No bike ride this Sunday. Instead, a day out to Sunderland and a game of football.

Our son Jeremy is a Premier League match official, and whenever we can we try to take in one of his games. This weekend he was running the line for referee Mike Dean for the live Sky match against West Ham at the Stadium of Light. Jez is also a FIFA official, and along with Mike Dean and the other officials is off to Belgrade for a UEFA match on Wednesday. It is the convention that the refereeing team for a midweek European game works together on a Premiership match immediately prior to it, for teamwork and bonding purposes, but also because it’s just good common sense.

Given the abuse they get from Premiership players, managers, fans and our media, incidentally, you may be surprised to learn that English officials usually are very well received by European clubs. Abroad, our lot are still considered to be the best around.

Anyway, back to Sunderland. We have been to top-class matches all over the country and as guests we always get a friendly welcome, but the hospitality at Sunderland took it to another level entirely. Pre-match drinks and hot food, in comfortable surroundings and, for good measure, in very good company. We don’t go to matches for the jollies – we go to support Jez, as we always have done – but if someone puts themselves out to make us feel at home we’re not going to say no to them. And this time, in addition to mixing with the officials and assessors, we were allowed to join the other guests of the club.

This lot included Brian ‘Pop’ Robson, the Newcastle, Sunderland, West Ham, Chelsea and Carlisle centre forward, and top scorer in the old First Division in 1972–73; and George Courteney, who was the match officials assessor. We have met George on a number of occasions and he has always made us very welcome. He is a FIFA delegate and was for many years our highest-ranking referee, officiating at the 1986 and 1990 World Cup Finals.

Sunderland chairman Niall Quinn was also there. Pauline says he’s very handsome, so doubtless will be banging on about that for a while. He was very good at networking, I’ll give him that.

But enough of the high life. It’s Monday morning, I’m back at work, and what with all our rubbing shoulders with the rich and famous I’ve lost another day out on the bike. Me and Greg need to spend some serious time together…

At last, back on the road with a CatEye computer that actually computes. Its first trip out and it did quite well, too, averaging 14.7mph over a tried-and-tested 25-mile route. Tried and tested, that is, except for two b****y gert hills that John contrived to insert into it – hills that would tax anyone. Well, me at least.

So, Carnforth to Crooklands via Burton-in-Kendal, left to Milnthorpe and through to Sandside. So far so good. But instead of continuing to Arnside we turned left at the garden centre, left again up a very severe rise and then a long drag uphill to Storth. From Storth we meandered back to Beetham, turned left at the Wheatsheaf and back up another nasty hill. Down the road to Silverdale, then home along the usual route past Leighton Moss and across the shore to Carnforth.

Makes me shudder, looking back, but I was quite pleased. Stuck at 15st 4lb, though, I am fully aware that I need to get fitter. I aim to do this by upping the midweek training – not putting in the miles, but by doing concentrated, high-quality training as recommended by the fitness gurus of Cycling Weekly.

I don’t know if Lance Armstrong’s nutritionist would back me up on this, but amid the stringencies of my training diet I would just like to say a word in favour of bread.

Beaten back by foul weather as we headed to the Lakes last weekend (and this on four wheels), Pauline and I salvaged our day out, as we often do, by dropping in at the bread shop in Staveley. Formerly Pain de Paris, now operating under the equally silly name of Munx, this place is special: none of your additive-infused modern rubbish, but real bread, and an amazing variety of it.

Apparently Gordon Ramsay agrees. Foul-mouthed celebrity chef endorsements normally encourage me only to keep on walking, but (a) we found Munx first and (b) on this occasion Gordon is spot on. If you are in the area, give them a try – but leave some for us.

Next door to Munx, incidentally, is Wheelbase, the largest bike shop in the country and a very friendly one to boot. Get thee behind me, Satan. As I have been threatening to do, I bought a new CatEye bike computer. As soon as I can figure out how it works, I’ll go back to posting my training data. Distance and time, at any rate. It remains to be seen what a freezer-full of Munx bread will do to my weight.

Our ride on Remembrance Sunday had it all. Strong winds, driving rain and hail, wet leaves: nature seemed determined to bring us both down. Tickled by the events of last week, presumably, and seeking a reprise. We had to deal with strong crosswinds blowing us sideways, large quantities of slippery autumn leaves, and at one point, passing through Milnthorpe, a road that was white with hail. I didn’t need any new bruises after last Sunday and John isn’t daft; we rode gingerly and were just glad to get home in one piece. That’s what you get on the roads at this time of year, I suppose – all part of the rich tapestry of Wrynose training.

After the stimulation of the ride, a change of pace, and attendance at the memorial service in Carnforth. Carnforth isn’t Whitehall, and there was no Nimrod and marching bands, but that’s not really the point. The town memorial was unveiled in 1924 (there are some interesting photos to be seen if you dig around here), and while the immediacy of the memories has passed there are many names on the roll call of the fallen that live on in Carnforth families today. The ceremony was all the more relevant and touching for being small, local people of all ages remembering their dead from the two world wars.

I have just discovered that next year’s infamous Fred Whitton Challenge, a sportive that takes in Wrynose, is to be held on Sunday, 10 May. John and I had got no more specific for our Wrynose or Bust than to agree we’ll do it in May, but this discovery has just narrowed our options. There’s no way I’m getting mixed up with the Fred Whitton lot.

The Fred Whitton Challenge is a one-day, ultra-tough 112-mile ride over all of the Lake District passes. Up to 700 seriously fit cyclists come from all over the UK to give it a go. They start and finish in Coniston, and before they even get to Wrynose they will have done Kirkstone, Whinlater, Honister and the daddy of them all, Hardknott Pass. In between the major climbs are a host of smaller but often equally severe hill climbs. Last year, the winning time was less than six hours, with late runners finishing in around 14 hours.

This is clearly an event of serious proportions and not something to confuse with our excursion. In comparison to what these guys endure Wrynose or Bust is a walk in the park (albeit a very big park with a bl**dy great hill in it).

The Fred Whitton types live for their sportives, pitting themselves against the sternest challenges that our landscape can offer – events like Hell of the Ashdown and the Exmoor Beast. But it doesn’t get any tougher than the Fred Whitton Challenge in our Lake District. My hat goes off to them: I respect enormously anyone who just takes part.

Sunday 2 November. Approx 28 miles, 15 stone 5lb.

This is going to sound perverse, but I have always taken a pride in how I fall off my bike. I developed a philosophy for falling many years ago when I absent-mindedly cycled into a parked mini. While the bike crushed itself deep into the rear end of the car, oblivious to what was happening I somersaulted clean over it. I picked up the merest bruise on landing. The answer was obvious: relax through the fall and you’ll do that much less damage when you come to earth. Sorted. Until this weekend.

Turning right at a T-junction (Silverdale road, joining the road to Carnforth at Warton, in case you’re taking notes), we processed onto brand new tarmac outside a housing development. Lovely surface, walking speed, what could go wrong? Slurry, that’s what. Invisible slurry.

Both wheels went sideways. From upright to parked on the tarmac in an instant, looking up through a tangle of bike, feeling very stupid and smelling strongly of manure. Just like in the mini incident, I had had no time to worry about what was happening to me. Unlike the mini incident, this hurt.

The normal reaction after a fall is to jump up quick and hope no one noticed. In this case I couldn’t though, partly because of the pain and partly because I was still attached to the bike. Pedal cleats on the whole are a great thing, but not when you’re in an undignified heap on the ground trying to disengage yourself from an uncooperative bicycle.

Bike: bent handlebars, gear lever at a crazy angle, and slightly redesigned gear changer. Computer still not talking to me. Me: badly bruised hip, bruised and scratched elbow and knee, and scraped ankle. All the damage on my right side, except, bizarrely, for my left thumb, which is sprained and causing more pain than all the other stuff put together. And the dented pride, of course, which I can’t really assign to one side or the other. 

John was his usual supportive self, as were the couple walking their baby buggy and the people in the car who understood that the appropriate thing to do is brake before arriving at the human road bump. For which, incidentally, thank you whoever is responsible for sending me them and not some chump in a baseball cap or the usual Sunday morning sociopath in a 4×4.

After a minute or 10 to shake myself down, we remounted and headed home.

And yes, I have put on a couple of pounds. But for what it’s worth, right up to the slurry incident everything had been going just great.