Eight Wheelers ran (or walked) 5k pre Christmas and then 11 completed (pr part-completed) the mammoth Rapha 500 over the Christmas week – where at times the ho ho ho stood for how honestly horrible.
Easy guess for who did the most distance on the Rapha 500 challenge, James Little. Michael Sleeman was close behind, having completed the 500 all outdoors (before then getting a 20% uplift for each outdoor km and also adding in a half marathon over Salisbury Plain). Those who notified me of the distances were uplifted for the outdoor efforts. I merely went with Strava (if I could access it) for the others. 7 Wheelers fulfilling the target 500k is impressive.
In the 5k run, Michael chose to run a 5k solo around the streets of Warminster and broke 18 minutes. He then decided that he might be able to go faster if in a race so knocked off another 10 seconds at a parkrun. Unsurprisingly he won. Some of our triathletes did the 5k as part of their interval training so Chris Giles, Innes Wright, Jon Rich and Vince Hounsome made up the top 5. The streets of Stur, Stalbridge and Shaftesbury hosted the 3 walkers.
So, Michael is the man to beat. But with 14 Wheelers having done at least one activity there is much to keep us motivated through the winter.
Between 5-18 January the challenge is to go as fast as you can (probably on your bike) over 20k inside (must be a TT bike to ensure no drafting) or out (use the Rob Gale approach and keep an eye on the weather forecast for that windy day and choose a straight, wind-behind route)
Results (and schedule) can be found on the GDW Winter Challenge results 2025-26.
