Here's an account that gives you a feel for the laughs and reality of a Polaris event. When you've read this (if you still want to enter one!)
Over the past 11 years or so I have taken part in and thoroughly enjoyed something like 20 Polaris Challenges. The Autumn 2003 event was our first for a long time, as we have a rule about not doing Summer ones, (we think they are too 'soft') and the Spring one was on the Isle of Man and just too expensive to take part in. Partner Matt and I set out at 10:30 from Ross for the long drive up to Alston, Cumbria. The Espace was already fairly well-laden with equipment, bikes etc. The first problem arose with the amount of luggage that our attractive hitch-hiker, Hannah, a work colleague of Matt's was taking up to her parental home in the Lake District!

The journey up was fairly uneventful, the traffic was quite busy but moving at a decent speed, and we were looking for a place to park in Penrith a few hours later. Matt had to locate and purchase a new pair of size 14 Sealskinz socks, but the only pair in town were £10 dearer and last years model as well! We therefore changed the plan a bit, nipped over to Keswick, which is one big outdoor clothing outlet, and managed to achieve 3 things, 1) Get the socks, 2) Have a pint and 3) drop Hannah off at home and get a kiss goodbye!!! Despite what you may think, this was the last vaguely sexual encounter of the weekend. 

We then headed over the infamous A686 (over Hartside - 57 casualties in 2 years) for the event centre at the secondary school at Alston. We signed in and registered very quickly with the Polaris people, and enjoyed a bit of light-hearted banter with the waggish Graham Longstaff. Next step was finding a space near one of the 'Master Maps' and mark our event maps with the ROW and out-of-bounds information. We mooched the trade stalls a bit, nothing much on offer, T-shirts being rationed and to order only, It was a strange situation, but Rab, main event sponsor just had one rep hanging about with just 4 lightweight sleeping bags for sale, no publicity material etc. 

Next we dropped our stuff off at our hotel for the night, the High Windy Hall above Garrigill. Wow, Matt and I were a bit taken aback by the high standard. A lovely woman called Pauline welcomes us, and inquires whether we will be eating there, as Alston apparently is a bit limited in the way of facilities. We recklessly say no, and after marking the checkpoints out onto our event map, head off to the bright lights for a beer, a gossip with other competitors and some food.

The first pub we visited (8:30pm) had a huge queue, the tables were heaving and the whole place was full of sweaty locals gurning at everyone, we didn't even have a drink there. We went on down to the town 'centre' and another large pub presented itself, it certainly looked a bit quieter. We made our way through the herd of people having a darts tournament clogging the entrance, found a table and had a quick look at the menu, as if we ever have anything other than steak & chips! I went to the bar to order, but noted to my alarm that the Polaris-people in front also ordering get rebuffed with a 'we've finished serving'. According to some other people in the bar, all the pubs in town have stopped as well!! There are only 1000-or so Polaris competitors wandering about with money to spend and the wiseacres running the pubs don't want their money! What would you do in the same position?

This was seriously bad news, I nipped up to the local Spar to get some ham and rolls just in case we had to go hungry, leaving Matt to eat 2 bags of peanuts as a meal substitute. Luckily we spot a caf'-type thingy down the road that has the good sense to stay open, I eventually get sausage & chips and Matt has a curry. This is the only food available in Alston at 9PM - Spar having long since run out of bread etc. With hardly any beer inside us to speak of either, we headed back to our lovely hotel to pack our rucksacks and fettle equipment one last time. We both of us hit the sack at 12 and were eerily sober! This may be a first for us on Polaris.

Various little alarms on phones, PDA and watches woke us whilst it was still dark, I drew the curtains but it was still too dark to see what the weather was doing, our main concern at that moment of the day. We showered and put on a bit of our riding kit and raced downstairs to the dining room by 6AM for a huge breakfast, all fresh-cooked and yum. A couple of other competitors were already eating, but they looked too professional to get too chatty with. With about 2000 calories each under our belts, we went back to the room to watch weather reports on TV, and then have massive kit cull after hearing the joyous news 'ITS GOING TO BE SUNNY AND GREAT!' We dressed accordingly in more lightweight stuff and saved about 5lbs in superfluous clothing apiece. We say our goodbyes to Pauline, and have to admit she was right about Alston, to our astonishment she adds that we only had to ask and she would have cooked us something, whatever the time last night!

The sky was now lightening up by the minute, the overnight wind had dropped and we headed off down to Alston. Big 'Polaris' signs directed us to the car park field, where we soon found a space. A quick faff about with the bikes and final check and we are off up a track to the start line for our 8:20 AM slot. A huge bunch of excited cyclists are clogging the track a bit waiting around, we are bang on time and have to push up through to the front. A quick pre-ride briefing for our start group from the organizers, then Matt and I insert our SportIdent dibbers into the electronic units and we are off!

Our first checkpoint is no 5 on a small bridge, which by the look of the large crowds, everyone else seems to have chosen, then we head anti-clockwise up to Garrigill for no 7, which isn't far from our hotel of the night before. Off come the zippable sleeves on my Endura jacket, and we start to motor on up to no 13 on the C2C cycle route, a very steep haul indeed. We carry on past some wonderful old lead mines at Nenthead, then up a rocky track to no 15, the electronic logger at which unfortunately isn't working properly. We carry out the usual procedure and record the number and identifier and take a picture for good measure! 

Retracing our wheeltracks, we go back down the track and over to no 8 in a small wood above West Cocklake. We think we're on a roll now, but get overtaken by a couple on a fully rigid tandem on a steep and slippery downhill, they only have rim brakes! We find later when we returned the following day that the road was so slippery that we could hardly walk on it! We then hit the road up to no 6 at Moscow (no, not THE Moscow) and do a bit of a sneaky shortcut back to the A686 to nab No. 11 up a long and heart-rending BOAT over Ouston Fell into a 25mph headwind, we then return and get back on the main road, heaving with badly-ridden motorbikes. We left the road after a while to bag no 12, then a mad downhill to Whitfield, Matt has already (surprise!) broken 2 spokes! We fix them in a pub garden and partake of a welcome Kronenbourg apiece.

Onward to checkpoint 16, then a mean climb and sickening loss of altitude back down to no 17 at Oakpool bridge (2 chevrons), getting really tired now, we ascend the other side of the valley, and with fading legs reach the start of the bridleway that parallels 'Old Flue' - an industrial archaeologists dream. Unfortunately a pack of bozos on horses want to ride up at their own pace, so we have to keep overtaking them, then pushing the pace to keep ahead, then wait for them to gallop past etc, we were completely knackered at the top! We take a breather and eat more hateful energy bars after we've clicked in at no 18 then continue the evil climb to rejoin the road. Chest pains and gallons of surging lactic acid are forgotten and we rejoice at the lovely downhill, and after this it's all a downward, slightly undulating road to the overnight camp at Knockburn. We arrive in with a few minutes to spare and rapidly establish camp on a flat pitch. Our diddy little MSR pocket rocket stove is soon on boiling yukky river water for a cup-a-soup each, which warms us up and puts some much-needed fluid and salts back into us.

To our surprise, we have gained 170 points and have done as well as we could, we can't be bothered to check the interim results later, as we are too cosy in our sleeping bags. We checked them at one event and found we were placed 10th, so overdid the celebrations too much and cocked up the following day! Matt gets a 4-pack of beer from the organizers tent and we retire for a couple of hours of rest. Our neighbours, Dan and Dave are a skinny, whippetty and chatty couple of young lads from Shrewsbury so we have a great time bragging and joking with them. We feel great because they think they've done well with 100 points! Both are a bit sick when we let it slip that a couple of old fatties have done better! We have our first Marks & Spencer Jalfrezi curry, rice and naan's and start to chill out with the gin & tonic premixes we have lugged about all day. Whatever anyone says, we think that a man rides on his stomach, and if you have lush grub and lux' drinks to look forward to, you ride better. As its now dark, we can pee on other people bikes instead of queuing for the traumatically over-used portable toilets.

We spend most of the evening telling tall tales and pissing about with the Shrewsbury boys, they are our new best mates! We have our last M&S curry, a particularly good Balti at 9PM and retire to our sleeping bags contented, with a full phone signal as well. Even I manage to sleep for once instead of rotating all night in discomfort like a chicken on a rotisserie! Something large is heard in our bin bag nibbling in the night so I chuck the whole lot over to Dans tent for them to deal with.

We wake in alarm at about 5AM to the chilling sound of a pack of wolves howling, a quick peek out of the tent porch is inconclusive, but we reason that it must be dogs! The rest of the camp has woken up at all this and very soon a dismal queue of cold and achy bikers is forming for the horrendous toilets in a spiteful light rain, oh well. Just the despised energy bars for brekky, if it ain't bacon and eggs its worthless! The water is straight from the river and tastes disgustingly of leaves, 3 puritabs make it slightly safer but even worse tasting! We set out again up to the start, we don't stop at the giveout but shoot straight up to no 19, where we decide on our route, remove a layer now we are warmed up and figure we have saved 10 minutes of mucking about. We head back in a reverse of yesterdays route, but pick up no 22 and find a low level attack point to the old flue again. We retrace our wheeltracks to 17 and then 16. We also make a quick stop at a post office for some better tasting drinks and some cakes. Matt isn't eating, which is a silly thing to do!

For a while we follow a couple of other competitors, an attractive oriental girl riding very well and her hubby. Matt and I make up some private dirty jokes and my all-in-the mind-MP3 player inexplicably changes from tracks of Joy Division 'Unknown Pleasures' to an eternal loop of Bowies 'China Girl' which I grunt out occasionally when the pain gets to baaaad up the hill of torment to no 12. The pain doesn't end as we struggle against a 20mph headwind along the road to the head of the track above no 6. Matt decides to change inner tubes on the front, as he has a slow puncture. A ruinously slippery and muddy track down to nab 6 and then a quick rumble up a bridleway to cross the main road again to do 11. A competitor on other side of road tut-tuts at me and says 'naughty, naughty, that's an illegal one!' I say 'Oh no it isn't you silly sod, read your map!' what a prat, I bet he felt really stupid!

Back into the eternal headwind again, the slog to 11 strips both of us of energy and will, but we dig deep, and are soon zooming back towards the next and last objective of our day 2 five hours at no 8, the one with the slippery road - how we stayed upright coming down it so fast, and that tandem!!! I examine the map and find a lovely bridleway back down to Alston, which avoids a single chevron 1km hill up to the main road, and is very relaxing after the stresses of the 2 days. With a respectable 135 points in the bag, which is phenomenal for us, and 5 minutes to spare (but very little energy left!) we've done about 150km plus in 7+5hrs. We check out and roll back to the car, stinky weasel-smelling clothing double-wrapped in bin liners and loads of FCUK spray and clean clothes on. Bikes dismantled and put in bags, addresses swapped with Dave & Dan and along comes Hannah to make our day. 5 hours later we are home, courtesy of the inexplicable traffic on the M6.

What a weekend, and what a team. We checked the results later and were pleasantly surprised with our overall placing for once. Choose your partner carefully if you ever do it, but don't nick Matt, he's mine!