Ebay Items

C'mon guys there's the assistant manager from the Harriers' own playing shirt on EBAY and it's going to £31 surely we can do better than that! Get bidding. www.ebay.co.uk and search for KHFC SHIRT.

Also, WHARTON PARK golf club have donated a golf day for 4 people (worth over £120) which doesn't even have a bid. Surely someone would like a round up there. Starting bid is £30, please text/call your golfing buddies and get them to log on. It would be embarrassing to let this go for pennies.

Thank you......

Just a quick post to say a big THANK YOU to all of you out there who have sponsored us and given us support thro our adventure. Chris will be giving you all a full run down in the near future & I have no doubt that I will add a few things, so briefly:
*Cheers dude for getting me thro the last climb when my lungs were about to explode.
*Fi for the great job you did caring and looking after us all.
*Bob for the never ending positive attitude that nearly killed me!!!!!!
*All the companies who helped us out especially Mudie Bond for the great Mercedes Vito van - I was so impressed that I'm thinking of getting one.
*Chris's parents/family who support & sponsor us in these barmy challenges we do. Oh and the persuasive way that manage to get people to sponsor us....
*Jen for the updates and putting up with me for the weeks before the ride.
Thats enough for now but as Chris mentioned, watch out for the downhill descent footage. (which will last with me forever) I'm sure a few photos will appear soon, probably of me knowing Chris...
Whats next, Chris reckons he will never ride again but I'm not so sure. I am already getting thoughts about our next challenge.

As Gordon Ramsay would say "520 miles, 14 km up the Alpe D'Huez....DONE" !!!!!!!!

Hammies Home Safely

It's late and we're all pretty whacked so this is just a short post to say we're back safe and well. The Challenge was fantastic. I'll blog the whole event late in the week but if I can say a huge thankyou to Mrs M who looked after us like royalty. To the other two who slogged it out with me. To all of you who sent me texts. And to all other those who've given us vans, tshirts, insurance, fuel, food, Harriers Shirts, Golf Days, Vouchers, money......

Thank you.

For fellow cyclists, the website for the Alpe D'Huez shirts is www.russtler.com and mention us. You might have to email them to get some stock in.

The crazy Alp descent video will be on youtube, check back after next weekend.

Wharton Park Golf Tickets on Ebay

Firstly - Well Done Crazy Hamsters!!

Secondly - Happy Birthday Chris!

Thirdly - Wharton Park One Day Golf Pass for 4 People now on Ebay.

Please see http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&rd=1&item=270169344774&ssPageName=STRK:MESE:IT&ih=017

Cyas, Holly

They have made it!

Chris just phoned to say they have got to the top!

Well done to the Crazy Hamster Crew. We never doubted you could do it.

Looking forward to hearing all about it later.

News Flash

Chris reports that he has just cycled a 'huge' mountain - and that there were people parachuting from the top.

The team are nearing the Huez - 'only' 40 miles to go (does that really sound near??!) with a last big climb to do before they get there.

Then, all that remains is the 11 mile ride to the top, which is a mile high.

C'mon guys, we are all thinking of you!

Beginning the climb.

Well Hammy enjoyed the first peak.

By God the climbing is hard.

76 miles down and legs are tiring now.

Morning! 23rd September 2007

Quick update from Hammy Chris,

2.25 hours down. 45 miles along Rhone valley. OK so farbut those pointy things are getting closer, andthe climbs are going to start soon.

Post from Hammy Chris

Hi Guys,

Managed to get wifi in the hotel tonight so thought I'd post. Thanks to Jen, Ruth, Mum and Holly who've been keeping you all up to date.

Day two was a little easier. Well if I start with Day One you'll understand.

We set off as a three and rode for two hours, then Bob and I continued on and we sat one rider out each hour till early afternoon. It was tiring and became apparent that NO OTHER TEAM had more than one rider on the road at any time. Oh and all the other teams have 4 riders. So in 200 miles they each to 50. AND they leapfrog their riders using the minbus to keep time down. So during the afternoon we did solo stints to allow us to recover. We got in in 12.5hrs which was a great efforst and became a little notorious in the restaurant that evening for the first team to ride in pairs!

We guessed we'd never make it to the Alp in one piece if we continued at the pace we did on day one so on day two, we all did the first hour as a warm up and then rode solo all day, one hour on, two off (the other teams have three!). We did about 70 miles each and did the last 10 miles together. The terrain was much tougher today with logs of hills but we got home as one of the first teams in. Fiona's been a star driving, organising and knocking up grub. WE REALY COULDN'T DO THIS WITHOUT HER.

Tomorrow is the biggy. The plan is to do 15 mile stints each from the start to get us to the Alp in plenty of time. Then it's a kit change into out TWIN SIX tops and hit the hill. Hopefully it'll all be over by about 6pm. Hopefully......

If I can blog tomorrow night I will but I'll try and get some texts to the girls and see what they can do.

Chris

Day two 22/09/2007

The hamsters are making good time today. They have only 30 miles left until the second stage post is reached.

Go Hamsters Go!

End of the first day

The team finished the day safely in 12.5 hours covering over 100 miles each.

Roll on tomorrow!

The Crazy Hamster Crew.( Now in search of a few sunflower seeds!)

21/09/07 13:35

Hamsters riding solo an hour at a time each to make up the miles. All getting a bit tired. Around 5 hours to go.

21/09/07 11:05

140ks down so about half way. Legs starting to feel it!! Come on boys keep pedaling you still have the monster hill to come!

21/09/07 08:10

Update from hamsters - Chris Bob and Andy all out riding. 3 hours completed 75ks. They have endured riding in the dark! The good new is Chris has withstood pressure from Andy and has refrained from shaving his legs! U go Chris!!

Ebay Auction - Signed Kidderminster Harriers Shirt!

Hi All!

I've hyjacked the blog! Its Holly here (Chris's sis!). Just to let you know that I have put the signed KHFC shirt onto Ebay! The auction will start at 7.30pm (this evening - Friday21st Sept) and will end Friday 28th Sept). To find the shirt, please type KHFC Harriers Shirt into the Search box at http://www.ebay.co.uk/ AFTER 7.30pm this evening!!

Also, please look out for the Warton Park Golf Pass for four people, also being put on Ebay later the same evening!

While I'm on here - Good Luck Chris and the Crazy Hamsters!

Best fishes,

Holly

It's all a bit real now...

8am Thursday Morning. Pretty much packed and waiting for Andy to come over and collect me. We've got to spin round to Ginos to get the shirts and then down to Hire-it! for another photo shoot before the off. I forgot to mention the one we did the other day for the Redditch and Bromsgrove papers but I could get used to being "Papped!"

Hopefully the Wyre Radio will give us some shout outs over the weekend so tune into them on 107.2 if you are in the Wyre Forest Area. The crew fully endose Rob Ison!

I'll try and get my sis to get the Harriers Shirt on ebay over the weekend, and the golf day at Wharton Park. She'll put a link on here. Donate generously and get bidding!!!!!

I've got to admit, I am geting a bit nervous now......

Judgement day......

What can I say.... Thursday lunchtime we will be heading towards the channel tunnel to start our adventure.
I've got to say that now we are at the start of our event, I'm a tad apprehensive. We have done a far bit of training but I am still concerned that I will let the team down and die on a big hill. OK, maybe that's a bit dramatic but I have started to dream about the Alpe D'Huez climb, (sorry I meant have nightmares..!)
I am sure that once we start at "early o'clock", I will feel a lot better. The fear of the event soon disappears once you have mounted your bike and left the start.
The organisers have had a massive job in getting this event together and I hope that it all goes well. Who knows what will happen but I'm sure that we will have a great/testing time whilst in France.
A big "THANK YOU" to all those who have sponsored us and our families who have had to put up with the training we have put them thro......

Two pack Jen (50g, you know who you are!) will update the blog whilst we are grinding it out in Le Francais. Thanks chick...! I may regret that when I get back to work.

Adios amigos, bonsoir Rodney.

PS.
YOU, and I mean YOU, can still sponsor us at the "Justgiving" link. One day, it could be YOU who needs our charities help........

The final day....

Wow wow wee, what a final day it has been. Just picked up the beautiful van from MUDIE BOND who are very kindly loaning it to us. RA Davies have given us our policy schedule so we're ready to go.

Gino (www.mgsportswear.co.uk) will be working late on the shirts as I think he forgot to get them done but they should be ready for the morning. He's dead if they aren't - I have links to more senior Italian Mafia than he does!!!!!

Spend hundreds on more bike kit today to keep up with Andy and all that needs to be done is the packing.

I'm sure there are more thank-yous needed but will have to do them afterwards...

Oh cheers Neil Howarth (Kidderminster Harriers Asst Manager) who has donated us his playing shirt to auction off. I'll try and get it on Ebay tonight but if not look out for it next week. This best go for thousands!!!!

Right, so I'm going to try and get some wifi access in the hotels and give you an end of each day blog but in the meantime keep checking for regular posts from the latest Crazy Hamster Recruits Jenny and Ruth who will be the recipients of frequent text messages over the next few days and will update the blog as often as possible for us.

Send all of us texts or post things on here to keep us going,

Hope to see you all soon........ I really do hope! Chris

A few more to thank

Creative Landscapes have provided us with a voucher for someone to spend in their beautiful nursery. Check out Keith Southall's creations at www.creativelandscapes.com. Get your sponsorship in as we're going to throw this in with the signed 'crew t-shirt being raffled by all those people sponsoring us.

Soon to be on Ebay is a golf day for 4 at the very exclusive Wharton Park Golf Club in Bewdley, big thanks to them (www.whartonpark.co.uk) and hopefully the Harriers are coming up trumps with a signed 2007 shirt. The guys have all chipped in with some cash too so big thanks to them. In fact the defence was feeling so charitable this weekend they even let the other team score 5 goals!!

On a training note, we had our first full team ride on Thursday. 61k's in two hours. By god Bob's quick, that the fastest average we've done so far...

We got shirts!

Wow....what a finale. I was left a little disappointed last week when the German firm supposed to be sorting out our shirts wanted to up the cost by 50% due to a shortened deadline. We withdrew our order and set about sourcing our own.

I'm so happy to report that due to the generosity of a number of companies we were inundated with offers. If you are a cycle club and need some kits, please check out http://www.cycle-clothing.co.uk/ Carlton who runs this site send us some proofs and they are really good. Great material a bit like the Climalite stuff that adidas make.

Speeds in Bromsgrove have sorted us some shirts for day 1 and are really behind the 'crew sending us to France with all sorts of spares and stuff.

My massive thanks go out to my buddy Gordon who put us in contact with the peeps at http://www.russtler.com/. They've helped us out with THE most beautiful shirts you've ever seen. They stock some of the Twin Six range (http://www.twinsix.com/) from the US of A and have sourced some Alpe D'Huez tribute and Fat Cyclist shirts. Thanks to Debbie and Co @ Russtler. Legends.

Aren't they beautiful?

Ha ha Bloody ha!

Yeah, funny, in my desperation at wanting some lunch before dashing from the Redditch Salon across to the Kidderminster one to meet with the boss I happened to stumble across the sarnie van in the car park. Having had nothing to eat all day I thought I'd take the opportunity to pocket some lunch. Trouble is, Liz's sarnie van was out of sarnies so I bagged a sausage roll and a pastie. Baggy, the Grandad of the salon who insists on Heart FM on the radio, dobbed me in to Millerz hence the Ginsters post. Thanks guys. But for the record I am now 1 stone and 3 pounds lighter than when we started this lark back in March. Who needs titanium eh?!?! And Baggy, the trimmed beard will make you a hit with the ladies kid!

So, two weeks to go. Two weeks and we'll be arriving back. I dare not even think what pain I'll be in. AND IT'S MY BIRTHDAY! I spend my birthday in a van driving through France. Shouldn't be too bad though as it'll mean I get control of the radio (Mixture of Chilis and Prince there then - Ruth you have soooooo much to answer for!) And I have a sneaky feeling that Andy's bought me a really expensive birthday present too, it might involve Carbon Fibre and Titanium hmmmmmmmm. Despite what everyone else says about him, he really is a very lovely chap.

So what have we been up to? The shirts situation has been annoying but hopefully that will all be arranged by Friday and I'll blog them. Sponsorship trickles in but we could do with a last push. Hopefully we have a couple of good gifts coming in which we will be ebaying so keep an eye out. And both Andy and I have been out at the weekend putting in the miles. We're getting together tomorrow and on Thursday for a couple of big rides - Trimpley hill here we come!!! I think the plan is to ease off over the weekend and next week just get all our kit together. Oh my god, it is really close now....

Oh Dear.......pie monster!!!

Crazy Hamsters got wheels!

Oh yes, with the help of Jeremy and the very lovely people at Mudie-Bond in Kidderminster we now have transport.


They have very kindly given us the use of a Vito van/people carrier to get us to the startline and follow us along the way. Fiona our driver was heard to comment "I'm very happy with the guys choice of wheels for me, Andy is too tight to buy me a Merc but Chris has come up trumps!".

Although I actually have to pass on all the credit for the arranging to the Hamster Crew's part time Event Transport Manager Gavin, from Hire-It who made this possible.

To add the the great news and well worth a mention are RA Davies Insurance Brokers who have kindly agreed to cover the trip.

To both of the companies, a really big thank you from the 'crew. Much appreciated.

Skin burn

In three weeks time it'll all be over. Mixed with the apprehension of actually doing the challenge, that makes me feel pretty rubbish. I cannot tell you how good getting out on my bike and riding makes me feel. If I'm down, I jump in the saddle. Ask my mum if you see her. Often I'd come home after a crap day at work/college/school and I'd just jump straight on my bike and go out for an hour or so. It clears your head, you can put the world to rights and re-organise.

I usually go out on my own but riding with Andy is pretty cool now. We talk about all sorts. Oh, sorry, yesterday we went out for two hours and did 50K's. It seems really insignificant now to keep reporting the training rides. What matters now is making sure we are ready and that means slotting in a sesh as often as we can. Right, all sorts.... Yesterday we were talking about falling off. Andy had a pretty bad crash last year and I'm always coming off my mountain bike but we talked about loosing your bike at 30kph and slowing yourself down with your skin :o( I think I commented that your legs would resemble the hard shoulder of the M6 as you attempt to pick out all of those bits of gravel.

Well, as luck would happen, that's what my left leg resembles right now. Minus the gravel. You see I have quite an admiration for the blessed game. Football. I play twice a week in between riding, canoeing etc. And I don't like loosing. So tonight, when we were up by only one goal I decided to stretch out and steer one past the 'keeper, only I did so landing on my left shin and dragging it along the shiny gym floor, plucking out half the hair and depositing a few layers of the pink stuff in the process. My god does it hurt now :o(

Mental note: Don't all off your road bike!!

On the Team front, the sponsorship continues. We paid a load into our HSBC account today so I'll get a balance update soon. I've a few more companies to thank later in the week but keep passing this round, the more views we get, the more we're likely to raise.

Sorry for the less than happy tone of this one, I need to get out for a spin and organise a few things. In the meantime I'm off to rub some mint, lavender and marshmallow into my feet (x!) Until the next one....

PS I dont know if Jen (Larkin) reads this, but I just checked and I'm the lightest I've been since I bust my ankle two years ago. Thanks for noticing! x