Ride Four — The One with My Daughter

The first three rides of this challenge were mine. This one wasn’t.

Ride four of the Cycle the Month Challenge for Prostate Cancer UK was 12.84km in 57 minutes, which makes it comfortably the shortest and the slowest ride of the month so far. Ride three covered more than twice the distance in not much more time.

I don’t care even slightly. My daughter came with me, and that changed what the ride was for.

Riding at Her Pace

There’s a version of this challenge where every ride is a solo effort against the clock, and the numbers get a little better each week. That version would have told me to go out on my own and knock out another thirty kilometres.

Instead we set off together and just rode. No pace to hold, no average to protect, no glancing down at the computer to see whether I was ahead of where I was last time. We talked the whole way round — the sort of rambling, unstructured conversation you only get when you’re side by side, moving, with nowhere in particular to be and no screens between you.

You cover a lot less ground at that speed. You also actually hear each other, which turns out to be the better trade.

The Bit Where We Stopped

About halfway we pulled over, got off the bikes, and stopped.

Not to fix anything or check the route. Just to stand there while the sun went down over the fields and listen to the birds. Neither of us said much for a few minutes, and it was one of those small, unremarkable moments that you know even at the time you’re going to keep.

Three rides in I’d been writing about how this challenge gets you outside at the right time of day. This was the first one where I properly stopped and stayed in it, and I only did that because she was there.

“Why Are You Doing It?”

Standing there, she asked me why I was doing the challenge.

Not in a polite, making-conversation way — she actually wanted to know why her dad had decided to spend a month getting on a bike every day and asking people for money. So I told her. About Prostate Cancer UK, about what the money funds, about how many men it affects and how many families end up somewhere in the middle of it.

It’s a strange thing to explain a fundraiser to your child at the side of a road at sunset. You find yourself saying it plainly, without any of the language you’d use on a donation page, because plain is the only version that’s any use. And saying it plainly is a decent test of whether you meant it in the first place.

I think I gave a reasonable answer. She certainly asked good questions.

Four Rides In

The challenge has already given me the tired ride, the functional ride and the beautiful ride. This was a different thing again — the one where the bike was just the excuse and the point was the person next to me.

Every kilometre this month, fast or slow, is raising money for Prostate Cancer UK — funding research, raising awareness and supporting men and families dealing with a disease that affects far too many people. These 12.84 were the slowest of the lot and they count exactly the same.

Four rides down. And a co-pilot for the next one, I hope.