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The idea of 'London - Roubaix' was born out of Covid-19, travel restrictions, Lockdown 2.0 and a little personal challenge I set myself, back at the start of 2020, namely to complete at least one 100 mile ride, every month of the year. I added a...

I first tried Everesting in early June, 2015. I failed on my first attempt, largely due to poor logistics, rather than weak legs! Two weeks later, with lessons learned, I succeeded and I’ve since Everested seven more times. One of these remains...

Please note, none of these pictures were taken during the actual Everesting Roam ride - I was solo and busy riding my bike, plus the weather was poor for much of the time. They all feature my son Tom on the same climbs though - just on different...

Of all my Everestings to date, this story is the most involved and the longest (in duration, if not words), yet for now, it's still incomplete. It's just possible that I've bitten off more than I can chew. In late Autumn 2018, with five successive...

All images by Bruno of Kupau Tours, Hawai'i, unless otherwise stated. Click on any image to view full screen and then use your back button to return to the text. Thank you Bruno for the awesome pics. I was hunched over my bike, resting my forehead...

2.30am - the middle of the night, Bodmin Moor, Cornwall: the descent towards the A389 seemed perfectly innocuous, until my light cut out abruptly, leaving me in complete darkness. Blacker than black. Time slowed down. I told myself that this sudden...

Click to view any of the images full screen and then use your back button to return to the story. I sat in the car, shaking uncontrollably, feeling nauseous and staring failure full in the face. In the last thirty minutes, the sun had set, the...

Last updated - December 2020 (and what a year it was for Everesting, because this was 'the Covid year' and professional cyclists, with their Spring race calendars cancelled, turned to alternative challenges. First some notable pros started doing...

A brief meeting with Ross Matheson, Marketing Executive for ASSOS UK & Ireland and before I knew it, I'd signed us up for the inaugural 2017 Red Bull 25hr Time Laps Race in Windsor Great Park. Think 'Le Mans 24hr' and you'll have a pretty good...

Plan A was to go to Wales in late October and explore the gravel tracks in the mountains west of Rhayader. Then Storm Brian arrived and Plan B looked more attractive. The problem was, Plan B was only loosely formed: 'find somewhere a lot further...

My cycling guilty secret: I love gravel more than any other surface. Even more than cobbles, although it's a close run thing. I'm currently half-way through a project to find the best 100 mile ride in Wales containing as much gravel as possible:...

Pictures by SGL, Jimi Thomson of TTT and Kev Mellalieu. Words by SGL. Click on any image to view fullscreen and then use your back button to return to the story. It was pitch dark. A few hundred metres ahead, I could see two rear lights blinking...

All photos by Kev Mellalieu. Click to view full screen and then use your back button to return to the story. I've never been good in traffic jams. It's one of the reasons that I moved out of London. We'd been stationary, engine switched off, for...

It all started in April 2013 when I rode the full distance Liege-Bastogne-Liege sportive, a day ahead of the pro-race, as the final day of Phil Deeker's 'hArdennes' training camp. At the time, it was by far the toughest ride I'd done and it opened...

Words by Sir Guy Litespeed, photos by Robbrecht Desmet of Too Soon, Too Late All the photos here are reproduced with the very kind permission of Robbrecht Desmet, film maker and photographer: https://www.facebook.com/toosoontoolatefilms/...

All Photos courtesy of Kevin Mellalieu, Jimi Thomson/Two Tyred Tours, Riccardo Green & Sir Guy Litespeed. Click on any of the images to view fullscreen and then use your back button to return to the text. The Theatre: The Cottian Alps: a...

By late June 2016, I'd converted my S-Works to 'steep Everesting spec': - an 11-40 cassette - an XTR Di2 rear dérailleur to accommodate that cassette! - front dérailleur removed to provide a clean chain-line - saddle tilted forward slightly -...

Photos by Daniel Melchior: click on the picture to view full screen and then use your back button to return. Prologue The hedgehog scurried around at the side of the road and then disappeared into the bushes. Meanwhile, a man in a full Black Tie...

With Lucy’s Cent Cols dominating late summer 2015, the story of July’s Tour de Suisse was never properly told, which was a shame since it was a stunning ride. So here it is, accompanied by Jimi Thomson’s superb pictures (click on any of the...

(Click on any of the images to view full screen and then use your back button to return) I was at my desk when it all began, although in truth it had started four weeks earlier, with tragedy on a road in a desert. It was early morning on the 8th...

"I've completely lost track of time, but I think it's somewhere near 5.00pm. The rain drops are big enough to actually hurt and they've been falling for the last seven hours. I have two hours still to go. I'm soaked to the skin and have been all...

Quite simply, my sister Lucy LOVED her bike. She had a habit of giving everything a nickname, including me (I became ‘Brother Ben’ and most of her friends never even knew that wasn’t actually my name)! She called her bike Buster and he was, without...

L’Enfer du Nord “Paris-Roubaix is the last test of madness that the sport of cycling puts before its participants. A hardship approaching the threshold of cruelty.” Jacques Goddet, former Race Director. My alarm went off at 4.15am and all the fears...

Lucy Monro 1964 - 2015 Lucy died on Friday 13th February in a tragic accident, whilst riding the Dubai Roadster's Coast to Coast Challenge. She founded Team SWR (named after Stuff Worth Reading, one of the magazine's that she published), in late...

It's c.9.00am on Wednesday and I've withdrawn into a very small place. The floor is comprised of smooth black tarmac, the walls are made of slow pedal strokes, straining legs, heavily laboured breathing and merciless punishment and the ceiling is...

SGL, August 2014. My final pre-CCC training block was three days in Wales, 8th - 10th August: a three day odyssey (see map below) - epic rides linked by epic drives!  Just what a road trip should be…  Wales has always provided the backdrop for my...

(Click on any of the photos to enlarge them and then use the Back button to shrink them again) July 2014: it’s Thursday afternoon.  The sun’s shining, the water’s a deep blue colour and as I pull into the wave I know that it’s going to be a good...

Back in November last year, I pulled the trigger and committed to attempting a Cent Cols Challenge (CCC) - the Dolomites version, commencing on 31st August – and my entire year has been focused on preparing for this. I first heard about the Cent...

SGL, October 2011 For the last five years or more, Ventoux had sat at the very top of my list of ‘must do’ climbs. I didn’t know anything about the climb until I read Armstrong’s autobiography in 2003, in which he described Ventoux as the hardest...

Saturday 20th April, 2013 4.00 am.  My alarm goes off. It’s cold in my room and I feel terrible.  I’m tired.  Really, deeply tired and maybe a bit sick too. I flex my ankles and then my calves – everything feels tight and sore.  I haul myself into...