National Rally; July 2000
Bedford Start and They're Off
This year Alan Brown and myself decided that we would enter the 1999 National Rally. For those of you not familiar with this event, its about navigating a motorcycle between various control points dotted around England and it starts at 2pm Saturday and finishes at 10am the following Sunday. With the exception of the compulsory stops every 200 miles, it's a non-stop riding event which requires the rider to cover a minimum of 500 miles if you're after a special gold award, as Alan and I were. This year about 860 riders entered and somehow I ended being competitor #1.
The event involves a lot of pre-planning as two weeks in advance of the event you are provided with a map of England giving all the control points and the designated (not actual) distances between each control point. Control points are also designated to be either lettered or numbered and can have the additional attribute of being a bonus control point. The finishing control point was Doncaster race course and the trick was to plan a route which takes you through the maximum number of control points while covering no more than 500 designated miles and, which passes through at least 6 lettered control points before covering 225 designated miles and, through at least 2 control points with the bonus attribute. The other complication is that control points close at various times so you need to make sure you plan to get there before the control point closes. Did you get all that? So there you are two weeks beforehand, with a network of control points dotted over England and your map trying to work out your route. The credit goes to Alan for finding the route which consisted of 23 control points the first of which was Bedford. We then set about planning the 22 legs between the control points.
The start at Bedford was a bit daunting with around 200 riders high on adrenaline emerging from a lay-by. I must admit to being a bit high on adrenaline myself but Alan, being the captain sensible of the two of us, kept me under control. This was probably the most scary part of the event. Anyway, the rest was failry uneventful as we followed our plan stopping off at the Worcester (8pm) and Ollerton (4am) control points for an hours rest each time. There was always a joker at each control point who liked to trumpet that #1 had arrived. This was amusing the first few control points but became a bit tedious later on.
We got lost twice on the M1 and in Leeds. The first was down to me basing the plan on junction 17 of the M1. Unfortunately you can get on at this junction but not off so that was a bit unfortunate. The second was down to Alan who insisted on going into the centre of Leeds even though the instructions said north east Leeds. So we got to Doncaster around 8am after covering an actual distance of 600 miles. When we got to Doncaster, Alan was on a real high but I must admit to being completely wrecked. He fell asleep at the race course, as did many, but I was too tired to sleep. Unfortunately, I fell asleep later on in the day while I was talking to Alan's dad who we had gone to see after finishing. Bit rude really but understandable?
Both Alan and I really enjoyed the event. Alan particularly enjoyed downing two giant fry-ups in the space of around 4 hours, one at Ollerton and one at Doncaster. (He's not allowed these things at home so he tends to overdo things a bit when he's away.) The weather was mostly kind to us although we got a good drenching on the way home. In total, we covered around 1100 miles in a little over two days. This included getting to the starting point at Bedford and getting home from the finishing point at Doncaster (and getting lost on the rally). The petrol bill on the visa has just come through! Alan wants to do it again and I'm thinking about it. We're still talking to each other which there was some doubt about beforehand with having to ride all through the night.
I would like to conclude by saying that Alan and I would like to say a very big thank you to all of those of you who sponsored us on the event. The charity mencap will be receiving a cheque for around £400. Once again, many thanks to all of you who sponsored us.