bigmoose project 1 million 2.0!

24 hour bike event? Are you mad? Let's do it.

So my friends Craig and Aimee are ambassadors for this awesome charity, link here to donate as you may get bored reading and not donate...Also donations close this weekend, so go go goooo! https://bigmoose.enthuse.com/pf/leena-takooree My friend Rachel, who I met in Italy just 3 months ago, mentioned she might fly over from Colorado for the bike event. She asked if I’d signed up. I hadn’t...

I’ve always wanted to take on one of these wild challenges, but they’ve usually felt a bit much for me physically. Kinging-It (Craig and Aimee) have taken on three bigmoose challenges now. I tried to support them during the 2022 Wheelie Bin Challenge but couldn’t make it. Two years later came the Castle-to-Castle cycling challenge. I couldn’t take part because my right arm never fully recovered after my 2006 stroke, so long-distance cycling was a no-go but I was there at the finish line cheering them on. Funny enough, Rachel did that challenge, but we didn’t meet then as I had to catch the last train home back to Bristol.

I’ve known Craig and Aimee for 15 years; I met Aimee through Young Lives vs Cancer (then CLIC Sargent), and since then I’ve made incredible friends through them, travelled to amazing places, and now, finally, I get to do a charity event with them.

Back to Rachel...when I signed up, I thought she was already in. Turns out she hadn’t even booked flights. Cue panic: would I know anyone? I was hesitant at first because their fanbase is huge, and I didn’t want to take a spot from someone else. But I also wanted to challenge myself and spend time with my friends, so I'm really glad I signed up and Rachel ended up flying over - bonus! This was bigmoose' biggest event to date, and would mark the third one Craig & Aimee took part in (correct me if I'm wrong here?) The challenge - 100 bikes, 100 teams or solo riders for 24 hours. Starting on Saturday 29th November at midday, finishing at midday Sunday 30th. OOOOF, as a team we actually smashed it, the bike was the easy part. Staying awake however, that was tough.

Bikes 19, 20 & 29 - Kinging-It

Our Team: 1. Craig 2. Aimee 3. Aidan 4. Leena (that's me) 5. Holly 6. Josh 7. Rachel 8. James 9. Jess 10. Tom 11. Mark 12. Michaela 13. Arno In total, I think Team Kinging-It were supposed to have around 30 people, so we were allocated three bikes. One person was meant to ride a full 24 hours, while the rest of us rotated on the other two bikes. This was not the case. The people above were basically the entire team, we have no idea where the others were. For whatever reason, I guess they couldn’t make it.

Before the event, we’d already planned a rota for one bike for team members 1–10, since we all knew each other. We put together a loose schedule (we even asked if we could drop the 24-hour solo bike and just keep bikes 19 and 20, dropping bike 29). So we’d sorted a rota assuming the second bike team would handle theirs separately… but that didn’t happen due to there only being 3 people for that bike, which would be totally unfair so things were chaotic for a little while, haha.

With a little help from Aimee, ChatGPT, Rachel, and all of us trying to figure out a plan, it kind of went to plan… for a short while. Thank you Mark, Michaela and Arno for joining us for the craziness and doing more shifts on the bike than you may have expected to, epic team!

Craig and Aimee took the first shift when it all kicked off at midday, then when they were off to document and vlog, the rest of us joined in!

Aimee & Craig! It begins! Aimee is doing her social media thing, gotta get that content.

My first shift was 2pm - 230pm with the legend that is James.

Second shift was with Arno at 4pm - 430pm

I could write for hours about where everyone was and when everyone took a stint...but actually it's all a bit of a blur haha. In between every ride I was freezing, it was pretty cold in there, so I'm glad I took a few layers...if I was to do it again though I would be a lot more prepared.

Josh, Mark, Craig, Rachel, Aimee, Michaela, Arno and I

Between 6pm - 10pm, myself, Aidan, Jess and James took turns.

Me and Aidan did an hour from 6pm–7pm. Jess and James took 7pm–8pm, then Aidan and I hopped back on from 8pm–9pm. Jess and James covered 9pm–10pm. The 10pm–2am shift was split between Rachel, Craig, Tom, and Michaela, however they decided to do four hours straight. They are wild, haha. Aidan made way to a nearby hotel to get some sleep as he had a four hour drive home the next day, and didn't need to be back on a bike until the morning.

At the back, there were Angel bikes available for anyone to ride or use to keep warm. So from 10pm-12am Craig and his brother Tom took the team Kinging-it bikes whilst Michaela and Rachel went on the Angel bikes, then they switched over at 12am. While the four of them powered through their shift, Aimee, Holly, Josh, and I headed to Holly and Josh’s van to see if we could get some sleep. Aimee wasn’t feeling great, Josh and Holly didn’t need to take over until 2am, and I didn’t have another shift until 10am. No sleep was had, maybe 10 minutes? Aimee decided to head home and see if that made her feel any better (we learned the next day that it didn't) when Aimee left the van I took her place and joined Josh and Holly in the bed haha. It was nice to rest, but we were very overstimulated, we popped on I'm a Celebrity get me out of here! Fell asleep for a moment, then we all needed a wee so decided to just head back to the bikes and hang out there. From around 2am I think I just stared blankly at anyone and everyone, I was very cold and very confused haha. At 3am I started eating Doritos and worked my way through Craig's fruit stash (thank you). My body was very confused why it was awake and what was going on, but I felt like staying awake was the best idea for all of us still in it, in case someone needed rescuing from the pedals. I tried to sleep on the floor but it was colddddd. Note to self, bring more layers, a pillow and a blanket (thank you Mark for letting me borrow said items) I started dancing and walking around to warm up in a Marvel blanket that Mark had let me borrow whilst he did the 2am - 6am shift with Arno, Josh & Holly. Whilst I made my two step moves a friendly face nearby said hi. I explained that I was cold that was why I was jumping around, he seemed concerned and asked about who I was with during the event. He said he was there with Men & Mountains and that his name was Tommy. I think I may have screamed in excitement "I think you know my brother!!"

Tommy! Men and Mountains. Sunday 30th, 4:26am - I've not slept.

Men & Mountains - Adam & Tommy

Sunday 30th, 6:34am, Send Help.

8am ended up being my last shift, I did 40 mins, took over from Tom, was a little late as I had to poop, sorry Tom - these were us covering Aimee's shift as a team, team work makes the dream work, or the knee pop in my case.

8am! Last shift before my knee gave up

James took over from Rachel as her legs were done, I mean I think she covered about 7-9 hours? I did 4/5hrs but didn’t document it all - I really wish I took more pics, butttt it was live streamed and they had a photographer…

I looked over to Mark like HELP as I felt like my knee was a bit dodge....he was halfway through eating a cake, initially I was yelling across "what cake have you got?" which he thought was me asking to swap...butttt turns out it was a good idea because when I stood up my knee gave way, oops. Thanks dude! Sorry for interrupting your breakfast cake.

Poor knee.

It's been four days...so I should get the knee checked out really... My last shift on the bike was supposed to be 10-1130am but luckily Josh saved me and did my shift whilst I sat from the side with my icepack supporting them and chewing harribo.

Photo by Aled Hopkins

Thanks to each of you for the chats, laughs, moments where we just stared at each other and laughed at being zoned out. Thanks for all the snacks you let me eat and for keeping me going. What a really fun and mentally challenging event! I'd do it again, but I'd bring peanut butter sandwiches and order 40 chicken nuggets to be delivered at 4am. Huge shout out to Gary from Barry who came with roasted garlic potatoes at the end, THEY WERE AMAZING.

Until next time?...

Dodgy Left Knee Leena x

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