The saddle sore diaries
This page will be used to give you a day to day breakdown of training, preperation, miles covered, areas visited, punctures repaired and pub lunches consumed during our journey so please watch this space...
26/12/2007
Dear diary, 10 or 14 days, that is the question?! Will covering 1017.8 miles in ten days be too much? Will we be pushing ourselves too far? Will we lose the spirit of the 'tour' and pick up the spirit of the 'time trial'? All these important questions need to be answered. In preperation for our meeting in the new year (time and date TBC), the author of this entry has prepared a Wild Card in the form of 'Itinerary Plan C' which is a breakdown of the same route as Itinerary Plan A and Itinerary Plan B but with the route spread over a 14 day period resulting in a average daily ride of approx 72 miles. Maybe 14 days is the way forward??? Please check out the 'Plan C' page for full details.
03/12/2007
Dear diary, we have five confirmed cyclists, three pending cyclists (waiting to have annual leave authorised etc), two confirmed support vehicle crew members and two pending support crew. The posters have now been removed from the PEC and we are just waiting to Find out if our pending people are on board or not before we can post our team member details on our meet the team page and schedule our first meeting to discuss preperation etc. These are exciting times indeed.....
01/12/2007
Dear diary, we have been bouncing a few ideas around the control room regarding the design of a very special, very sexy, super slick gmas end 2 end team cycle jersey. Please check out the 'kit' section on our preperation page for further info and to veiw a couple of our initial designs!
29/11/2007
Dear diary, the weebly staff got back to me and have explained a few things regarding the page tab problem. It would appear that there is not a great deal that can be done to help those people who can not veiw both rows of page tabs located at the top of the website. Obviously we want everyone to veiw every page on our website, therefore, I have added some sublinks to the home page section 'what does it all mean'. My advice is if you are still unable to veiw both rows of page tabs at the head of our website, please use the sublinks provided on the home page.... I hope this helps...
29/11/2007
Dear diary, due to the ongoing problems with some people not being able to veiw all page tabs at the head of our website, I have today requested Weebly (the kind folk that provide the interface for the site) look into it for us. Hopefully they will provide us with some answers and/or a solution to the page tab mystery... I will keep you posted....
25/11/2007
Dear diary, I have been a very busy boy. I have now prepared both itinerarys to go into the presentation folder. I have also plotted the route in an AA road atlas so everybody involved can have a look and get a feel for the route on paper. I hope they like what they see!
24/11/2007
Dear diary, a few people (but mainly Viva!!) have reported that they are having problems veiwing the page tabs at the head of our website. From what I can see there is no actual problem with the page tabs on the website. I have tried presenting the website in several different formats and have tried several different page tab designs etc but this does not help matters and is in fact causing more problems than it is fixing! Therefore the current design for the website (including page tabs) will remain the same. From my investigations, I can only suggest the problem may lie with the end user VDU?! I have veiwed the website using various different computers and VDU's and all but one (in PEC messroom) load the website (including page tabs) in full with no problems!! It's a mystery! - Looks like a job for Scooby and Co.
23/11/2007
Dear diary, Itinerary 'Plan B' is now complete. I am now going to plot our route on a road atlas so we have a 'hard copy' for reference. I am also going to print hard copies of itinerary 'Plan A'and 'Plan B' and add them to the GMAS LEJOG presentation portfolio I am preparing for use during meetings and planning etc.
16/11/2007
Dear diary, itinerary 'Plan A' is now complete. My initial estimate of a 950 mile route was a little bit out. Well, 67.8 miles to be precise. So the actual total mileage we will be covering over ten days is 1017.8 miles. Not a big difference I am sure you will agree! Now I must get started on Itinerary 'Plan B' or it will not be ready in time for month end when we hope to hold our first meeting to discuss planning and preperation...
14/11/2007
Dear diary, as Highlander once said 'there can only be one'. In this case I am not referring to immortals, I am talking about the route. The author of this entry has been working hard on the itinerary and daily mileage breakdown of the route. The proposed breakdown of miles per day Provided in my original Itinerary (Plan A) is turning into quite a controversial issue. Therefore, after talking to a few of the people that have so far signed up, I have decided to provide two options for the itinerary, Plan A and Plan B. This way, we can collectively decide on the daily breakdown of the route when we have our first group meeting. Like Tony B once said, 'democracy democracy democracy'.
10/11/2007
Dear diary, lots of people are interested in coming on board to do the end 2 end! This is great news and the way it has been received in the PEC is very encouraging indeed! Just have to wait until the 30/11/2007 to get a proper idea once and for all who is going to ride and who is going to provide support in the van
05/11/2007
Dear diary, good progress is being made plotting the route and many a late night has been spent wrestling with Microsoft Auto Route and a tatty old road atlas
01/11/2007
Dear diary, so far so good. Lots of people have shown interest in the trip mainly down to word of mouth and the poster. Also, behind the scenes, preparation has begun on the route. Maps, books and travel guides have been purchased. It wont be long untill a provisional route has been drawn up with the help of one or two stabilo highlighter pens!
30/10/2007
Dear diary, Poster advertising trip goes up on the walls in the PEC. I wonder what the response from people will be like?
27/10/2007
Dear diary, Much to his wifes despair dlb spent all of today creating a website to use as a source of information for all involved. He also let his MS powerpoint skills shine by creating a poster to put on the walls in PEC to make more people aware of the adventure these brave few are planning
26/10/2007
Dear diary, today James, Dan and David planned their first epic training session. They have agreed to do the 50 mile round cycle trip to the Cat & Fiddle public house near Buxton on the 11/11/07. This will allow them to start training (and perhaps most importantly enjoy a slap up pub lunch in britians highest pub).
25/10/2007
Dear diary, today John and David spoke even more people and it seems as though there is a lot of interest in the idea. Everybody agrees they need more information.
24/10/2007
Dear diary, Today Dan and David had a conversation in the mens toilets about organising a sponsored cycle trip from Land's end to John O'Groats in August 2008. They asked a load of people who all work at GMAS if they were up for it and a lot of people said yes.