Goodbye Lantau...

This last Saturday, I headed out to meet Kelvin for what was to be my last ride on Lantau Island. The plan was to get a decent ride in before meeting Vicky at the TaiO Heritage Hotel where we would be spending Saturday evening as part of a short ‘staycation’ (a very thoughtful wedding present).

Arriving a little earlier than planned I made my way along the platform at Sunny Bay MTR station (front wheel of course off my bike) and noticed a minor scuffle between two ageing Cantonese guys. There was a bit of shouting and a little bit of ‘hand-bag at twenty paces’ type shoving. Not too unusual, so I skirted past and made my way out through the turnstiles. Next thing, one guy pushes past me muttering under his breath, throws down his bag and pulls out what I thought was a pen (to write a complaint?!). As soon as the other guy left the station he launched himself at him with, what was now apparent to me as, the screwdriver in his hand and started wildly trying to stab him in the ribs, kidneys, head and neck. Total chaos ensued!

The Cantonese labourers weapon of choice - more dangerous than one might expect

I wasn’t quite sure what to do, I was unarmed and didn’t fancy catching a screwdriver in the face. I thought about throwing my bike at them, but it was new (and expensive) so I quickly dismissed that ridiculous idea… A quick scan of the area revealed no readily adaptable street weapons. Deciding that I was going to be no use I also briefly considered whether I should film it (or maybe even Instagram the action….). I stood there uselessly.

A very ineffective street weapon

Eventually the unarmed guy wrestled him to the ground and got him in some sort of leg lock whilst the crazy guy flailed around on the floor with his bloodied screwdriver. The victim was streaming blood from his face and neck and clearly had several puncture wounds. Phone calls were made and the aggressor got up and legged it for a bus (from which he was refused entry) and then into the distance. People gave chase, then a typically unnecessarily large number of police (three paddy waggons?) and ambulances arrived. Shortly followed by Kelvin in all-white kit…

Try not to look too closely, you might get an unpleasant surprise

Is all white kit every really acceptable? I am not sure it ever is. I was wearing a white jersey, fine, it gets hot and it is a cooling colour. White bibshorts though, they are frankly indecent – a tiny bit of rain or getting a little threadbare after being loved too much and they reveal far too much of areas no one really wants to have to see. I resigned myself to spending as much of the day riding in front of Kelvin (or at the very least side by side) to avoid unwanted images being etched on my retinas.

I recounted the street fight / attempted murder as we cycled out of Sunny Bay, narrowly avoiding a pack of police dogs, and headed towards what in my mind was the mini-goal of the day – climb the Beast in my fastest time to-date. This would be the last time I would climb the Beast and to be honest I was a little glad about that. Hitting the bottom I tripped the lap timer on my Garmin and started to grind my way up (mindful of my power output – see previous, very interesting, blog here). Finally hitting the top I stopped the clock to a time that appeared to be 30 seconds slower than my previous effort a few weeks ago, but with a higher speed and greater average power. I tried harder, hurt more at the end but was slower - something was amiss.

Brushing my pathetic performance aside we headed towards Tai O with the promise of legendary coffee and cheesecake at a little stilted gem of a coffee shop – Solo.

Espresso time!

After a fab siphoned coffee, we started the climb to enlightenment and headed towards the Big Buddha (to be featured in the next Hills of Hong Kong blog entry). The cheesecake sat heavy in the stomach as we climbed and almost proved fatal in slowing us down when we needed to sprint away from a (wild?) dog that jumped out from a side road, teeth bared and started chasing us up the road. The dog was not mountain goat though and was quickly dropped.

The bad feeling amongst the canines continued as we tried to cycle to a good view of the Buddha at the top of the hill. We were surrounded by four or five dogs and every time we edged forward on the bike we were greeted with wild barking and snappy teeth.

Dogs are literally everywhere.... just out of shot

Not wanting to push our luck we headed towards Mui Wo along a storm drain which was significant flatter than the coastal road, free kilometres.  After a quick liquid refuel in Mui Wo we doubled back on ourselves and headed up the Reverse Beast – the, only marginally, easier side of the Beast At the top I left Kelvin to head off for his flight back to the UK and doubled back on myself and took advantage of the free-kilometre-storm-drain back towards Tai O to meet Vicky.

I am probably the first guest that the Tai O Heritage Hotel have had check in in full lycra.

Despite the Beast disappointment I uploaded my ride to Strava here – mercifully I had knocked 30+ seconds off my time for the Beast and moved up to 4^th on the leaderboard. I wouldn’t need to make the ride private after all.

I am currently in Taiwan for through days of riding through the mountains (and my highest every road pass next). Can’t wait (although the weather needs to improve).

Lantau 100

The holiday period over Chinese New Year provided the first real opportunity of the year to head out for a long ride and get a decent number of kilometers in the legs in one hit. Lantau Island would provide some (relatively) quiet roads with a number of challenging climbs. As with most climbs in Hong Kong, what they lack in length they certainly make up for in gradient!

JK and I were joined this time by Pt and Janice who were keen to give themselves a 'wake up call' and to kick start their training (having been focused more on running and other sports recently) - it certainly was always going to be a very challenging day so early in their training (not helped by Janice being under the weather too). Sacha and two friends (Casey and Dave - Dave only having bought his bike four days previously) also joined us for the majority of the ride.

Pt and JK getting ready for the big day...

Following what these days could be considered a lie-in, we all meet at Sunny Bay MTR at 8am to head off on the planned 100km ride (with ~2400m climbing). The first 12km along to Tung Chung was an easy warm-up along the gently rolling flats and a chance to get the blood flowing through the legs before we hit the bottom of The Beast - the most feared (although not the most difficult as it later turned out...) climb on Lantau. We had warned Pt and Janice that it was pretty brutal but I dont think anything can really prepare you for the relentless steepness of the climb - between 13-16% all the way to the top. The Beast will get its own blog entry at some point in the near future...

Taming the Beast... a view from the top

Once at the top I was shortly followed by JK, with Sacha not too much further behind (slightly surprised that he had been so comprehensively schooled 'by a girl'). Casey then followed, but it was a while before Pt, Janice and Dave emerged - shoes in hand and pushing their bikes having been beaten by The Beast.

Sometimes its quicker to walk...

From the top of The Beast we all took the awesome decent down to Lower Cheung Sha beach and then another 10km of rolling terrain towards Shek Pik Reservoir. From Shek Pik we then headed up towards the Big Buddha - 4.5km at an average gradient of 8.5% but with long sections at over 15% - a real grind! It was beginning to get really hot and sunny too. Again I hit the top, shortly followed by JK and then Sacha, with Casey and Dave not too much further back. We waited, and then we waited a little more, but still no Janice or Pt. After weighing up the options we decided to head back down to see if anything had happened only to find Janice and Pt just around the corner with 100 yard stares and shoes in hands again. Janice was really not well!

A painful pilgrimage

I had been keen to try a climb up from Sham Wat that I had never done before, but it was pretty clear that, other than JK, I was alone in that wish. As a compromise everyone except JK and me headed down the decent to Tai O to get a little extra rest. We headed down the narrow decent to Sham Wat.... only to meet around 150 mountain bikers in various stages of delirium weaving wildly up the single track road as they winched themselves up at an achingly slow pace. No idea what was going on, but they were everywhere!

On hitting the bottom, and having seen how steep the decent was, JK and I headed back up the Sham Wat climb knowing it was going to be tough. It was definitely the toughest climb of the day - no wonder only a handful of people have been up and down it! We really had to grind our way up (JK managing to shake off the crazy guy on a Brompton-type bike that seemed hell bent on not being overtaken by a girl).

After pausing for breath we headed down to Tai O, collected the others (asleep on the seafront) and headed through the narrow and winding streets of Tai O to the most amazing coffee shop (name unknown, but not sure I would mention it if I knew), which much to my dismay was shut for the 'holidays' despite there seeming to be some fat gweilos in there... we settled for a place across the street (Melt) and tucked into pies/cheese toasties.

Melt... an aptly named cafe

On trying to leave Tai O we had to battle through Lion Dances and more smelly mountain bikers. At this point Pt and Janice jumped in a cab (sensible given how unwell Janice was at this stage) and Sacha, Casey and Dave said they would be heading back to Tung Chung meaning that JK and I could head off at our own pace - which we did, leaving Sacha (mistakenly) grinding up the climb out of Tai O in his big ring, heading towards Mui Wo.

A money hungry Lion

The ride to Mui Wo was pretty uneventful, tracking our route back to Lower Cheung Sha and then taking in a couple of additional minor climbs along the way. On arriving in Mui Wo and JK getting 'another' sugary drink we bumped into Pt and Janice waiting for a ferry back to Central. After a brief chat we headed back to Lower Cheung Sha beach to meet Vicky for a well deserved late lunch at The Stoep (a pretty hit and miss place in my opinion - for a place that specialises in BBQ meat they seem to cremate most of their menu... - cant argue with the beach side location though).

Vicky and JK eating burnt food

Photos only girls take....?

After inhaling some food, drinking a sizeable amount of sangria and having a snooze under the afternoon sun on the beach we set out again leaving Vicky (to a pretty arduous journey home, involving buses in various directions, taxis and the MTR) and headed back up the 'Reverse' Beast - the slightly friendlier sibling of the first climb of the day. A fast descent down the other side towards Tung Chung and then a final 12km along the flat back to Sunny Bay to break the 100km mark and we were finished for the day. 

A brilliant day and the first real big training ride of the year. Over 100km covered with more than 2400m of climbing in glorious sunshine (but not the too hot and humid Hong Kong weather of the summer). Glad I am not in the UK right now suffering in the snow and cold - Hong Kong is offering the best base miles right now...

The Dark Knight and Ida get a well deserved rest

For those that may be interested the Strava link of the ride is here. JK's slightly more witty blog of the day can be found here.