New Forest Gridiron 2013

As forecast  we awoke to a dull damp morning with rain clouds looming so it was definitely going to be a day for the rain capes. We set off early to get to Lymington to try and get registered and away with the first riders at 0830 hoping to be back at Lymington for around 1430.

Getting the bikes ready

We are very fortunate and found a car parking space on one of the roads just a couple of hundred yards from the community hall where the event starts from. We arrive at the hall having unloaded the bikes and it is very busy, but check in is quick and easy. We are informed that there is a late route change due to roadworks between Burley and Crow so we join the throng to study the map where the change has been helpfully displayed.




One last check over of the bikes and we are on our way riding our first ever Gridiron. The planned route will take us on a 102km circuit of the New Forest crossing numerous cattle grids hence its name.

The Gridiron route

Puddles in the entrance to Burley Lawn car park

The first part of the route is comparatively easy and is on roads we know well and have cycled frequently either on our own or on CTC rides. However, just outside of Boldre the first of the weather arrives, just a gentle drizzle but enough to get me reaching for the rain jacket. Now this is quite an exciting moment as the rain jacket is brand new, untested and very bright red and little do I know at this moment it is going to get a very severe test as the day wears on!! Bright red is good though because I do stand out in a sea of high vis yellow!!!! At around seven miles we find a young lady in trouble at the roadside with a puncture so we stop to help. It is unfortunate and not a great advert for this sport of ours that all too many people had ridden past her without even an enquiry as to whether she needed help. We get the puncture fixed on her lovely 1964 Claude Butler road bike, proper 'old school' no quick releases and real spanners required. We invite her to join us as she is riding alone so now we are three, myself, Kathy and our new companion Vicky. We negotiate the diversion and route change without incident as I am fairly sure I have cycled this detour before. From here it is on to Burley on a route that takes us through Burley Lawn so bypassing the town centre.

From Burley we head on through Crow, Poulner and Moyles Court on to our first coffee stop and control point at Hyde Memorial Hall. En route we carry out our second good deed of the day when we come across two guys stranded by the roadside. Their response to Kathy's call of 'are you OK' is to ask for an inner tube. Kathy and I always carry two each plus repair kits so we are happy to oblige. It turns out they had had a puncture a little earlier and now a second tube had 'exploded' on them.  They offer to pay us but we say that this is on us. We always work on the theory of 'what goes around comes around'. Kathy also likes to think that at some stage they will 'pay it forward', that is do the same for someone else. To me this is part of the ethics of cycling but if we go by Vicky's experience earlier perhaps this is not the case anymore. I hope that this is one sport where friendship, gentlemanly conduct and good humour will always remain.

John and trusty track pump

Anyway on with the ride. At Hyde we are greeted at the gate by John Hayter one of our  CTC Wessex riding buddies who on hearing our story of the morning gets his track pump to properly inflate Vickys tyre, thank you John. We go inside and get our brevet cards stamped and a welcome coffee and biscuits thanks to all who were helping here from CTC Wessex that included some more of our cycling buddies - Dave W, Alan and Ann, Jim Mc and of course Terry W.

Outside at the Hyde control

After coffee we head off on leg two of the ride which will take us across the northern section of the forest to control number two at Colbury. We are just a few hundred yards into this section when the rain really starts no longer content with just drizzle it launches into a full blown monsoon!! The roads are now really wet and large puddles are appearing everywhere and I am glad for overshoes, warm tights and a brand new 'bright red' rain jacket!  From here on we also start to see the carnage that wet roads can inflict on road tyres, I don't think I have ever seen so many punctures on a ride and guys more experienced than me agree. The first part of the route is well known to Kathy and I as we cycle along that exposed stretch of road the Roger penny Way. However, when we turn off towards Normansland and Bramshaw we are on less familiar roads and once on the gated road between Bramshaw and Winsor we are on completely uncharted territory. Fortunately on big randonnees like the Gridiron you are rarely alone and we are soon being led by two guys to whom this is local turf. The route takes us under the M27 and onto Woodlands. From here we briefly join the A35 before a quick route around the houses back to the A35 and a safe crossing by way of a pelican crossing to Colbury Memorial Hall and control number 2. By the way did I mention it was raining? Well it is fairly lashing it down so a huge thank you to the marshals who were manning the crossing and helping us all safely across - Chapeau! We are doing well in at Control 2 at 1315 so even with our couple of good samaritan stops we are doing well for time.

Puncture repairs at Colbury

Time for lunch and we need to refuel as the damp is starting to take its toll. We briefly catch up with 3 of our normal Sunday CTC cycling buddies Doreen, Jill and Peter who are just getting ready to leave. We also meet up again with the guys who we gave the inner tube to and hear that they as a group of four are now on their sixth puncture, fresh out of tubes they are sat on the stage desperately trying to repair punctured tubes! Outside there are also at least three groups changing tubes on bikes, like I said earlier its carnage on the puncture front but everyone still has a smile on their face. Never doubt the power of the bike and cycling  to bring happiness and joy in even the most dire of circumstances.

So onwards and the short hop back to Lymington, downhill all the way. Well it is at first and all goes well until a couple of miles from Beaulieu when a combination of misread route card and signpost conspire to send us towards Beaulieu Road and Lyndhurst the marshals from another cycling event I think added to the confusion. It was good to see that I wasn't the only one to make the mistake and we managed to round up a couple of other riders before they completed the extra five miles we had just ridden. So by the time we got back to the junction an additional 10 miles! The words of my late Father now echo in my head, a couple of his favourite mantras 'Whatever doesn't kill you makes you stronger' and 'The man who never made a mistake never made anything'. That makes me feel better.

Back on route and we sail passed Beaulieu, almost quite literally with the amount of water on the road - did I mention it was raining? We turn off towards Bucklers Hard and then follow the road as it skirts alongside the coast sometimes offering brief glimpses of the Isle of Wight through the mist and rain. Spirits are high we are within touching distance of the finish, we are wet, a little cold but we are not beaten. Did someone hear that hissing noise? You guessed it another puncture, Vicky has a puncture but at least this time its the front so much easier to fix and there goes another new tube. I guess there will be a lot of tubes being repaired later once people and bikes have dried out. Puncture repaired we complete the final sprint for Lymington which even in the rain looked wonderful. Back at the hall where we started and the final control. It took a bit longer than planned but thats the thing with randonnees they are not races, it is about a shared experience and making new friends all of which have been accomplished today. Thanks for your company Vicky we hope to see you out with CTC Wessex soon.

Gridiron momento 

A quick coffee to warm up and we also treat ourselves to a couple of Gridiron caps I reckon we earned them today, then its back out into the rain to load he bikes back onto the car. I think it was Sean Yates who said that 'your car must not be worth more than the bikes you put on top of it' looking around me I don't think many of us have bought into that idea. Or perhaps we're all just out on our winter training bikes!!




A final thank you to all the people who gave up their time to man the control points and provide the tea and also to the riders we met along the way who kept smiling  even through the atrocious conditions. See you out on the roads soon.