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Sunday, August 28, 2011

Eleven Plus Questions

I was out on my bike for four hours today – cycling through woods along the Darnley Trail and then through a few towns before joining the National Cycle Track which runs beside the River Thames.

At one point on the Darnley Trail I found myself at the bottom of a remarkably steep hill. I dropped down through the gears – all seventeen of them – until I was pedalling rather slowly. Should I have got off and walked or kept up the pretence of being a cyclist? Just at this moment two young men passed me without acknowledgement on either side. Five more in the party then swept by. They all had that familiar steak of mud up their backs showing that they were real men who went straight through puddles and dips in the path.

I came rather slowly round the corner and there they were – their bikes lined up neatly against a fence – three of them on their backs, two drinking from their water bottles and two peering at a map. It seems that the steep hill had done for them!

Eleven Plus Question Number 1

If a cyclist is passed by seven mountain bikers should the cyclist get off and push - or pant slowly onwards?

Eleven Plus Question Number 2

How far would an average cyclist ride in four hours, without walking, but on a range of terrains?

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