Ordinarily with a cycling event I’ll turn up the night before, camp, do the ride, camp again, and get the train home the next morning. This was the draft plan for 2025’s Brother Big ‘Un ride in Kent, but events conspired and I just didn’t finish and get home from work until around 7.30 pm the night before. The good news was that I’d been lent an electric van to go with, so my thinking was I’d just drive in the morning and do the ride. This is a post about what I learned and observed in so doing.
Tag Archives: gravelbike
What I learned and observed riding the 2025 ‘Surly 100’ in the Cotswolds
The Cotswolds is not a part of the land I’d much cycled in. Pasting in from Wikipedia, the name means literally “sheep enclosure in rolling hillsides.” It’s a great off-road cycling location that an experienced route-setter like Graham Foot knew how to get the best out of with this year’s Surly 100, a two-day ride that takes one out of town straight in to the hills, but on wisely-chosen trails that, while tough, are definitely rideable. I’ve written up what I’ve learned and observed over these two days and hope they’re helpful. A big thank you to Graham, and the wider team who made this event well worth the train trip.
Four learnings and observations from riding the 137 km Stone Circle Gravel ‘Rebel’ route with no bibs and arguably the wrong bike
Having put up my tent in the grounds of Old Sarum fort at gone 2130 hours, I was dipping in to my bag to prepare my clothes for the ride the next morning, and laughed bitterly. My neighbour asked me if something was wrong, so I gave the news; I’d left my bibs on my bed and would have to ride with the pants and shorts I was wearing. ‘The adventure starts here,’ they reassured me, clearly finding this very funny.
This is a short blog post about what I learned and saw at this amazing event which went down on Saturday 28 June 2025. Hopefully you learn something from it yourself and avoid a mistake – or at least get some amusement from it like my very gracious neighbour did!
Calum On Wheels 