This weekend we finally set off for John O’groats to start our seven day JOGLE epic…
We’ll try and post twitter updates so look for #HSXJOGLE and if any of you, your friends or families want to donate, they can here…. https://mydonate.bt.com/events/hsxjogle
Wish us luck….
teamHSX doing the JOGLE….
With it being Easter, HSX as always have headed to the Great Tower in the Lake District. This year as we’re doing the JOGLE in May, teamHSX JOGLE decided to make it a training weekend and to be honest, I’m pretty glad we did as it was a tough one..
Unfortunately out of the eight of us doing the JOGLE only five could make it to the Lake District (Dave, Chris, Smudge, Craig & myself) as the others had commitments keeping them at home. We did though have an honorary member for the weekend as Footlong joined us as he’s training for a sportive and may join us for a day or two.
Thursday 28th April
Craig, Dave & myself were there early so we popped out for a short ride.. Just 20km from Great Tower to Bowness & Windermere. Craig had his brand new, never been on the road bike and he was really keen to get out.. However, four miles in to it’s first outing and Craig hit a pot hole and had a blow out, which resulted in us shivering by the side of the road whilst it was fixed.
(20km – 56min – 283m elevation – 636kcal burnt)
Friday 29th April
With everyone who was there now all together we headed out for a cheeky ride.. The weather although cold with plenty of snow on the ground was glorious, so we started cycling towards the Langdales to hit Hardknott pass.. However, this was very snowy and we didn’t fancy a repeat of Box Hill from December.. So we turned around and went on a tour of the Lakes where we hit Coniston, Windermere, 5 Chevron Hill ( a very very very steep hill), Stavely (Wilfs cafe & the largest bike shop in the UK) before heading home. By the time we got home legs were beginning to ache for some of us..
(113.6km – 5hr47min – 1,722m elevation – 3,444kcal burnt)
Saturday 30th April
What a day. All six of us covered our first 100mile bike ride. Not bad considering we were still nursing sore legs from the 70 miles the day before.. An awesome day. I finally visited Braithwaite, proclaimed myself “King Coaster” for my ability to coast very fast down hill (43mph), we had snow, forest tracks, pasties and ale of course for a great day out..
(160km (100miles) – 7hrs45mins – 2,373 elevation – 4,686kcal burnt)
Sunday 31st April
We had to help with climbing and abseiling in the morning, so we chucked our bikes in the van and left at 1400hrs from Borrowdale and headed back. Another great ride, I was pretty broken and dying slightly. However, we had a beer and took the Hawkshead ferry to make it a bit more fun.
(59.2km – 3hrs11mins – 1,122m elevation – 1,995kcal burnt)
After four great days cycling in the Lakes with fantastic weather, we’ve now all got to get our training it as we leave in less than two months… Happy training everyone..
So…… That’s it.. All done and dusted… And what an awesome experience/adventure we all had. I won’t bother putting a trip report up here, I think Chris’ blog updates and the awesome photos tell the story… However, I will put a couple of things on here.
Firstly, I want to link you to one of the other runners post race thoughts… What a write up and he says it all pretty well.. Navigate here http://www.4deserts.com/blogs/comptetior_blog_new.php?pid=OTQy&blog=21 and read Ian’s second blog entitled ‘Till the next time…’
Who won the Prize Pot & Sponsorship update!!! Oh, the excitement… Well, thanks to all of you we managed to raise a whopping £6190.34 inc gift aid for Cancer Research UK… A massive thank you goes out to everyone of you.. And now, on to the prize pot winner or winners….
Well, we always said that the winner would be the person who picked the time slot for when the team didn’t finish and due to the unfortunate events of Chris being quite ill, the team didn’t finish Stage 5. So the winner of the entire prize pot is Ian Furlong. Well done Ian. However, we also felt that as two of us did finish, the person who bought the time slot at 41hrs, 47mins, 42 seconds which was where Rich and I finished also deserved a prize.. So, we managed to get a laptop donated to us by Geek Squad UK www.geeksquad.co.uk so we’d also like to congratulate Andy Wilkinson on his prize..
Two questions left…
Would we do it again? I can’t talk for the other two, but I would (and I’m pretty sure they would)…
Do I recommend it to you? Yes!!!
teamHSX on Atacama recieved emails today with details on the course…
It makes for interesting reading..
Distance of Each Stage
The approximate distances of each stage are detailed below. There are checkpoints approximately every 10 kilometers / 6 miles along the course where volunteers and a medical doctor are stationed to give you water and support. Each checkpoint also has a tent providing shade.
Stage 1 – 35.2 km / 21.9 miles
Stage 2 – 41.8 km / 26.0 miles
Stage 3 – 40.0 km / 24.9 miles
Stage 4 – 42.8 km / 26.6 miles
Stage 5 – 73.6 km / 45.7 miles
Stage 6 – 16.0 km / 9.9 miles
Terrain
The terrain is varied. You can expect salt flats, sand dunes, loose rock and dirt, grassy plains, canyons and hard-packed dirt tracks. There are also a few water crossings throughout the week.
Altitude
The course starts at its highest altitude. Camp 1 is just over 3,000 meters / 10,000 feet. Each Stage takes competitors to a lower level, with the week finishing in San Pedro de Atacama at 2,443 meters / 7,780 feet.
Climate
The climate of the Atacama Desert is hot and dry. Course temperatures can reach higher than 40°C / 104°F (with lows of 5°C / 41°F at night).
Good luck to us….. 🙂
As mentioned yesterday, teamHSX on Atacama were on today’s news.
This link takes you to the main article :-
and this link is the small snippet on the lunch time bulletin :-
Also, this evening we broke the £1,ooo mark for our Cancer research fundraising.. please help us get to £6,690… Thanks..