Hill no 26 - 32 Riber, Matlock

Riber was my last ride of our Derbyshire trip. The car was packed full of our stuff, the dog was in the back (thankful to be leaving the small, but perfectly formed Thimble Cottage). Only one hill remained and somewhat ominously it was Simon Warren's "favourite" hill.

I scooted down Bank Rd (you can see from the link here:  http://connect.garmin.com/activity/85930670 how easy it is going down compared to going up), over a couple of roundabouts and saw Riber Castle towering over me ahead. A turn right and it was a quick wait for Emily to catch up with me, a reset of the video camera and off I went.

The first bit of the climb isn't "that" impressive, you are just climbing up through a little residential area, the blood gets flowing and the heart pumping. But to continue the climb you have to turn off onto Riber Rd and virtually straight away things get "interesting".

The real killer of this climb is the corners. They really ramp up steeply - I normally like this, because being a big kid at heart, there is something about going round corners - it just FEELS as though you're going faster than you really are. So I see these big steep corners, get out of the seat and pound for 5 secs just to try and get up enough speed to carry you round, up through the steeper gradients.

Generally this tactic works, but there is a happy medium here - basically, if the hill is too steep and you are standing on your pedals, your bum isn't putting weight on the back wheel and especially if its wet, the wheel can "slip" on the road. Of course, if the road is too steep and you don't stand, the front wheel can come off the ground in a wheely.

Here, I was slipping around and had to be very careful not to try and put too much power through the pedals  (but enough not to make me fall off!). Em said that she struggled getting the fully laden car up in first gear some of the time, so it wasn't just me being a wimp.

Beautiful at the top - but we were sad that we couldn't go to Riber Castle and have a look around. A quick stretch of Hobbs' legs and we headed for London - a fairly succesful weekend all in.

Video here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rLv03QuNgeQ&feature=related
Garmin data here: http://connect.garmin.com/activity/85930660
Flickr here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/100hillsforgeorge/sets/72157626991893346/