A good weekend getting plenty of miles in. More importantly I got the new bike and feel committed to things again.
Went out on Saturday morning with London Dynamo for an excellent ride. As there were quite a few new riders they put together a group for us and we got through four laps at a fair old clip. I quite enjoy the riding in a group element as it makes the training go faster and feels a bit more affirming. Also getting out at 9am in a mist coated Richmond Park and blasting through four laps in under two hours means that I don’t use up the whole day on training.
The final lap when the pace went up killed me. An extra 3kph and I couldn’t get through. I could get onto the wheel in front but couldn’t get past. The group was a bit quicker, at that point, than I’m used to going and maybe I just need to dig a bit deeper but I could feel a bit of a bonk coming on so ducked it out and then spent the rest of the lap trying to get back to the group which was a nightmare.
I’m fairly certain I’ll be trying to get out with them more often from now on, either on the Saturday ride or the Sunday one. It make sense for what I’m aiming at to get used to riding in a group and keeping with the pace. I met up with Rhyddid as well and we put in an extra lap afterwards discussing tactics and so on.
Like many Etapers the biggest challenge is the time management, or rather juggling, to fit in the hours on the bike around our everyday commitments of work, friends, domestic and all the other bits. As I don’t have a long commute to work at the moment I can’t use that as an easy source of mileage through the week, whereas others can find this their main source of training.
I guess I could ride more in the evenings once it gets lighter but, after a long day in the office, sometimes that’s the last thing I want to do. Once I get out there though and start turning over the pedals my mood tends to change and I fancy it again. The biggest problem is actually persuading myself to get out and ride as I prefer to go on well lit roads than out into the quieter country lanes.
I probably should tell you about the new bike, but I’ll save that for when I have ridden it more. Suffice to say my first impressions are that it’s a vast step up in my cycling experience. It’s far more responsive and I feel far more comfortable on it, even if I think I might need a slightly shorter stem fitted. Nigel at De Ver’s has said I can pop back for that in a few weeks once I’ve given it a proper testing and settled into it a bit more.
Now about that sponsorship (I really need to start getting a shufty on with it)…