Originally Posted by
wheezing donkey
Competed in the 4th round of this year's lakeland lanequest series last night at Ulverston. After 75 minutes of the permitted 120, I was collecting my 9th control whilst asrtide the top tube of my bike when the vegetation beside the fingerpost gave away and my front wheel dived into a hidden ditch, This pitched me over the 'bars; I demolished part of the thorn hedge and landed in the bottom of the ditch covered in nettle stings, thistle and thorn scratches with the bike on top of me and some of the hedge on top of the bike. Keswick AC's Angela Brand-Barker was directly behind me; she first rescued the bike then me. I thanked her profusely but did remonstrate that in rescuing the bike she had not valeted it!
In the remaining 45 minutes I managed to punch at another 9 controls - driven on by the stimulation of the nettle stings and embedded thorns in all 4 limbs and nose.
Ian Roberts, Bowland F.R.