Supporting the JOGLE in May 2010

Supporting the JOGLE

Reflecting on some learning, May 2010.

On the 2^nd May 2010, my son Siôn began a 874 mile bicycle ride from John O’Groats (JOG) to Land’s End (Penn An Wlas) (LE). This was completed in 9 days in the company of five other men. That he did it at all gave me the opportunity to participate as one of the support crew. It is the experience of support crew member which has caused this reflection on learning, and led to the writing of this record of it.

Siôn, I think, was the last man to join the cycling mob. At 24 years, he is the youngest. The idea began with Dave Sandford and Stu Morris, with their respective partners, Sarah Dalton and H (Hayley) Mowbray, and later Gareth Davies and Ian (Shay or Chez?) Chapman joined. Here was a group of men with connection through Cheltenham and neighbouring communities, who, on reaching the 30 years of age milestone, wanted to mark its passing in a way that involved a personal and physical challenge. Thus the JOGLE. Or as the website’s name morphed into ordinary speech: the 9dayjogle (dot co dot uk). Their own version of the Hero’s Journey without Ridley Scott and attendant camera. The original list of potential participants was longer back in November / December, but some could not take part for the usual set of reasons. And others were able to join. Paul Home’s name came into the frame relatively early – the connector being Gareth – the group’s maven (see “The Tipping Point”, M Gladwell). He is also my nephew, and thus Siôn’s cousin, and my sister Elinor’s son. Which is how Siôn got involved. People like being around Gareth. He’s a lovely, cheerful, passionate, laughing and serious man, and people like to have him in their group. He does not seem to go out of his way to make connection with others, but people connect with him. Maybe this is because he usually has a song title or a fragment of lyric ready to link aptly with the occasion or the idea.

As the JOGLE idea developed into: dates; an overall route; daily routes; names of cyclists fixed into a list; same for the support crew; a list of BnBs and so on, each step solidified the plan a little more until it became reality in people’s diaries and planning and life. Dave’s partner, Sarah was ready to drive, and follow, so too H, Stu’s girlfriend, and Frankie (Francesca, no Italian connection, just a familial delight in Italian names.), Ian’s fiancée,  had also declared her hand. Me too. Essentially these were the characters in the group. Others played parts at different times: Siôn’s mother, my wife, Vicki Fletcher, and Elinor and Chris Davies, Gareth’s parents came to John O’Groats for the off. We all travelled up on the 1^st May. Not quite: Vicki, Siôn and I drove to Manchester on the 30^th April (Friday before a Bank Holiday, ugh) to stay with Gareth, who was at work that evening. During the evening, Dave and Sarah arrived from Romford. Next morning, Paul joined Dave and Sarah, while Gareth put his bike on the back of the whale (what we call our Toyota Carina) and joined us. Late lunch in Inverness! Of course, in order to do a JOGLE you have to get to JOG to begin. That Saturday evening we had a meal for eleven at the hotel in JOG. A happy and anticipatory occasion, lightened by daylight being at least 45 minutes longer than in Hampshire 800 miles to the south, the day before.

Already this notion of “support” is more complicated than I had envisaged at the beginning. Elinor and Chris followed the cyclists’ endeavours on the first two days of the JOGLE. Staying at the Black Isle BnB and Aberfeldy. They turned up again – with cake and boiled eggs – at Bridgwater, Somerset for a Saturday evening takeaway supper at the excellent Admiral Blake Guest house. And other parents, relations and friends turned up to share meals and hear about the day’s triumphs and disappointments, in Clifton (nr Penrith), Hereford and Bridgwater. Also a chance to catch up on the story so far as well as the election and its aftermath. 

Because of the call of other duties, Vicki and I came back to Winchester after the send off on the 2^nd May. It was the evening of the 5^th May that I entered the support role fully, joining everyone at the BnB in Clifton. By which time four days of cycling and support had happened as well as all of the Scots cycling routes. The group was already a little unit, properly using the experiences so far to look forward to the next days’ cycling and support work, and beyond.

Sarah, H and Frankie had worked out a certain routine to their days by then: wave the lads goodbye; take photos of newly rested men back in hi-viz; into the BnB for their own breakfast (cooked if offered – it usually was); make the lunch – mostly sandwiches but with goodly amounts of protein in the filling; pay the BnB bill; pack up the vehicles, and go; overtake the peloton (from the French, meaning little ball), and where possible stop to take a snap or two; find a spot about two thirds of the days’ planned distance and set up lunch – preferably with a nice downhill for an easy after lunch start; wait for the riders; when they arrive, feed them and listen to the stories, wonder where the tail ender might be; use the iPhone to determine how long to stay at the stop, Google meanings of words and news sites; see the riders off on their afternoon leg; drive to the next destination BnB and set up shop there with baggage and bike necessities. I imagined it was a bit like running a supply chain for a small armed group in a war.  All I had to do was to fall in to Sarah, H and Frankie’s arrangements and routines, and not push anyone out of the way!

Of course, one of the critical member-of-support-group functions is rescue. Rescue the enpunctured or chain-offed. There was call for this, but very little, considering. And almost all of which happened to Siôn. On two occasions we had to get the bike rack on to complete a few miles. And there was some to-ing and fro-ing to a bike shop in Preston for parts.

What did I learn or re-learn?

That the being alongside is the important part of supporting. (A re-learning is what I’d call this for me. Much of my work is about being alongside.)  Just the presence of the people supporting the endeavour is of itself reassuring, and a comfort. There is also the notion of knowing about the day’s landscape and weather for oneself that you can later share more authentically with the cyclists who have been out in the wind or rain (very little of this, by the way) and pushing themselves up the hills. I was there at the beginning, there for the second half, and witness to the completion; and this is another aspect of being alongside – the long term part of it.  In Land’s End we were able to say to passers-by that “I’m part of the group, and it is these 6 who have cycled the whole way …” 

And each of us who supported will have our own memories of associated with Caithness, the Cairngorms, Stirling, the Lake District, Lancaster, Preston, Warrington, Hereford, the A49, Somerset Levels and a host of others.

Taking time to travel a long way over a fairly long time, means you get to experience much more than the inside of your car, and the tunes your in-car sound system provides. The relatively slower journey means the delights of non-motorway travel. Even so, the cyclists when on the road, are travelling at about 20 miles an hour, so it is not an idyll, but it does mean a more embodied experience – eg getting out of the vehicle to take a photo also includes sniffing the air, avoiding the puddles, seeing the wildflowers in the woods and hedgerows, clocking the urban or rural industries at work, and so on.

There is also witnessing the way the group functions as a group. According to Tuckman’s taxonomy then by the time I began my support role in earnest, on the 5^th May, the group had already done its forming and storming (maybe the latter on the long hills in Scotland) and norming (struggling together through the traffic of Stirling), so it seemed to me as if this group was performing. My joining probably meant greater effects on the support crew and some re-forming took place there to allow me in. It was a reminder to me how quickly a group or crew can come together to be effective. There was a common cause, of course, and the lifetime of the project limited, nevertheless this group shared its enjoyment of its task, and took care to be sure that everyone was getting something from the process. The focus was obviously on the cyclists, and their needs were uppermost, but support crew were valued and made to be part of the whole adventure even though we were not pushing pedals. By travelling away down south on the 2^nd, I probably missed the forming part of the process, though I think much forming had been done by email and establishing commitment to the venture in the winter time. Dave had been careful to get assurances from participants to being signed up, and on that basis booked ahead the BnBs and gave deposits, and called for deposit payments to be made to him. A good process. On that basis, and on the basis of the route Dave had devised, Stu had constructed a series of small cards – one for each day – showing the route on a map, as well as the Google based descriptions on the reverse. One set for each person. Brilliant. The business of the JOGLE was not the 9 days it took to ride and follow, it was also some assiduous preparation in detail.

It was a pleasure and a luxury to be with a group of people a whole generation younger than me. When we were talking together in the evenings during our shared meals, I sometimes found I had no idea what was being talked about. It wasn’t a case of mishearing (or not being able to hear) but rather a different frame of reference. How invigorating: to be socially lost in one’s 60’s! This led me to think: here is the next generation. Reminding me of Allen Ginsberg in the Bob Dylan biopic “No Direction Home” saying that he remembered weeping when he first heard Dylan’s Masters of War realising that the mantle had passed from his generation to another!

Finally, luck. It would have been a different set of challenges had it been raining the whole time rather than dry and cold. As luck would have it, rain did not challenge this lot very much. About 2 hours worth on the whole event. That is what I call lucky. In my experience it is just as likely to be wet for 9 days as it is to be dry, even if it is early May. But you have to work for your luck, and this lot did.