My average speed when I did the Bogle in 2002 was higher than this year’s. I was in better shape that time, cycling to work most days, and the course was different. On the other hand it was pissing down the whole time. If the weather this weekend had been even half as bad as in 2002- hell, if it had rained at all- I don’t think I’d have completed the first loop let alone all three.

I say it every year, but I should get in training for next year’s Bogle so I can do it quicker and maybe even get in a fourth time around. (And persuade the organisers not to send me along Oldham Road. Eternity cycling along Oldham Road was becoming my definition of hell.)