Winter tyres and the return of confidence

Having acquiring my first racing scars and taking time to reflect on last weeks accident it hasn’t taken long to become enthused once again. I didn’t even want to look at a bike again after the fall last week but some good words from a few people in the biking world, new winter tyres and some retail therapy left me thirsty to get on the bike again this weekend.

Yesterday morning I set out to achieve one thing and that is a KOM on Strava (online biking community). I now know where some of the runs are, to achieve a KOM, after reviewing my route last weekend. A KOM is basically when you hold a record for being the fastest over a stretch of land whilst competing with every other cyclist in the world. The run could be 50 metres or 50 miles. The only reason I wanted to challenge this was last week I came 6^th overall on one run and didn’t realise it was there. So with that in mind I thought I could at least get in the top 3 now if not the KOM (King of the Mountain).

My attempt at the KOM was literally a mile into my ride so I would be fresh to attempt this. Once on the run I had a good go at it and thought I had done enough to move myself up from 6^th place but I would not know if I had beaten my previous time until I got back to the house and uploaded my data from my computer after the ride (this really is how I get my kicks these days).

So KOM run complete and less than 2 miles in I am absolutely panting. On reflection it is not really a good idea to gas yourself at the start of a big ride.

Then on to the ride itself. I headed towards Dagnall on the Leighton Buzzard road without any pre-planning and decide to go wherever the wind would take me and actually that is pretty much what happened. Yesterdays winds were horrifically fierce and made for a very testing ride overall.

Not many “action points” to cover from yesterdays ride but I did however see a lot more road kill than usual. Badgers, foxes and a rabbit topped the list.

On the ride itself I went through Edlesborough (the scene of the crime from last weeks accident) and made sure I went over the exact same piece of road to exercise the demons. I headed towards Milton Keynes and flipped back when I got to the MK Dons stadium. Back down the A5 to Dunstable and swung a right and headed towards Tring crossing over Edlesborough again and that nasty bit of road again just to show it I was back in the game!

I now have intermittent exercising movements for my feet to keep circulation going as the rides are becoming so long and this has really helped with blood flow. It must look a bit weird though for passers by seeing me doing some kind of sat down star jump and rolling my ankles but I hope they enjoy.

On arrival to Tring it was the long hilly stretch back home to Hemel and completing a new circuit that looks like a figure of eight.

Once I got back I was exhausted and needed a while to recover. I think I should take out some energy bars for the rides that last over a few hours as this must help. Anyway, I uploaded my data immediately hoping for an achievement on the KOM but alas I was 2 seconds slower – so back to the drawing board. I blame the winds!

I did achieve some new records though. Over 4 hours cycling, over 60 miles (longest ride to date), fastest 40km and highest climb / elevation on a ride. Here is the ride for those interested:-

http://www.strava.com/activities/100135468

The only last thing to note is how well the new shorts performed from the purchase on Monday. Well I feel good in the areas it was meant to protect on the longest ride to date so I can vouch for them so far and happy with the investment.