Donny-boy Sharpens His Fangs

Long memories will recall our Road and Country captain from the 1984-85 season, Don Anderson, attempting to boost his endurance after a spell out with injury with a trek through the Himalayan mountains with a 26-kilo backpack. His mission was a success although not without a major wrinkle on his descent into Kathmandu where he was robbed of his money and passport.The British Embassy refused to help our wretched hero and what follows are scenes straight out of Indiana Jones, as DA immersed himself in the local culture, borrowed transport such as a bicycle, and cycled hundres of miles to India relying solely on local hospitality for food and accommodation. With the help of some serious wheeler-dealing, Don managed to infiltrate the Indian border and hitch rides on the footplates of steam trains, cooking food on the train’s boiler, en route to Delhi. Happily for Belgrave, the British High Commission there was more sympathetic to Don’s plight and we got our captain back in time for the road season.Fast forward 31 years and Don still has the travel bug, and with a remarkable 24^th National Cross-country championships in the claret and gold approaching at the end of the month, Don has again resorted to unusual methods to purposefully prepare for the competition.Venturing to Dunedin on New Zealand’s South Island, Don has put together a session on Baldwin Street, crowned as the steepest in the world, with a one in two gradient, ¼ of a mile long.Whatever Leicester’s Donington Park racecourse has in store will feel straight-forward after this.