Now if I had said this it would be a good thing, unfortunately it was my daughter's views about doing the BHF Goodwood 2014 ride on her birthday.
Not impressed having to exercise on her eleventh birthday.
Tough, we're doing it.
The ride is something I had read about where you can ride around the famous motor circuit at Goodwood to raise money for BHF. It hasn't happened for a few years so most of us were pleased to see it was happening again.
We managed to get 3 other families signed up so there were 8 adults and 7 kids.
This is my poor effort at photo editing for the Just Giving page. I got bored.
As it was Lilly's birthday, and she was soo keen, we didn't want to get up too early so we got there at 11.
On the way over Lilly said she would aim to do 4 laps of the 2.4 mile circuit, but wouldn't enjoy it!
The event starts at 10 so it was already busy with cyclists of all shapes, sizes and ages whizzing around the track.
They ranged from athletes on time trial bikes and pointy helmets to toddlers with stabilizers.
So we set up our Feed Station and then set off.
As you can imagine it is a beautiful surface to cycle on, no pot holes, lovely sweeping bends and no #bloodymotorists.
We all settled in to our own rhythm, doing laps with different people at different speeds. Stopping for a drink and a feed and then carrying on when ready.
We made the mistake of taking a BBQ, wasted cycling time!
I did a couple of fast laps with Chris and Richie. It was great to be able tuck in behind someone without having worry about them swerving to miss something. We got some good speeds.
I also did some great laps with Lilly. The whole event really helped her confidence on a bike, she actually learnt how to ride no handed.
There was one lovely corner, slightly downhill with the wind behind you where you could really get some speed up.
On one lap Lilly and I decided to go for it and she got up to 24mph which she was really pleased about.
My wife Kate, had suddenly decided she could bake and made some amazing scones for a nice cream tea. She also brought Lilly's favourite, profiteroles which meant we had the best Feed Station ever.
Team Sky could learn a thing or two!
The track closes at 4 so there was a mad rush to get in an extra lap. They did let one person do an extra lap so that he could break the 100 mile mark for the day.
Between us we did about 500 miles with some impressive distance covered by the kids.
I only did 15 laps. Part of me wishes I had done more but then I loved the laps I did with Lilly, it was real quality time together which we both needed.
On the drive home I asked Lilly how she did against her target. She did 11 laps or 26.4 miles and she actually enjoyed it and wants to do more laps next year!
It is a geat event, really well organised with all the support you'd expect. Yes you are going round in circles but the views are nice and we were lucky enough to see a WW2 plane take off and land a few times.
We are planning to do it again next year but aim to get there earlier so we can smash our distances.
The is the link to the girls Just Giving Page if you would like to support BHF.
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