Nathan Evington

Nathan Evington
28/02/77 - 03/11/07

About Nathan


Nathan, was a big chap in more ways than one. He was always to be found at the centre of the action, telling it exactly as it was – loudly!

In fact, Nathan was in such a hurry to make his impact on the world, he arrived on a cold February morning 8 weeks early. He was so premature that he spent his first month in hospital, and at the time was one of the youngest babies in Hedon Road hospital to survive!

Cycling played a huge part in Nathan’s life. He loved the film American Flyers and watched it many times. In it, there is a scene where the main character does the "torture test" which involved running on a treadmill for as long as possible before ending the test by hitting the "chicken" switch. After Nathan’s diagnosis of cardiomyopathy in 2004, he was actually quite excited to discover that he would be required to do his own "torture test" and spent a good deal of time psyching himself up for a good performance. In fact, he was so determined that it was ultimately the doctor, his Mum and the technician who had to drag him off, as Nathan refused to give in himself.

Cycling also revealed Nathan’s talent for remembering facts and figures. He was our very own walking cycling encyclopaedia. He loved to test his friends and show off his knowledge, and he was always the person you would want on your pub quiz team.

Nathan was determined to live life to the full, and unbeknown to his Mum he began playing in a football team a few years ago. The cat was out of the bag when a new football trophy took pride of place on the mantelpiece one evening. Nathan was very proud of himself and his team-mates, although I am reliably informed that Nathan was valued more for his enthusiastic participation, rather than his football talents – which led to his shots on goal just missing the target – 100% of the time!

Nathan was the life and soul of any party and loved to dance. He would always take to the dance floor first, and was quite happy to dance alone. However, his infectious enthusiasm always encouraged others to join him.

Nathan was a kind man, and always generous to a fault – on the benefit of his Mum and brother. He had a very special sense of humour – one he shared with his brother – and left his mark on everyone he met.


Sunday, 6 July 2008

A lesson on pace...

On reflection, here's how last weekend went. I cracked 2/3rds of the way up the climbs, I was broken 2/3rds of the way round and we covered less than 2/3rds of the distance we have to in the alps... I figured I needed to try pacing myself a bit better! I also figured that it was probably time to try and work out how to translate braining myself for 80 miles into making it to the finish, whatever the speed, over 130miles...

Friday I had a bit of a warm up - 42 miles home from work the long route on an unseasonably good day in Aberdeen. Ave 18.4. Not a bad start to the weekend...

Today I decided I needed to go for a long one, so I plotted a hilly 110miler, with 2800m of climbing according to memory map (600m more than my previous max, and more than twice what was done in Hull last weekend...). The weather was pretty much as good as it could have been today, light northerly winds, and low cloud keeping the temp around 16degC. Given the distance I decided I'd better ease off on the pace, and duly engaged the 25 sprocket at the bottom of just about every climb. What a difference!

With 90 miles done I'd reached the top of the last big climb of the day and still had a bit left in the legs. Normally I'm weeping at that stage! So, head down for the last 20, I managed to haul the average speed up to a fairly respectable 17.1mph. So, that's 85% of the distance we do in France, without cracking - I even mustered up a sprint for the Aberdeen sign and broke 30 on the flat (just!). (I know, the other Col's probably thinking that barely counts as a sprint but trust me, for me breaking 30 in a sprint is like TG having a bad hair day, or Haley's comet passing...) All I need to do now is be able to double the amount of climbing and double the temperature and add another 20miles and I'm sorted! The Alps should be a walk in the park...

Route profile below for anyone interested.


I see we've had another flurry of sponsorship! Many thanks to all the generous donors. It's a good incentive having all your hard earned donations to live up to! With the offline donations as well there's just £500 left to go before we beat our target.

Cheerio,

Col.
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2 comments:

Damian said...

Well done, good effort. You're right about pacing yourself though, if we blast up the first one we'll seriously regret it come the second one and God knows how we'd make the final climb!

6 July 2008 at 16:12
Anonymous said...

Hey Col

Glad to hear that you're doing well. It all sounds amazing! I must shamedly admit that I've done that little cycling that I'm now giving my bike to Elmeria to make better use of it. So, to make me feel better about it, I'll get her to buy it of me and add the money to your total. Good luck with all the training. Is Simpson Junior on a bike yet?

Take care

W, K and L

8 July 2008 at 12:34

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