The Mothership Connection

With some nerves, trepidation and reluctance I phoned the organisers of the Grape Ride to get a late entrants spot in the 101k bike race. I paid over the odds to punish myself because Jen was coming over from London, with her friend Evie, to compete in the race – and if they made the effort….

The significance of the whole shebang was that the race is on Jen’s parent’s doorstep and it was going to be a huge surprise for them to find that their daughter had turned up out of the blue, without any forewarning. The race was also the same weekend as Jen’s mum’s birthday. What a great surprise! I was looking forward to being involved in the festivities but not a long bike ride – I hadn’t been on a bike since last November when I got wrote off by the car.

We got the ferry over and were picked up by Jen and father – he enthused about the shock and surprise of coming home to his daughter whom he suspected was in the UK. We got to their house and I walked into their kitchen and - lo and behold – my mum was also sitting at the kitchen table with Evie and Jen’s mum. Apparently my face was a complete picture and the blabbered expletives were amusing. My mum’s not been on a plane before and if I was a betting man, I would not put money on her randomly turning up on the other side of the world for her first trip. So double bubble surprises all round! Much mirth and merriment ensued and Lisa felt like the second coming of Cilla Black for keeping all the details of the Mothership landing quiet for a couple of months.

Jen, Evie and Myself set of for the ride the next morning, me on her dad’s mountain bike with full off road tires. We all got plenty of strange looks from the lycra clad, road bike, carbon frame brigade. The course goes through the vineyards of Marlborough and then heads out to the very windy and extremely hilly Queen Charlotte drive. I was struggling away at the back of the race, battling gravity and friction while the bike chewed up tarmac. The last 3^rd of the race was truly painful and a real test of spirit to actually finish, rather than throw bike into the bushes and thumb a lift back to finish line. It took 5 hours to complete and I immediately vowed that, should I do it again, I’d make sure to do some practice and get some slick tires on the bike.

That evening I deserved the wine, inhaled loads of food and nursed my saddle sore posterior.