Save yourself, save yourself…

No, that’s not a line from Saving Private Ryan, it’s Ben (but it sounded like Jim Bowen in my ears with that northern accent): “OK, phase 1’s in the bag. That’s safe, save yourself son, that Puig Major’s a bugger, it’s spit me out so many times – I’m pacing myself today”.

Look - no hands!

Within that breath two pro cyclists went spinning past –WHOOSH – WHOOSH – WHOOSH. Hold on what’s Ben doing chasing them?

Imagine Ben & Jerry, oh no that’s an ice cream, I mean Tom & Jerry (Ben being Tom – hold on that’s getting too confusing!).

Anyway he’s off chasing like a maniac, I’m doing 50km and can’t get anywhere near them… he must be up to 65km down that hill. To say Ben’s competitive is an understatement. Well that pretty much sums up his character and determination, that’s why he’s ready for the “ride of his life” in 10 days, and that’s why I’ve enjoyed training him.

Saturday we cycled 135km of mountains, the toughest route in Mallorca, as difficult as Ben will experience on his journey. But we did it with comfort. For the first time Ben enjoyed that route, he’s confident, ready – in fact we stopped off to admire the scenery and have a coffee & sandwich instead of head down pure training!


We started out 12 months ago as complete strangers – trainer & client – and we rode the 135km on Saturday as mates – chatting, laughing and just enjoying each other’s company.

I’m not saying it’s been an easy journey. For both of us, so much has happened but those events have made us both so stubborn & resilient and strong enough to tackle the journey. A great example was Sunday. Ben was due to ride so I wished him luck by text. I could tell by his reply he wanted some downtime to chill with his family. I nagged him (if you can nag by text?!), his reply was “I’m all lycrad up”. I got another text 3 hours later, after getting another 90km under his belt “I hate you”. I laughed out loud – that’s the kind of relationship we have, I’m not his trainer, just a mate who happens to be a fitness trainer.



Bring it on!



Are we ready? Too right we are! This is not just a fitness challenge but a mental challenge. I guess we’re pretty mental to take this on, I mean mental as we’re both quirky characters, quirky but mentally very tough. 

As Ben always says “How do you eat an elephant – a chunk at a time”. That’s how we tackle this, a chunk of road every day until there’s no road left, nothing will get in our way.

Let’s go and eat some road matey!

Claire's weekend challenge report!

Our ride from the top of Soller mountains back to Portals took us 3 hours, mainly due to the fact, I needed to take a few breaks and water my bits and pieces to calm the pain down, and its was 32.5 degrees in the shade!

Was given the chance to quit 3 times, and I refused each one! (And for the sceptics back in the UK, who think I just write this for fun and don't actually do it, here's the photographic evidence!)

Considering I only got back on a bike 2 weeks ago, I'm so delighted that I didn't give up and I will continue with my training when I get home with my own bike when I go and buy one!

What all this has done is put into perspective what Ben has achieved so far and trains daily to keep on achieving! Remember back in June Ben competed in the 312km Mallorca race? Considering he'd only bought his bike in January and that everyone was telling him he was insane to even attempt (let alone in agony), Ben did the impossible in extreme pain and blistering heat!

We did a tenth of that yesterday and did the first 4km down a mountain, not the first 100km up the Tramuntana mountains!!

We all got back to Mood, totally exhausted and elated! Ben had the biggest grin on his face because his big sis didn't give up! Dan and Dave both had a little soreness of the nether regions too and put me to shame! Woodhouse better look out when we get back, the bikes will be out on a regular basis and training will continue!

Return of the Mack – Dave’s training diary

Not sure if you remember that song, one of my favourites. Now there's two reasons for the title:

1. I've just returned to the island


2. the singer was a bit of a dodgy fella and always pointing guns at people... that's why Mark Morrison wasn't on the music scene for too long!

‘Hold on’, I hear you saying... 'what's this got to do with Ben and his training?' Well, when I was in the UK I recall a telephone conversation with Ben where he was telling me that this Swiss ball is easy: ‘I've been doing hundreds and can't feel it doing a thing!’

Roll on last Monday, our first session back in the gym. What Ben didn't realise was that my stopwatch was in my mind a gun... ‘Oh you bugger... ohhh you bugger... ohhh you bugger – arhhh!’ His face was purple, sweat dripping down his temple, pupils bulging, his bum was twitching (because he had a Swiss ball jammed between his knees!). He was in the firing line and he knew he was in trouble. ‘Now Ben, were you doing a hundred of these?’ I blew the barrel of the smoking gun... I mean stopwatch! We're back on track.

It's currently a tough time for our caped crusader; it is seriously hot and very, very tough to train. Ben is so hard on himself, it's tough for me to keep him pegged back and get him to realise just how far he has come. For me the hardest part is to keep him focused on today, taking small steps towards the ultimate goal - I'm sure if the team hadn't set the dates and built the website he would have quietly just snuck off already on his own!

Please feel for Laura, Ben’s lovely wife, this week. I can't tell you how much Ben was badgering me to go on a ride with him on Saturday – and I just couldn't. So it was poor Laura's turn to feel the pain!

She arrived at the gym on Saturday morning to collect her bike, looking all dainty in nice heeled shoes. I could sense she was a bike virgin... soon to be taken... taken to a beautiful place, ridden hard ‘til exhaustion, yet at the same time to feel exhilarated... to wake up on Sunday morning in the arms of the caped crusader knowing that she was safe... until the next time!

Lots of emails have been flying backwards and forwards so let me start by thanking you all for your hard work and effort in to this web site and challenge, I don't know if it is because you love me, love the idea or your just scared of my sister, but thank you.

I am really excited and nervous all at the same time. This started with just a wacky idea and now it's more real than I can believe!! Every day when I train in the gym or on the bike I'm thinking of you all and the emails that you had sent that day. The effort going into the smallest detail to make this whole challenge work is an inspiration to me to push harder and go faster.

Just to let you know that this Saturday I have my first race coming up, this will be my first competitive race in my life!!

This week I am taking it very easy with no or very little training, I am resting completely and having lots of physio work as I have strained my back, left knee and right tricep. This is not through accident, it's just from lots of kms on the bike over the last 4 weeks. Now I have stopped for a few days all the aches and pains are coming out, so I have a real big push to get ready for Saturday.

The race on Saturday is for 14 hours. I guess that I will be disqualified for not finishing on time, but that's not important, I just want to finish. I will have Cenk on standby in the afternoon to continue the support once the race has finished and also to drive me home afterwards. I think my time will be more like 17 - 18 hours. The Tramauntana mountain range is just a killer, it will spit me out at the end and I will be destroyed, I will then have another 200kms to do!!!

Wish me luck for Saturday, and once again thank you all so so much, with such a good team behind me, I feel we are going to do really well with charities and raising some really good money too.

Love

Benj