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An Everest and a Ben Nevis as cyclist raises over £2,500 for Nepal

Justin Gage racks up over 10,000m of ascent

Cyclist Justin Gage successfully Everested one of his nastier local hills yesterday - then went on to climb the height of Ben Nevis, as one friend put it, "just to make sure".

Accompanied and cheered on by family, friends and well-wishers, Gage rode Winsley Hill, between Bath and Bradford-upon-Avon 91 times, six more than necessary to complete an Everesting — climbing the height of the world's tallest mountain, 8,848m.

Gage has so far raised over £2,500 for the Disasters Emergency Committee to help victims of the Nepal earthquake, smashing his original target of £1,000.


Justin's Strava record of the day

He was rapturously congratulated by friends and followers on Strava. Henry Stevenson posted: "I'm in awe - Everest and then Ben Nevis just to make sure!"

Andy Stewart said: "Brilliantly done! It was great to be there to do the last few. I feel a fraud just doing 11 though! Amazing efforts, by you, Emma and Mya and Arthur.

"So many brilliant quotes you were coming out with too: "it's been easy really" No! 20 hours and 91 reps is "awesome", not "easy", that's just typical Mr Gage underplaying a huge achievement :-)"

The weather wasn't kind to Gage, with intermittent rain and temperatures in the low-to-mid teens.

Over a little more than 20 hours Gage clocked up 234.6km of riding and 10,612m of ascent on the 105m climb. He burned almost 11,000 Calories, the equivalent of 23 Big Macs.

On the Strava record of his epic ride, Gage posted: "A massive, massive thank you to everyone who came and supported me. I really don't think I could have done that without you.

"The number of people who rode with me, stood and cheered and of course sponsored me was truly overwhelming. Thankyou for making a hard task that much more bearable.

"xx J"

Donations are still open via Justin's Just Giving page

John has been writing about bikes and cycling for over 30 years since discovering that people were mug enough to pay him for it rather than expecting him to do an honest day's work.

He was heavily involved in the mountain bike boom of the late 1980s as a racer, team manager and race promoter, and that led to writing for Mountain Biking UK magazine shortly after its inception. He got the gig by phoning up the editor and telling him the magazine was rubbish and he could do better. Rather than telling him to get lost, MBUK editor Tym Manley called John’s bluff and the rest is history.

Since then he has worked on MTB Pro magazine and was editor of Maximum Mountain Bike and Australian Mountain Bike magazines, before switching to the web in 2000 to work for CyclingNews.com. Along with road.cc founder Tony Farrelly, John was on the launch team for BikeRadar.com and subsequently became editor in chief of Future Publishing’s group of cycling magazines and websites, including Cycling Plus, MBUK, What Mountain Bike and Procycling.

John has also written for Cyclist magazine, edited the BikeMagic website and was founding editor of TotalWomensCycling.com before handing over to someone far more representative of the site's main audience.

He joined road.cc in 2013. He lives in Cambridge where the lack of hills is more than made up for by the headwinds.

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OldRidgeback | 9 years ago
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