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Team GB in Pakistan

Saturday, 24 September 2011 00:00 Rob Friel Race Reports & Results

I applied to ride for GB in the Tour of the Himalayas last January with no idea what was involved and got declined. Then Matt Page emailed me at the start of August informing me they were a rider down and did I want to take part and join himself (national and euro 24hour champ), Rikkie Cotter (national 24 hour female champ), Mark Spratt (national vet 24hr champ) and Elite woman Mel Alexander (currently 2nd in the NPS). Yes!

Then I found out where the race was. Pakistan. Fly out to Islamabad on 9/11, tenth anniversary, travel up the Karakoram Highway, through Abbotabad (where Osama got caught) and race in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa region. I must admit Islamabad wasn't on my hitlist of city breaks, and I was slightly concerned about the Taliban. The foreign office website read: "We advise against all travel to specific regions of Pakistan and against all but essential travel to other specific regions of Pakistan." More specifically it advised against Khyber Pakhtunkhwa travel, stating increased risk of militant activity, kidnap, robbery and murder. It advised against travelling on the Karakoram highway. Finally, it advised against all travel to Abbotabad following Osama’s capture.

I was having doubts about the trip, but the organiser of the race emailed me stating it would be alright...

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SXC Round 3 and Ben Nevis, the World Cup and the ortho clinic

Tuesday, 07 June 2011 18:24 Rob Friel Race Reports & Results

Record timing between posts this is but its amazing what you find time to do when you have two broken wrists.

Well in chronological order since the last post....

SXC, Edinburgh 48 and Ten under the Ben.

Saturday, 28 May 2011 12:45 Rob Friel Race Reports & Results

Eh up from Glasgow.

Well here's another race report from up North. We had a horrible cycling winter. Training was a bit hit and miss, included a bit of skiing down steps in the park, up at Aviemore and Fort Bill, some snowboarding and a lot of messing about at trail centres. In fact - one of the most fun days out at Glentress I've had with bluebird skies and deep snow. No long road rides really. Anyway - I got some turbo sessions in and started racing in March anyway.

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Scotland, SXC, Squad ae boys and the Crow Down.

Monday, 27 September 2010 16:40 Rob Friel Race Reports & Results

Race Season 2010

The latest race update ever - This year has been a bit different - I moved up to Glasgow in December and have had a hectic year since. I was worried Glasgow was going to live up to its reputation of a big city with a small heart. Luckily this was proved false. It is in fact a big city with a big liver.

Didn't really get to train too much this winter. It was -16 degrees up here, the clyde froze over and I was doing a few turbo sessions in an underground car park with a wooly hat on and no cycling friends. I suffered early season.

My season was based around the SXC, selected NPS races, the national champs, a premiere calendar road race and selected other road races. I had a lot of mechanicals this year.

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Mountain Mayhem 2010 Results

Monday, 21 June 2010 07:54 administrator Race Reports & Results

While I was enjoying a dry dusty uplift day at Hopton this weekend team "Not the Committee" and a few others were once again lapping around a field at Eastnor Castle for 24 hours non-stop. Medium Steve stepped in as a last minute replacement for Shakey and the lads finished a very respectable 7th in the Veteran class; doing 24 laps. Complete lap times for the all important "who beat who" banter are below:

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