I was doing some digital sanitizing the other day trying to clear out some stuff on my laptop and I came across the photograph that you see in the blog here.
It’s actually in a frame in my office which was given to me as a present by my friend Stuart who look the picture.
It was taken in June 2013 in the middle of the night somewhere between Manchester and London on the 24-hour bike ride.
I love it, it’s one of my favourite photographs of all time.
It’s not impressive to anyone else but I love it because I remember exactly what that was like and exactly where I was and what I was doing.
It was somewhere around 2am in the morning and we’d been riding for 13 or so hours and arrived at a hot food stop in the middle of the 24-hour bike ride.
The food was lasagne and it was in a school or leisure centre canteen thing and people were sat around tables with plastic chairs (you can see in the background), 18 are trying to eat and generally commiserating with themselves that they might have another 10 or more hours to go on this ridiculous bike ride.
I couldn’t eat anything although I took a plate of lasagne and tried.
I was properly broken.
As is my way with the power sleep thing, I took myself off round the corner and unhooked my bib shorts and lay on a crash mat and fell asleep for 10 minutes.
Stuart thought it would be a good idea to take a photo of me while I was asleep and I’m glad he did.
It’s not pretty (look out for the stomach hanging over the front of my cycling shorts there) but I remember what it felt like getting back up off that crash mat and putting my bib shorts back on and my kit back on and putting my leg back over my bike to cycle again.
It was hard that and I’m sure at the time it felt like one of the hardest things I’ve ever done but it was to get harder again later on in the night and harder still riding through London.
It feels a little bit like that sometimes now. Monday mornings when you start the week again wondering what things are going to be thrown at you this week, what’s going to change and what’s going to be different. Who’s going to be there and who isn’t.
The funny thing is I look back at that photograph and wish I was doing it again (and think in one form or another I probably will).
I didn’t celebrate arriving in London and the photographs of when we did arrive in London are not special to me.
It’s never about the destination.
Blog Post Number - 2568