A short ride this evening -shorter than planned, as half a mile from the start point your leader came to an abrupt halt with a burst front tyre.

Just making the start only a couple of minutes after the ride should have left, examination of the wheel showed a small split in the tyre, through which the tube had protruded, become pinched, and then burst.  My thanks to the only two riders who turned up this evening, Julian and John, for their assistance in effecting emergency repairs, which meant the ride was able to take place, albeit 45 minutes late in starting.  Julian had also got a punchure earlier in the day and was worried that the tyre might not make it, but in the event the rest of the ride passed off without incident.

Due to the lateness of the hour, we went on a fairly direct route up to Eastergate, but we did manage a trial run up the partially completed cycle path from Felpham to Barnham. This path can be described as being in three parts - the first part from Felpham school (and ALC) around the golf course to Flansham has not yet been started, and its future revolves around the progress of the 700 homes to be built around it  ("Site Six"). The second part, which is where we joined it, runs from Flansham to the bridge over the River Rife. This follows a somewhat rutted, but hard packed and easily rideable farm track, and would be fairly straghtforward to convert to a proper cyclepath, however no work at all has been undertaken.

The final third was the most difficult to engineer and has been fully completed, although lacks any signage or publicity. It involved re-routing the old footpath on a completely new alignment, and then significantly regrading a rough and steep farm track. The surface is is rock and gravel dressed with a compacted sand finish, and makes for a very comfortable ride, although how long the surface will last is anyones guess.

 It regains the tarmac in Church Lane at Barnham, from where we proceeded direct to the Wilkes Head.  Edwin met us there, although by this time it was well after 9pm and he was about to depart having assumed the ride had been curtailed.

Our return route was straight down the A29 from Eastergate Memorial to Bognor Regis, and some lively running ensued on a very quiet evening for traffic. At Shripney Edwin and John left us for Pagham, whilst Julian and I continued over Highfield Bridge and back roads to the Arun Leisure Centre.

My mileage for the evening, a modest 13.9.

Graham 

Posted by RideLeader at 23:26 BST

Updated: Saturday, 10 May 2008 23:58 BST

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