Tour of Caerphilly

I can’t believe it’s been a year since I went up Caerphilly Mountain to catch a glimpse of last year’s Tour of Britain- it feels like only a few months ago, but the time has finally come again to totally rearrange my working week in order to get up to the top in time.

After catching the train from Cardiff I started pacing up the hill, just as I noticed I’d had a text from my friend Caitlin saying there were rumours at the top that Bradley Wiggins had pulled out this morning. Nobody at the top had any internet connection on their phones, so I quickly loaded up a screen grab of the BBC page confirming the news to her and made my way up. As happened last year, somebody started talking to me on the way up, asking about the area. He’d come from Bristol and cycling runs in his family, having had two professional cyclists before him he grew up surrounded by it and now follows it wherever he can, and having previously spent 2 weeks following the Tour de France a couple of months ago he now found himself halfway up a windy mountain in Caerphilly. In fairness, it does have a lovely view.

As with last year the atmosphere was brilliant, with people cycling to the top before the race getting a big cheer (or in some cases heckled) by the crowd and strangers stopping and talking to each other on their way up. There was a fairly noticeable increase in numbers this year, with British cyclists having had such a successful year it was great to see such continued support. It would be great if this could carry on to the extent that more people would take up cycling, which could in turn lead to greater acceptance for cyclists and ultimately better cycle paths being provided in some areas.

I’d love to have a bike but ultimately, I don’t feel that safe on the road. And I can’t afford one. And I have nowhere to keep it…

Anyway, enough about me, today we got twice as much for our money compared to last year as they went up the hill twice! Bonus!

Unfortunately my lack of reception for ITV4 and my lack of anything other than some freeview channels means I’ve been quite out of the loop with cycling since about 1988 so I still don’t know many of the competitors, and I haven’t got round to even seeing who won, but if you don’t already know, you can just have  look yourself!

In the meantime, here are some photos…

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