SPORTING spectacular, charity fundraiser, community event…
Descriptions for the Magna Mazda British Pedal Car Grand Prix are almost endless.
But a single word lodges itself deeper into my consciousness with every stiff-legged step from the kettle to the computer.
Exhausting.
Thirty seconds into my first stint behind the wheel of Cliff Polton’s gleaming car number 26, the canyon-sized flaw in my traning programme becomes apparent: gentle rides through the New Forest and Purbeck hills at a pace suited to nature study are useless as preparation for flat-out racing.
A blood-and-guts run from an adrenalin-fuelled pit-lane changeover sees my career as a pedal car racer begin with a couple of easy places made in the Magna Mazda hairpin (or the Market Place as it is know to the uninitiated).
But as I exit the tight turn and straighten the car, I am struck by an inconvenient truth: Ringwood’s High Street is built on a hill.
Imperceptible to the naked eye, but inescapable from behind the wheel of a pedal car, the minute gradient of this narrow commercial thoroughfare now feels like the Col du Galibier.
My legs are on fire as I bank sharp left at the Naughty Corner, and my heart thumps at my breastbone with the speed and urgency of a hungry woodpecker.
Luckily for me, the demands of my body are overruled by the gallons of adrenaline crashing against my fizzing brain like the sea at Old Harry Rock.
I find myself suddenly affronted by every car with the temerity to occupy the road ahead me, and attack them with a recklessness that would shame the joyriding yobs in Police, Camera, Action.
In my defence, I am only trying to match the efforts of my teammates.
Richard Polton opens our bid for victory with a lung-busting, four-lap stint, accomplished at what appears to be an average speed of about 40mph.
Richard’s sterling effort is almost matched by his father, Cliff, who takes the second turn in car 26.
Gone is the genial committee member who has patiently fielded my endless questions for the last six weeks, and whose good-natured cries of “Lovely evening” have calmed horse rider and dog walker alike on our training rides across the New Forest.
The Cliff Polton who flashes past our pit position in a blur of red, black, and gold is a man whose additional years have clearly been spent fashioning a will to win that makes Ricky Hatton’s look half-hearted.
Graham Morse is next in the car, his school-masterly salutes to his amazed and excited pupils in the crowd barely slowing him as he rattles in one three-lap stint after another.
Robin Shelley provides sterling service as “pusher”, hauling me from the car after an exhausting stint and dumping me in the gutter, before guiding my replacement into the hot seat and steering him back into battle in a single movement. If you thought Ferrari’s F1 pit crew was slick, you should watch Robin on a Ringwood race day.
Once the chequered flag has dropped, normal service is resumed. Some of the nicest people I have met during my time in this job go back to being…well, nice.
Oliver Pilley adds a fourth junior title to his impeccable pedal car CV, receiving his trophy with a been-here-before half-smile.
Steph Mills skips past me excitedly clutching her award for the winning ladies team, cheerily adding that her victory might make an additional item for my report.
Howard Cox, Ringwood Carnival organiser and pedaller with the Lavery Flyers, is showing off a trophy made from pieces of a pedal car which came to grief while under his control at a race last year in New Milton.
Bird on a Wing, Het Nicholson, and her father, committee member, Peter, reflect on what might have been, and look ahead to the next time the pedal car circus rolls into town.
And Jim Stride, a man beneath whose tireless efforts to promote the race the Daily Echo’s email server has staggered, stands with a contented smile, one arm each around daughters Katie and Hannah from the Pink Panthers team, every inch the proud dad.
TWO days left before two hours of pain on the streets of Ringwood.
Three training rides with Cliff Polton and his loyal band of pedal car enthusiasts, and a couple of solo sorties across the Purbeck hills now seem scant preparation for Sunday’s trial of strength.
My brief spin in car number 26 for a Daily Echo video report now seems a very long time ago, and I spend idle moments searching my memory for any face-saving data gained from that brief, first impression.
Sleep is broken by turbulent dreams in which I am unable to evacuate the car in mid-race changeovers, and find myself doomed to another 30 laps or so of the Ringwood town centre circuit.
Some comfort has been gained in two on-air chats with Wave 105’s Andy Jackson, who blithely confessed to having done no training whatsoever.
But his cheery admonition "We’ll have you" may hint at a deeper level of preparation than that to which he will admit on air.
In stark contrast to the physical preparation of its media participants, organisation of the race continues with military precision.
A concourse d’elegance will be held under the jubilee lamp in the town’s Market Place at 10.45am tomorrow (Saturday 12).
This beauty pageant for pedal cars has a serious function. Awards for appearance translate into grid placings, with the best-looking machines lining up ahead of less-attractive designs on race day.
Race director, Cliff Polton, and committee member for press, Paul Allis, have decided upon an F1-style pre-race press conference on Sunday.
The purpose of the media briefing is to free Cliff from the insatiable demands of the press in the last precious hours before he relinquishes the duties of race director and assumes those of four-wheeled gladiator.
Race organiser, Jim Stride, has made a call for volunteers to help prepare the circuit on Sunday morning. Hardy souls should meet in the Market Place at 8am.
New recruits, or those eager to add to their early-morning efforts, will be needed at 5pm to remove barriers and allow Ringwood to resume its function as a bustling market town. A "debrief" in one of Ringwood’s excellent pubs will follow.
Marshals are needed for crowd control and to help extricate the occasional stricken competitor from the wreckage of their pedal-powered contrivance when things go horribly wrong. Volunteers should report to the Furlong Centre at 11.30am for a briefing from race day chief, Steve Fowler.
Anyone enchanted by this year’s event and keen to help out with future races, can contact Cliff Polton on 01425 620062.
CLIFF Polton’s Tuesday night training rides are beginning to take on the aspect of a Tour de France peleton, with more riders turning up every week.
Valuable information on one’s rivals can be gained from these innocuous evening jaunts across the New Forest.
With 11 days to go until the race, there may still be time to lobby for a handicap to be placed on the junior teams.
Ben Lloyd will be leading the Barton Pups, a team of adventure scouts, and if his turn of speed on four wheels is even remotely similar to his pace on two, the race is already won.
His main rival from our training group is Ollie Pilley, the leader of the Crazy Frog team, and three-times junior champion.
Our training group splits into two almost as soon as we leave the Royce Engineering unit on New Milton’s Stem Lane industrial estate and head for the New Forest.
The situation doesn’t change greatly throughout the evening, with Ben leading the juniors, and a second group following behind.
Tim Lloyd, the leader of the Barton Moments team and Ben’s father, is one of a wheezing bunch that includes your reporter, struggling to keep up with his speedy son.
A huge banner to be hung across Ringwood High Street is proudly unfurled at the start of the evening by race organiser, Jim Stride.
The 15-foot banner has been sourced from Ringwood’s Multisigns and is only the latest of Jim’s many successes in his tireless battle to promote the race.
An identical banner will be displayed at the roundabout for Ringwood’s Furlong car park as the race committee goes all out in its bid to maximise publicity.
Another massive boost to the charities backed by the race has come from supermarket giant, Waitrose. A substantial donation has been made by the company’s branch in Ringwood’s Furlong centre.
The fundraising total has now passed the £12,000 barrier, with sponsorship for the official race programme now sold out.
The glossy 64-page guide goes on sale in Ringwood shops on Saturday priced £1.00, with sales increasing the amount raised for the race charities.
The Wave 105 team has drafted in the host of the station’s breakfast show, Steve Power, to join teatime presenter Andy Jackson and his crew in their bid for the top step of the podium.
I’m due to call in to Andy’s show on Friday July 4 to find out how training has been going for our media rivals and to give listeners some breaking stories in the build up to the race.
FOLLOWING in the footsteps of Clarke, Senna, and Schumacher, I decide to walk the circuit ahead of the grand prix.
But it is not the fastest line into Monaco’s Casino Square that is occupying my thoughts. Nor am I staring the length of Silverstone’s Hangar Straight with an eye to the best entry into Stowe corner.
Ringwood may lack the glamour of the Cote D’Azure, or the racing heritage of the famed Northamptonshire airfield, but for me has taken on the daunting aspect of the world’s best-known theatres of four-wheeled combat.
My guide around the town’s narrow streets is Cliff Polton, race director of the British Pedal Car Grand Prix, and one of the circuit’s designers.
The lap gets off to a bumpy start outside Finn’s at Ringwood, before heading around the Jubilee Lamp island at into the Magna Mazda Hairpin. This section of the race will be "absolute mayhem" on race day, Cliff assures me, with evident and unnerving glee.
The High Street will be renamed for the event; divided between the Daily Echo Straight and the Pampered Pets Mile. Barriers will line the thoroughfare on July 13, says Cliff, holding back the 10,000 spectators expected in the town on July 13.
A sharp left-hand bend at the Naughty Corner gift shop will take the competitors along the Zizzi Straight – named in honour of the Italian restaurant on Southampton Road.
Another sharp, left turn and the pedallers enter Meeting House Lane via the Ellis Jones Corner and the tricky Wave 105 Hairpin.
"Burly marshals" will police the Arcade Flowers chicane, Cliff promises. Hay bales will reduce the width of the road by half in a bid to protect spectators crossing the road in front to the Tourist Information Centre.
Anyone gripped by the spirit of Senna and tempted to make a move through the chicane will be penalised one lap, warns the race director.
The Waitrose Hairpin leads to the fastest section of the circuit as cars plunge down the narrowest section of Meeting House Lane, and back into the Market Place.
Race organiser, James Stride, meets us beneath the Jubilee Lamp with glowing reports of the progress made by his colleagues on the committee.
Nearly £11,000 has been raised already from programme sponsorship, putting the organisers ahead of the £10,000 target for the Tenovus cancer charity and Lymington’s Oakhaven hospice.
The programme is due to hit the streets of Ringwood on July 5, with many local shops signed up as vendors.
PREPARATION for two hours of pedal-powered madness around the streets of Ringwood is progressing well with just four weeks left until the British Pedal Car Grand Prix.
A further visit to the New Milton headquarters of race director, Cliff Polton, last Tuesday (June 10) was followed by a mountain bike ride through the glorious scenery of the New Forest.
Cliff’s familiarity with the forest is almost as impressive as his knowledge of the intricacies of bearing mechanisms.
Oliver Pilley, leader of the Crazy Frog pedal car team and three times a winner of the junior race, accompanied us on the ride and showed a worrying turn of speed through the tight woodland trails.
A ride of about 13 miles through Ossemsley, Brockenhurst, and Hinchelsea ended back at New Milton in the comfortable surroundings of the Rising Sun, where a healthy draft of orange juice and lemonade completed a productive evening.
The weekend brought a stiffer challenge with a visit to a mountain bike trail centre in Afan Forest Park, South Wales.
Over 100km of trails in the valley have proved enormously popular with the UK’s mountain biking fraternity, attracting thousands of visitors every year.
My day began on White’s Level, a 15km route of rocky single-track trails, which zig-zag their way 400 metres up the side of a mountain.
My arrival at the summit left my legs burning with lactic acid, my lungs working like a pair of industrial bellows, and my heart attempting escape through my breastbone.
Further threat of cardiac arrest was presented by the descent, an upsurge in adrenaline replacing exertion as the principle cause of the strain on my aorta.
A narrow ribbon of trail, barely wider than my handlebars in places, hurled me around banked, hairpin bends, over giant stone drop-offs, and through bone-shaking "rock gardens" at light speed.
Two of the centre’s four world class trails ridden back-to-back delivered me back at the wonderful Skyline café ready to consume their entire menu.
With four weeks to go until the race, I’m hoping to put in some miles on the road bike in a vain attempt to build some stamina and avoid humiliation in front of an estimated 10,000 people on July 13.
MY legs are stretched before me in the classic feet-on-taps stance adopted by many in their pursuit of bath-time opulence.
But this is not a report from that longed-for assignment at a country hotel dedicated to the pampering of overworked hacks.
The purpose of my recumbent position is not to better enjoy the soothing balm of scented soap and warm water.
It is to squeeze my already diminutive frame into an aluminium cockpit raised only inches from the ground by a wheel at each corner.
As I hurtle around the forecourt of an industrial unit in New Milton at speeds approaching 25mph, relaxation could not be further from my mind.
Welcome to the world of Cliff Polton, manufacturer of bespoke components to the stars of professional cycling and the race director of the British Pedal Car Grand Prix.
Seven of the magnificent machines rolling off the Market Place grid in Ringwood on July 13 have been made by this genial and engaging engineer.
His confident smile as I approach the doorway to his factory at speeds just under mach three, should be reassuring. If he’s not worried, then why am I?
In a moment of sheer insanity, I have volunteered to uphold the honour of the Daily Echo and join Cliff’s team for two hours of blood-and-guts racing on the streets of Ringwood in just six weeks time.
Wave 105 have entered a team, and the Daily Echo has joined Magna Mazda in backing the race to raise cash for cancer charity, Tenovus, and Lymington’s Oakhaven Trust.
Team Royce (Cliff’s company) is led by the man himself, and includes sons Richard, Gerald and Jeffrey. It’s something of a family affair, and so the honour of the newspaper isn’t all that’s at stake.
And when it comes to working with pedal-pushing outsiders, I find myself in the illustrious company of Cliff’s clients, Chris Boardman and Nicole Cooke.
To the uninitiated, Boardman took gold at the 1992 Olympics with victory in the 4km pursuit. And Cooke is a two-time winner of the women’s Tour de France. Did someone say "pressure"?
All said, it’s a good job its such brilliant fun. I am grinning like a six-year-old, and blithely ignoring the warnings of my legs not to have "just one more go".
With a month-and-a-half between me and the race, I’m determined to give it my best shot. And with petrol prices rising in steady proportion with my belt line, there probably isn’t a better time to get serious about cycling.
You can follow my progress on these pages and those of the newspaper. Any hints, tips, or methods for avoiding heart failure, would be greatly appreciated.
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