Bigman's secret sortie

Bigman had mild scare yesterday in the Bus Museum Sprint, as The Fit One kept the drive up for a sustained period and has clearly been gaining in fitness with all his tandem cycling.

This afternoon provided a perfect opportunity to put in a secret solo training shift with The Wee Yin requiring to polish up an essay due for submission this week.

The target destination was Col du Cleish, ou to the MilkBar at Powmill, and back over Mont VeKnockhill. It was a pleasant sunny afternoon with a fresh breeze out of the north west. Bigman lost himself in the countryside and could not recall the journey to the top of of the Col, except to pay hommage to the monuments erected for The Gruesome Twosome's contribution to Tandem Cycling bt Loch Fitone.

From the top of Cleish all of the evidence necessary to demonstrate the changing season was laid bare before you. A patchwork quilt of fields; some green, some still full of golden barley, some freshly cut with stubble remaining and some already ploughed ready for planting. The passing clouds provided an alternative palet of colour as the clouds flew past overhead. And all this had a backdrop of the blue skies and trees turning from green to brown with a carpet of crisp leaves covering the roadway ahead. Majestic!

After flying down the North Face, the journey along to Crook of Devon was its usual testy self with a robust wind seeking to push you back from whence you had come. The imagery of carrot cake drove the Bigman on to the refreshment stop at Powmill in under 60 minutes.

The climb back up and over Mont VeKnockhill was straight forward albeit a bit scary with the Knockhill Motor Racing Circuit emptying and spectators leaving and seeking to re-live their heroes as they imitate Louis Hamilton on the road from Knockhill to Powmill. I suppose they see the white lines as a guide to cornering, something to keep between your wheels. A bit like a life size Scalextric track. Only you don't find too many cyclists on a Scalextric track!

The clock was showing Mont VeKnockhill scaled and descended in 25 minutes and so a wee personal challenge was set to get back to Dunfermline within 30 minutes. After 29:54 minutes since leaving Powmill, the Dunfermlne limits were past. Result.

A cheeky wee 28 miles extra bringing the weekend total to 90 miles.