Posted Aug 17th 2007, 1:59pm

TRANS ROCKIES BLOG - Stage 5 update

UPDATE

(Also titled 'Who have West Ham signed?')

Chris's Blog ..

So I get to post my story of Stage 5 before the earlier ones as Bill's blackberry (a font of information about City finances but not the important stuff like the football scores or whether West Ham have signed any more players) is the single source of contact we still have with the outside world.

Bill is disappointed in my mechanical failure that lost us a lot of time but as you will see from my blog from yesterdays stage (when it finally leaves my blackberry) I will be happy if we manage to cross the Rockies at all - we still have 2 days, about 180km and about 4000metres of climbing and descending to get through.

I want us to have a couple of strong days to finish with, but a decent position is now beyond us.

Dick and Dan

We haven't told you about Dick and Dan. English lads we had never met prior to the coach ride here when they were among the other riders laughing at our inexperience - I think we would now trust our lives to them - which with 4000 metres down rocky single-track and our ameteur status, I hope we don't have to put to the test!

They are mountain bikers - eager to help and advise and when I broke down they didn't think twice about stopping for half-an-hour to help. We have a bond between the four of us and today we spent much of the Stage sweating through it together.

They are like a married couple - moaning to and about each other. We foolishly tried to compete with them over the first few days but we are learning far more by as they say 'if you can't beat them, join them'.