It was 15th January when Golly last rode Ingram Valley with Jason, and it was considerably cooler than today's ride which John and Terry rode in the company of six Reivers. Those present:

Ride Leader Derek, Suzanne, Mick, Gary, Arthur and Tom with our two intrepid MidAirCrisis bods.

We arrived very early for once, and spotted Derek parked at the roadside a mile short of Ingram Village, as he wanted to avoid upsetting the hiking fraternity by parking at the Visitor Centre for no good reason. Interestingly, the bulk of the other Reivers, Arthur apart, chose to ignore our presence and drove blithely past doing just what Derek didn't want them to. Ah, well - there was more Reiver wrangling to come... That made it necessary for the four of us to pedal along the road to Ingram to collect the others before backtracking to the start. When we got to the others, the little Gollum ticker almost stopped beating - there was Suzanne unloading her carbon Scott Genius MC10 - all 12 ounces of it, so the pace was likely to be furious. Bollocks. As it happened I needn't have worried, as I had a Secret Weapon in the shape of Tom, whose unorthodox ride tactics ensured that the front end never escaped by more than half a mile by simply stopping every mile or so. What a simple and effective idea. Early probs included some sort of knee trouble but he fought that off pretty quickly.

John shows us his new bike - a Kona Kikapu Deluxe - somewhat lighter than the 46lb Saracen Awol!

And I must squeeze in a shot of my lovely baby.

  Which way Derek?

Jeff had been due to lead the ride but had turned his ankle while getting ready to come out and had to cry off. That left Derek as substitute Ride Leader, but as the day wore on there seemed to be more and more dissatisfaction with his leadership, (see end of last paragraph for example) and at one point in particular where there was a very misleading signpost, the Reivers were about to ignore their own Golden Rule.

That was until the Gollum pointed out in fairly graphic terms that they should follow the leader, right or wrong, as Derek had already taken his chosen route and was a few hundred metres up the hill by now with the others seemingly unwilling to follow. Here are a couple of shots of the disputed way marker, and the next one at the top of the hill. As far as I'm concerned Derek did exactly right (if you care what I think!) so I followed him as soon as I  had recovered from the last climb.

Here's the Bear watching us (or is it something else?)

At the end of the ride John and I had collected the following data from our respective computers on the Barracuda and Coiler (max speed* - John couldn't get into Big Ring for the final descent!):

Come back later in the week - unfinished symphony...

Have you Killed A BIKE THIEF TODAY?