby de la Zouch ( – do you know what a Zouch is, by the way? You will learn later.) and talked about what was to happen the next day. Mrs Carr and the Headmaster had gone to great pains to arrange a very special day. We were to arrive at 0930, to avoid the traffic jams on a narrow country lane and park in the School carpark. Bethany had arranged for the press to be there and for a Bikeability Instructor to come and do a session with all the school. We had a very pleasant evening and the weather was perfect both on Thursday and Friday.
When we arrived the next day, there were cycles and helmets everywhere! The parents had obviously taken up the suggestion with enthusiasm. It was great to see such parental support. We were conducted through the security formalities, which have sadly become necessary at schools, and to the classroom. I chatted with the children, thanked them for their letters and mentioned each one by name. Some had missed out for various reasons and wanted to write as well; all sorted out and these will arrive here in the fullness of time. I’d prepared a short Powerpoint presentation detailing the route and with a few maps and pictures. Amazingly, there in the classroom were the computer and large white screen to do the show. No problem with the technology at all! Hope the show was as good!
Then I was interviewed by a panel of students in front of the whole School Assembly. Bethany had set up some of the pupils to ask me a series of questions about the bike ride and Guinness World Records. It was an excellent way of having their questions answered, instead of me doing a boring blurb. It also set limits to the length of the session, leaving time for the rest of the normal school assembly. I enjoyed it a lot – what a great way of having an ego trip! Hope they enjoyed it, too. Questions – how did I learn to cycle, have I any other challenges, what advice for anyone wanting to attempt a Guinness World Record, do I think exercise is good for you, etc.
And so to the actual cycling. The school playground was big enough to accommodate the oblong of cones set out by the Bikeability Instructor. There were so many cyclists we had to split up into two groups. But first the photocall and a chat to the Press photographer. He took a group photo, with one pupil holding the Guinness Certificate, and me on the bike in the middle. Then the Bikeability session began with cycling round the lap of cones. All ok. Then a bit more advanced – turn into the lap of cones and out of the other side. I had the job of picking who turned in and who didn’t. I chose every two or three bikers.
And this was my downfall. I had not given my life-long and severe motion sickness problem a thought. However, after about 15 or 20 minutes of pointing and turning my head through 270 degrees to follow each cyclist, I began to feel ill. Couldn’t understand what was happening at first and then the awful truth dawned. Having just about made it to the end of the cycling session, I staggered over to the car, loaded the bike and began to change for lunch with the School. However, it soon became apparent that this was not just a headache but full-blown motion sickness, which is totally disabling. Anyone who suffers from this will appreciate how bad it is.
What a disappointment to have to miss the lunch and instead attempt to drive for two hours home as soon as possible. In fact, I just made it by following Beth to the nearest Premier Inn, a few miles away, where we were fortunate enough to be able to take a room and stay overnight. As usual with these sickness events which plague me, after a few hours sleep, everything slowly returned to normal. I was able to drive home ok on the Saturday. It was very fortunate my daughter was with me to supervise things.
Despite this ignominious ending, I had enjoyed the whole visit and the day so much. Meeting Bethany and the Class was a joy. I’ll remember it always.
Visit to New Swannington Primary School
If you have followed this blog, you will know that the entry for February 9th, 2019, “Reaching Out” explains how I came to be in touch with the School, how delighted I was to receive 20 letters asking me questions about the LEJoG ride. Well, after an exchange of emails with Mrs Carr, the enterprising geography teacher, we have managed to find a date, Friday, May 24th, when I can visit the School, talk to the pupils and have a bike ride with those who wish to do so, in a safe place. The details are being sorted out now.
The plan is for me to travel down to the Ashby de la Zouch area the day before, have a look round as a tourist, stay overnight and travel in to the School the next day. I am really looking forward to the trip. I have yet to work out what to say to the pupils, especially if I am invited to address the Assembly. Describe the cycle route, try to explain what it was like, show them the bike which did it? I guess it would be so satisfying if I gave some inspiration for them to have a go at cycling and touring. Especially if the parents are involved and the family has a go at a challenge on the bikes. There must be interesting local routes to try. I wonder if there is a cycling club near by to pick up the idea of encouraging the children to cycle regularly, perhaps?
There is plenty to think about and arrange, which I will be doing over the next few weeks. Wish me luck.
Italian Holiday April 6th to 13th, 2019
Just home from my fourth visit to Hotel Dory, in Riccione, on the Adriatic coast of Italy. Here’s a picture us riding into Gradara Castle.
This was on the rest day from the Hotel series of led rides. There are four levels of rides to choose from. They range from my level – 70 to 100 km – to almost professional level, very long and fast. Lots of variation and different routes, so lots of pictures.
Alex is in Burnham
The week I am visiting Bettie and Fred in Burnham, Just before we fly out to Italy for a cycling holiday/training bloody hard work.
Here is a photo of Bettie and I from last year in the Italian Sunshine
And the Final Outcome . . . .
Robbie rang me today and suggested I look at GuinessWorldRecords.com so I did! And there it was, Guinness World Record’s confirmation that they had accepted our application and made my ride last year the Official Guinness World record for the Oldest Person to Cycle from Land’s End to John o’Groats!
All the effort and work on producing the website, planning the many details, testing the GoPro, gathering the extensive witnessing requirements of GWR, keeping a log, writing a blog, taking videos and still photos, ensuring the Garmin had recorded, taking a Strava record as backup, oh, and yes, not forgetting, riding from LE to JoG, has achieved the objective. To say I am pleased and smug is a big understatement.
It has been a nail-biting time since we sent all the data to GWR in October, 2018. If you have followed the Blog in detail, you will know that there were several people on the same quest just before I set off. You can imagine the heart-searching I had, trying to decide what to do. Luckily, I had so much support, moral and material, from my family, that the final decision was obvious – carry on, gather all the information required and go ahead with the application to GWR for their decision. Only GWR can decide to whom to award their Record.
All the publicity in the Cycling Press for Donald Wells, an 87-year-old, who completed LEJoG on his 18-year-old Brompton, entirely alone and unsupported over his five-week journey, made me think the application would not be successful. However, Donald is now in the position I was in two years ago; having completed the ride without realising the extent of the GWR requirements. Not being aware of the data required before setting off means it doesn’t get collected at the time and it is very difficult and sometimes impossible to gather the info required retrospectively.
So how does one think about the difference between a successful application to GWR, knowing there are others who have broken your record but not been credited by GWR? My attitude to all this was neatly put by Mark Beaumont, in the book on his amazing 78 days Round the World ride. On the way round the World, Mark achieved the Guinness World Record for the most miles cycled in a month. As he said, he knows there are people who have ridden further than him in a month but he has “set the public bench mark”, I think was the phrase. Here is The Bench Mark to be met and passed. For me, this is the inestimable value of Guinness World Records. Without being a “duly constituted” body like the Union of Cyclists International (UCI), the Olympic Committee and many other official bodies, they have become the recognised authority for holding an enormous number of World Bench Marks, for anyone to have a go at. The service they render for stimulating many, many people to have a go at something can’t be under-estimated. I am reasonably certain now that there must be lots of 80+++-year-olds, maybe 90+, who have cycled anonymously from LE to JoG and are quietly and modestly just satisfied with that.
In conclusion, I want to say that the whole experience has been wonderful. Being joined on eight of the stages by two friends and four members of family was very special. The companionship and encouragement throughout the ride by my fellow riders on the tour gave me a lift. Being contacted by New Swannington Primary School and receiving those gorgeous letters was an unexpected bonus. The other end-thought is that, no matter who takes on this challenge, everyone does it in their own way. Thank you to Guinness World Records for putting up the challenge. Good luck to the next challenger to knock me off my perch!
Maintaining Bike Fitness
The weather this winter hasn’t been too bad. In Darlington, there have been just a handful of days when frost, snow or wind stopped me going out. It’s Spring at the moment, with beautiful warm, sunny days. Very different from winter 2017/18, when I recorded zero miles for the whole of December, 2017. It was very hard recovering even reasonable fitness again. The memory of that made me re-think fitness and the bike.
I am developing the principle that I should keep fit for cycling, rather than cycle to keep fit. It was partly the memory of inactivity last winter and partly the result of talking to cyclists who also row. Needless to say, they were super-fit and very strong on the bike. They are in no doubt that rowing and cycling are complimentary sports. My policy now is to develop the leg muscles and do lots of cardio-vascular.
In Riccione, I met a double-sculls pair of ladies, strong cyclists, who spoke of how rowing and cycling help one another. During the 17 days of LEJoG in 2018, I spoke to another rower/cyclist, who was an excellent advocate for both sports. Susan had been an Olympic-class rower in her University days and had returned to it as a top veteran/masters competitor, after having a family. She recommended blending the two – biking and rowing – and also adding interval training and hill reps.
Last year I went somewhat over the top when it came to long and short tours cycling – 9 weeks in total. So, this year I tried to turn the wick down a bit but you know how things get out of hand? Italy training week in April is a must. In June, Jenny and I have booked a week in the Isle of Man, taking the bikes, of course. Then I kept on seeing must-do trips – two short ones with Peak Tours (Hadrian’s Way and Way of the Roses), a week or ten days in Provence (including The Ventoux from Sault), a one-week trip to Mallorca with Club friends and a week in Tenerife organised by Love Velo. Only six weeks in total but it’s still all go again this year, trying to bring fitness up to standard. But this year with the addition of an indoor training routine.
The usual three or four outings weekly with the Club will be the backbone of the steady cycling and “getting the miles in”, which everyone advocates. However, the indoor routine has developed into three half-hour sessions:-
i) Up and down the stairs (36 of them in my house) with 10 kg of weights in a rucksack. (Jamie calls this “single leg work”). While the rucksack is on, I do a few sets of squats and heel raises for the leg muscles. That gets things warmed up.
ii) This is followed by half an hour on a Concept 2 Rowing Machine. My grandson Jamie just happened to have one in his attic not doing anything, so he has loaned it to me. If you haven’t tried a C2, don’t. They are two things at the same time – an invention of the Devil for high-level training/suffering and, curiously, a machine which gives immense satisfaction after a blast. I operate at just inside 10 minutes per 2-kilometre pace, giving 6 km for the 30 minutes. Technique is all-important, and I’m still style, rhythm and breathing. Maybe I will write more on this at a later date, as I get used to it.
iii) After the rower, comes 40 minutes on the turbo-trainer. I have been using one of my bikes on a Halford’s turbo-trainer, which does the job. However, my son-in-law John has found a high-class proper spin trainer, a Schwinn, at the back of his garage, which he is lending to me. Grandsons and sons-in-law are very useful.
This indoor training routine, when the weather precludes cycling, or when I only have a shorter time available, is settling down nicely after nearly two months. I think I can feel the benefit on cycling days already – although it may be a triumph of imagination over reality – rather like hope over experience? I have a theory of old-age fitness. Part of the joys of growing older includes wrinkles, shrinking muscles and a slower maximum heart rate, among other lovlies like a smaller heart and things of which we will not speak. My lung capacity is still about 4 litres. My maximum heart rate is probably 135 to 140 beats per minute, using the various published formulae .Now, if you are cycling with a squad whose max HR is 180 or 200, my maximum blood flow to lungs and muscles is two-thirds of theirs, or less if my heart is smaller. Solution – increase breathing rate deliberately high, hence increasing oxygen concentration and supply to leg muscles; a sort of natural EPO. So, on the indoor training, I am concentrating on increasing my breathing rate/lung capacity and trying to apply that principle to cycling when extra effort is required. Hope it works. If you hear me hyper-ventilating, ignore it.
There is another puzzle about how athletic ability diminishes with age. In fell running there is clear evidence of a parabolic, second order decline, or a very steep drop after 50 or 60. However, the hour records in cycling decline linearly with age. I haven’t got to the bottom of this yet, or looked at masters track and field records but I intend to.
Well, that was a tirade. The intention is to keep the Blog going for a while yet but we will see. Depends on the result of the GWR application, probably, and we are still waiting.
February 9th, 2019 Reaching Out
It’s been a long time since I last wrote in this Blog. We – Robbie and I – decided to keep the website alive, at least until we heard from Guinness World Records on the result of our application. They contacted Rob to upload the gpx files and routes taken again but there was no explanation why. Many people keep asking “have you heard from GWR?” but we can only wait; and hope they haven’t forgotten us! My standard reply is “they haven’t said No, yet”.
But this missile is about a very lovely message we received recently – so the website is still performing the function we had hoped it would and reaching out to people. This message was from a very enterprising Primary School teacher in Leicestershire. As a means of bringing interest and immediacy to her geography teaching on the subject of the UK, she used Lands End to John o Groats . Would I mind if the students in her class wrote to me to ask questions about my “Challenge”. What a super idea! I was so pleased to say “Yes, of course”. And so 20 very neat, and very thoughtful, handwritten letters arrived on special notepaper. I never dreamt we would be reaching out to youngsters, as well as oldsters! Well, each letter had to be answered individually, of course. They were all individuals, who had thought about what to ask and how to compose the letters.
So . . . . . . I sat down with a big notepaper pad, 20 envelopes, a large cup of coffee and did the job. One thing I kept re-iterating was how interesting it is to receive a handwritten letter in the age of texts and emails. The questions were about were I slept and what I ate and did I train hard. Another theme was what I missed while I was away. The students would have missed their friends, their rooms, their dog and, I should have known, their family. I used those remarks to suggest a challenge for them to have a go at. Maybe a short ride around Swannington, where the school is. Or maybe train for a Coast to Coast with friends or family. Maybe climb the highest peak in Leicestershire?
Mrs Carr, the teacher, made a big display with the letters and my replies and a photo of me being silly at John o Groats. I hope we can put the photograph Mrs Carr sent on this web site.
Who could have predicted such an outcome? It’s just so lovely. It has made my last few days very pleasant indeed. We have a germ of an idea for me to take my bike to Swannington and we can all go out for ride. Maybe too difficult to find a suitable moment and a mutually convenient date. I do hope we can pull it off.
Alex Menarry's blog, "thoughts from a 89 year old athlete" 