Cleats on the beach

Having been out of the country, with work, three times in the last three weeks and forcing my body into three different continents and time zones I was a mess at the start of last week on my return and my body did not know what it was doing. The only way to correct this imbalance was to throw myself straight back in to training and enjoy what I had been missing desperately and craving whilst away...Rex...

I have put in a lot of KMs since I have been back and today was no exception. A few months ago I was thinking about taking things a little easier towards the end of my training and in the run up to the big day but as usual it is go big or go home…

Today I completed Gran Fondo 4 (ride 130 KMs in one ride) on Strava. "MapMyRide" later, train in to London and then to Southend and back! The exploratory journey took me to places I hadn’t been before and guided me past Stratford and the Olympic Village, Stadium and the abstract art outside. Then on to deep Essex and Ilford, Romford and Chelmsford. On the journey in to Southend I was permanently harassed but scores of motorbikes making their way to what I am guessing was a big meet in Southend. I now have a new found opinion on “bikers” and it is not good. The vast amount of leathered up petrol heads that whizzed by me had a huge lack of respect for any other road users and were quite frankly DANGEROUS! And I wouldn’t mind so much if it was only their own lives they were putting at risk but it wasn't.

After navigating safely to the beach front I had a small lunch, watched the train take people to the end of pier and rested my legs for the journey back.

Cleats on the beach

I came back exactly the same way that I entered so not much to report. I did however achieve my fastest ever 40k by clocking 1:18:23 (which works out at 19mph over the 40K – VERY HAPPY!). Here are some other stats from today:

Moving Time: 5:25:50

Elapsed Time: 6:03:02

Avg Speed: 14.4 mph

Avg Moving Speed: 16.1 mph

Max Speed: 31.5 mph

Also, for completing my challenge today here is another digital badge from Strava:-

Lets see how the legs hold up tomorrow and I will then know whether today was great last minute training for the big ride on Wednesday or alternatively a very silly move that locked my legs up…