The darkness undoubtedly contributed to that, but it also brought with it some magical moments with what seemed like an abundance of wildlife including owls, deer, badgers and rabbits.
I did find it quite amazing that despite having ridden the route only a few hours earlier in the other direction there were sections I didn’t recognise. I turned at Winchester before darkness and started the final section back to my start point in Amberley. I had time in the bank after a reasonable pace over the first half, so I just kept spinning along to Winchester. I was determined to keep going and just settled on the approach that as long as I could still pedal and keep moving then I would do so. This unfortunately hit my average pace quite significantly and it became clear that my desire to finish before darkness was not going to happen. I developed a strategy to ease the cramps when they came by standing on the pedals, stopping to stretch, walking the really steep bits and just generally not pushing hard at any stage. 130km when I started cramping quite badly which prevented me from pedalling at all. Apart from a slightly worrying puncture in the rear tyre after only a couple of kilometres the ride went as planned up until approx. I decided to start from Amberley at around 4am on a Friday hoping that the trail would be quiet and that if everything went to plan, I may be able to finish before complete darkness. On Friday 2nd July 2021 I finally managed to get my act together and complete the ride. I know now that being mostly a roadie, I was not doing myself any favours with tyre pressures / tyre choice. Since then I have attempted this ride 3 times on each occasion having catastrophic tyre failures from the sharp flint or mechanicals that brought the ride to an end. I stumbled across the South Downs Double website years ago and immediately had the urge to give it a go one day, but I was in no doubt that it would be a serious undertaking.
NICK FINCH FULL
I have done several single rides across the South Downs Way and it’s fair to say that completing the full length in a single day can be challenging especially if the conditions are not in your favour. I’ve lived on the edge of the South Downs National park for over 15 years now and spent quite a bit of time riding road bikes, mountain bikes and gravel bikes on its simply beautiful trails, lanes, and byways. Third time lucky for Nick, his perseverance paid off! Nick Finch – 22h 17m 43s on the 2nd of July 2021.
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