Open eyes, open curtains, you know the drill – except…today is different. The sky is blue, there is a car park outside and there’s a pub too. But we’re in Bodmin and about to complete an absolutely epic 921 mile journey (hopefully) arriving in Lands End at around 4pm.

The scale of the challenge has been both physical and mental. The latter, far more than I expected. Getting out of bed and cycling 90 miles a day for 10 days is beyond normal and ‘dealing’ with that has been hard. And we have to do it, just once more. Yesterday was brutal for climb, today is not much better, let’s just hope the adrenaline pulls us through.

Neil’s birthday today, so we sing Happy Birthday on the start line – that was different! Then we’re off, only 63 miles today but loads of Lewis-friendly climbing in store. As it was his birthday, even Neil was enjoying the hills.

A stop at 25 for second (or third?) breakfast and the pace continues. Two groups today (almost a team?) with Peter scouting well ahead. Lunch stop at Penzance and suddenly we’re within 10 miles of the finish. Lewis has one more trick up his sleeve for a picturesque if slightly over-hilly detour (thank goodness for the phone) and before you can blink, Lands End is in sight. A pretty significant crowd awaits us at the finish line, mostly tourists curious to see what nutters are coming in next. Big cheers, applause and we’re through.

Photographs and then more at the sign post – ‘we’ve only gone and done it!!’

I think there was more relief than elation, this has been the hardest thing that any of us have done, or will probably ever do again. It felt like it would never end, but it has now. Someone described it as the ultimate stag do without alcohol, there was very little of the latter – might catch up on that tonight – but seven guys with support from Rose and Terry and friends from across the industry did somehow pull it out of the bag.

The words ‘Thank you’ seem so inadequate when we have had such incredible support from so many people. The team at Roland, Janine, Helen and Martyn and many others, have worked incredibly hard at fund raising and all of the administration behind the ride. We could not have achieved this without you. Terry and Rose, you are the best surrogate Mum and Dad and we would all adopt you. Terry looking after the bikes and driving, and Rose rebuilding bodies and filling them with calories! Great fun too. And then the team. Everyone pulled together when it was needed, but special thanks to our resident pro-cyclist SImon Lewis who has been a great coach to us all and kept us safe. No one died!! A few got injured….

Lastly I must thank everyone who has donated money. Your generosity will help to change people’s lives, we were just the catalyst to make that happen. Thank you, thank you.

So what next for Three Men on a Bike? Well, as I write Simon is depositing his bike over the cliff at Lands End.

For me, JOGLE 2012 is the right time to retire from such events. It doesn’t get much bigger than this and what better than to go out on a high. I can’t speak for Peter as he’s so far ahead of our peloton he can’t hear what I’m saying. I am sure though, we will all continue to ride for pleasure (but only on a sunny day). I’d like to say that there was some pleasure in this last ride, but the bruises and aches sustained during day nine are still too raw. Maybe next week we’ll reflect on that. It has been an enormous privilege to be part of this team, but most of all, so humbling to be able to be a part of raising so much money for two fantastic charities. As I write the total is over £40K with more money still to come, we could end nearer to £50K.

Tomorrow it’s back to normality (what’s that?) – we leave early for the annual car park that is the Bank Holiday M5. It’ll probably be quicker by bike….