Team England - April 24

I didn’t have my cover on my tent last night and was woken at about 4am this morning by a few drops of rain. I quickly hurried out to put my cover on but as I got back in my tent I heard someone say ”I might as well get up now” soon joined by other people and the noise of them packing away their tents!! So although I tried to go back to sleep – no chance! Very annoying!! So I pretty much got up at 4 this morning – not good!! Anyway I packed my tent away and was ready to leave. Today was a non race day but there was going to be a fun country team trial for anyone interested. I had pretty much decided against it as I wanted my legs to be fresh for tomorrow – but then the girls approached me and asked me to join them in Team England – Ruth, Alice and Angela – it sounded like fun so I agreed! I could ride hard but without hurting myself! On the way to the start I had to help them with a flat tyre and then a little further along the way we came across Liam also with a flat – so I helped him – and then a little further on again the girls had another flat!! After fixing three flats we finally made it to the start. There were meant to be 4 in a team but we had picked up Liam also from the UK and so we decided to go with 5!! The girls did really well especially as they really weren’t on the best bikes for it – and we did the 40 km in about 1 hour 15 minutes – about 32 kmph. Not bad going and it was good fun!! We then rode together to lunch where there was a huge group of riders. The scenery was still as boring – we rode about 20 km with Liam and myself in front chatting pulling the girls just behind – to a coke stop at about 100km with about 10 riders already there. I took my time here having fun and chatting to all the riders. Then I realized that if I wanted a room that night I should get a move on as there were a lot of people in front of me. So I left the coke stop on my own and decided I would catch up with Liam who had left earlier – I caught up with Alice who told me Liam was about 5 minutes ahead so I headed off to catch him – probably faster than I should have. Then we rode together and caught up with Angela – she was actually going faster than us into the headwind for the last 10 km. The road was zig zagging with wide curves to the left then right – and we were seeing a lot more cattle – healthy looking cows along with donkeys. The last 20 km was really hard but I was fine and managed to secure a room in the Overlander Camp at Ghanki. I then put my TT bars on my bike ready for the tour’s longest day at 207 km – tomorrow’s mando day! My plan is to ride with the racers tomorrow and to try to hang on - maybe even sneakily win if I can manage to hang on until the end. I think I can still outsprint them if it gets to that point! It just depends on how much they hurt me in getting to the end – and they will hurt me I know!! So – we’ll see how that goes! Am going to try to get a good dinner followed by a good night’s sleep!!