My first ever Audax… but what are these directions?!

Jimmy, Chris and I headed out for our first every Audax but do we managed to find our way to the end?

Check out Audax Uk for other long distance events, or if you’re in the Essex area, then head over to the Audax Club mid-Essex (ACME) website at https://acme.bike to see what local rides they have planned.

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stamping a rain jacket they say it’ll be fine they say what’s that messages at midnight so it’s gonna be a hot one fellas [Music] good morning and this morning you joined Chris Jimmy and I on the way to our first ever audax now we have of course done long distance riding before but never in an ordax UK event but first we need to get to the start and for some reason we’ve decided that we’re going to cycle from Stansted to bulldog in Hertfordshire which is about 24 miles so about onto the top of the ordex route hey it’s gonna be a fairly long day that said the distance we’re doing today on the audax is only 100K so not strictly true or Dax length and that’s because we’re only doing the last part of a three-day event covering 300 kilometers to the guys that we’re meeting up with today have done all three days and by the end of today we’ll have completed 300 kilometers so I don’t think we can call ourselves super random errors just yet but it’ll be a nice foray into the world of war decks [Music] put too much of a toll on the ride but unfortunately just as we’re on our way there it starts to rain I think it should only be a short shower though and given that it’s so warm I’m hoping that will dry off pretty quick [Music] Jimmy and Chris have definitely left me standing on these Hills though oh man I’m definitely more of a downhill specialist much more of a pigcock than a Picacho yes I just compared myself to Tom Peacock what are you gonna do about it [Music] oh my God there’s so many Hills and it’s definitely what you would call muggy today moist moist is the word some incredible views this morning though absolutely stunning oh great another Hill [Music] right well we’re off the start of today’s hundred kilometer leg of this three-day ride we have our brevit card we’ve got our instructions although when I say instructions it feels like you need a degree in code breaking before you can actually understand them what hopefully we’ll make our way through them quite easily though but we’re literally two minutes out and the heavens have just opened up and none of us have brought a rain jacket so this should be fun [Music] all right next is Leicester two Junction grass triangle time posted thinksworth so having never done an audax before and knowing full well that cycling has a lot of rules I decided to look up all Dax last night to see what it was all about and see what we’re getting ourselves into so there are a number of different classifications aboard ax and what we’re doing today is a brevit popular [Music] soaked muggy very muggy listen to the moaning of Jimmy the layers summer he does like a layer old Jimmy so the interwebs tell me that a brevit popular is a shorter raw Dax that may take the same route as a slightly longer Order X taking place at the same time but it’s more of a an introduction into long distance riding which to be fair is probably what we need to be honest though Tom the organizer main priority seem to be don’t forget to stop for lunch and 11c’s as well which I’m all in favor of so Tom the organizer State over the last couple of days they’ve been having some lovely long leisurely hour-long lunches along the Route I like the sound of that today’s phrase of the day appears to be oh great another climb [Music] so we’ve reached our first stop and on the private cards there are a number of questions to prove that you’ve been to the control points and the first one at 7K is what is the name of the first Pub and it is not there it is the Rose and Crown so we have completed our first control Rose and Crown exclamation mark next one is the pubby Nationals that’s another 20K yeah this is the new me with glasses so Chris has got a new pair of sunglasses which have photochromatic lenses sorry they’re photo dramatic lenses they’re very nice which turn darker as it gets lighter so as the Sun starts to shine the lenses turn dark but Chris is a bit worried because it seems that in any amount of light they go quite dark and he’s worried that he looks like where would you look like what bear in mind this is a family show he looks like a bell piece with his dark sunglasses on in not much light they do work quite well apparently so we’re not going to say too much we love the glasses so we’ve now got 20K until our next control point or 47k too much Adam which might be where we stopped for lunch [Music] oh boy this is time three of three of today so we’ve got another five of these to go oh great another Hill but the rain has disappeared thankfully and the sun has started to poke its head out from the clouds and it started to get very warm now I know I talk about the weather a lot on these videos and I’ve said it before but it sort of dominates your life as a British cyclist so I’m going to continue but it is very warm today Garmin saying it’s currently 21.6 degrees so I took the cap off a little way back because it was getting very very warm up top but we’ve suddenly coming to what are we in still in Hertfordshire so we’re now right out in the heart of the countryside in Hertfordshire absolutely stunning and I keep saying this I said this on the dunnage video last week but there’s lots of the English Countryside it looks very much like the French Countryside riding along the Avenue ver with the wheat waving either side of you absolutely beautiful but so for that group just flying by we’re obviously out on their normal Sunday morning ride it’s reminded me of something that the organizer Tom said this morning is that ordex is all about just taking it nice and leisurely nice slow ride through the countryside and just enjoy it it’s all about the journey not the destination I could definitely get used to that [Music] so it says Road becomes a507 we’ve not gone to that yet have we not right on left hand Bend is this it I’m looking at this now and this is saying straight up is this the right way all right I told you follow me will you it’s all up here [Music] you know you’re probably in the countryside when you see a John Deere dealership [Music] [Music] well my train just came off going down that Hill that never helps [Music] bro I think I’m getting used to these hieroglyphs now our next instruction is continue ahead to Esso at x no dollar sign all right continue ahead to straight over across roads no signpost simple it does require you to think quite a bit though which I’m not very good at the best of times especially not when I’m trying to operate a bike as well so we are 43 miles in and 2 hours 57 minutes so far so we’re looking good for a six hour finish at 1pm this afternoon which would be pretty good and we’ve stopped off at a little convenience store for some refreshments Jimmy’s I don’t know what’s happening with Jimmy’s glasses I mean if they stay there if it works if it’s crazy and it works it’s not crazy right oh no it stopped working did I mention it’s very warm today um definitely need this yet more Hills human who chose this route how many times have we done now this is six of eight oh six of eight we’re on now only two more to go I did the math for you just in case you couldn’t yeah there have been a hell of a lot more than six actual climbs though it takes a lot to be a hill around here it’s quite an exclusive appeal Club around here yeah won’t cut the mustard has to be a proper manly Hill I have to say if nothing else this is just a lovely way to see parts of the country that you’ve never seen before despite the fact that Chris keeps telling me that we’ve ridden these roots a number of times I’m a nightmare for remembering where we’ve been but in that way it’s actually quite nice because you just keep thinking you’re seeing new parts of the countryside which is great I can tell you where for sure you know we came down here and turned right after we fixed that kind nurses puncture see he says for sure I’ll know it I’m not convinced so having said earlier the audaxes are all about taking it easy being leisurely we’ve actually pumped up the pace today and there’s partly to do with learned behavior unfortunately every other ride we go out on we’re absolutely steaming as fast as we can to try and get a decent workout but also because we are on a slight time challenge today as well because as I’ve mentioned before with all three of us being married fathers of young children there are domestic responsibilities too so we all need to get back for family engagements this afternoon own however I reckon on the next Order X we’ll take it a bit slower right oh yes it stops every 10 miles hour long lunches breakfast at one brunch full lunch cheese board at the next one Pit Stop pre-dinner dinner post dinner and then maybe at some point we’ll get to the end and amongst the food a cycle race might break out [Music] you’re saying this is a 17 grade so we have just left control point three which was just a village shop and our proof that we were there is a receipt for goods two packets of salt and vinegar crisps which Chris swears are a great cure for cramp and a chocolate bar just for a bit of sugar and now we’re back on the move on our way to Whitton in Chelmsford we’ve got another 30 miles or so to do and honestly this has been an absolutely awesome day so far yeah we had a bit of rain earlier but it wasn’t too bad but now the sun’s come out stunning said it before I’ll say it again this is all looking very Northern French [Music] what a glorious day absolutely gorgeous red kite Munchak Bowl shrew hair rabbit peacock Kestrel they’re all out today Treadway Simmons and salmon as well they’re all out and flies everywhere they get in your mouth right well we’ve taken a quick detour off of the official ordex route for the only permissible reason to change the route and that is to get some cake well it has to be said that that was a massive piece of cake but we have done 58 miles so far so I think we deserved it I mean we have had a Sachin egg sandwich chocolate bars and crisps and an ice cream today but you know we definitely deserve the code definitely deserve a cake you’re God worthy to vacuum man ready yeah let me tell you that’s no fantasy of mine [Laughter] so also while we stopped Jim has been giving a droopy saddle how’s it feeling now Jimmy absolutely wonderful millimeters make all the difference they keep sending these Wi-Fi so I I need to point out that was Christmas joke I can’t take credit for that one so with tilty saddle up and now he’s happy as Larry are you sorry are you Larry hi Larry [Music] a car Festival going on in matching Green Well it has really warmed up now go home and telling me it’s 27 degrees at the moment she is a warm mistress it’s actually quite nice when you get into these shaded areas the temperature drops right down gotta Savor this although this slow ride has now turned into a bit of a hair in the tortoise race the other ordax guys who have done the last two days they’ve been taking it easy today so they’re the tortoise and we’ve been the hair but the problem is with the hair and the Tortoise story is the hair decides to stop off quite a few times which is what we’ve done and it’s put us back a little bit so now we’re trying to make up a bit of time by pushing on not good in this heat right we’re at 78 of 86 miles it was supposed to be 85 but then we took a mile diversion for cake so we’ve got eight miles left to go and mercifully the temperature was dropped somewhere it’s now down to about 22 degrees still warm but not quite as warm as it was earlier and we were all melting but I think we’re all starting to flag a little bit now aren’t we yes yes we are [Music] all right just coming into Witham which is the final info control point and the end of our ride [Music] and that is us we’re done I’m ready I’m waiting for us is our lift National mate that was good 85 miles done in 5 hours and 48 minutes not a bad time [Music] so the boat’s on the roof are ready to go what have we learned today time in Lycra with your pals is a good time indeed resistance is better than speed yeah well we are home after a very long and warm 85 miles but a very very enjoyable ride one thing I’ve learned which I’ll definitely be taking forward in future ordexes that I take part in is to really look at the instructions when the instructions are turn left or right at the next t-junction that’s simple enough but it’s when it’s take the second right or second left after a particular feature that you can very easily forget and just keep going straight on and miss the tone completely which we did a couple of times but other than that yeah really good ride and I can see us definitely doing some more long distance audits routes in the future Jimmy and I are not actually members of all tax UK but I think we’ll be signing up very soon to get some more longer riding because it was great fun and hopefully next time uh when we’re not on a timer restraint we can take it a bit more literally Pace at the end we were flying quite a bit we were doing 25 30 mile an hour at points just to try and get back in time I haven’t done 85 miles today and 130 or so last weekend when we did the Dunwich Dynamo uh yeah that’s over 200 miles in a week so yeah fairly happy with that and that definitely brings my weekly tally needed uh down quite a bit I’ve not updated the spreadsheet recently so I’m not sure exactly how many miles I need uh per week to reach my goal of 2023 miles this year but I’ll update that and I’ll let you know in the next video I hope it gave you a bit of an insight into how all taxes work again it was all new to me having never ridden one before and if you get a chance to have a go at an audits then definitely give it a go because certainly I had visions of a proper hardcore crew flying as fast as I could to get to the end but actually I’ve learned that there is a minimum and maximum allowable speed limit so as Tom the organizer said this morning it’s more about the journey than the destination and as we passed a few of them on the road they were taking a nice leisurely lovely slow pay so yeah next time we’ll definitely be going a bit slower but yeah again thanks very much for watching guys and I will see you in the next video take care right well we’re off right well we’re off right well we’re off right we’re off 100 kilometers heading generally West East so we’re now right out in the start that again right so we are now 42 miles in three hours oh no sorry 40 let’s do that again right so we have just left car we’ve just left yeah