When the fun stops, stop

 

One cold morning in December 2020, Jonny Lincoln , Jules Claxton and myself set out south from Lowestoft early morning in the dark on the mountain bikes. The aim was to ride on as many bridleways as possible, head towards Tunstall, do a loop of the Viking Trail which is about 9 miles and head home. About 13 miles in, going steady along a bridleway near Walberswick, me and Lincoln were on the front talking about the price of watch batteries, like you do. Lincoln was to my right, well, he was. A pretty thick branch was sticking out from the hedge, somehow he didn’t see it and it clotheslined him, straight across the arm and chest. From spinning along to laying on the deck in a split second. I looked back to see Jules riding straight over the top of him, cartwheeling and landing on the muddy trail. Bloody idiots! It was one of those times when you know it’s not great as there isn’t much movement. Jules slowly got up, Lincoln didn’t. I tried to show sympathy, it’s difficult as the constant piss taking between us three makes it difficult to change the mindset, but obviously I care, kind of.

Lincoln was a bit dazed, holding his chest and not always making sense. In hindsight I think he was a bit concussed. “How is it light?” Lincoln asked. By this time we had stopped for about 15 minutes and the sun had risen, Lincoln wasn’t great. After discussing the options, he decided he was okay to carry on and he peddled off. “We’ll have to keep an eye on him, he’s making less sense than normal” I joking said to Jules. “Sorry for ruining your day” Lincoln soon commented, me and Jules laughed. He hadn’t ruined it, it was pretty funny to be honest.

We carried on to Aldeburgh, where we decided to abort the idea of heading to Tunstall and headed back to Lowestoft and  I decided to round it up to 70 miles that day. Lincoln only realised when he got home that his arm had development a lovely juicy wound. Off to A&E he went for some stitches and a Brucey bonus of a broken rib.

Fast forward to April 2021, and we have decided to try the Tunstall loop again, the one we had attempted in December, we planned the ride for 17^th April. A couple of weeks before, my urge to compete in some time trials (TTs) was gaining, I logged on to the Cycling Time Trials (CTT) website, it told me that I had an upcoming event. “Huh!” I thought. And then the penny dropped. Back in January I had entered a Breckland TT which was being held in March. I had hoped that the covid restrictions would have been lifted by then, but they weren’t and it was cancelled. I hadn’t realised that it had been re-scheduled………..for the 18^th. Great, the day after the planned long mountain bike ride but I was still going to do both. Gone are the days of just riding fast as possible. It would be a great weekend of contrasts, long, slow, off-road fun on the Saturday and as fast as you can, hold on, keep that average up, but don’t chuck up on the Sunday. They may be bikes, but these rides would be completely different. Bring it on!

I had decided that this year, like last year, was not all going to be about TTs. For 8 years (well, spring and summers) up until 2019, my riding had centred around TTs. Putting rides off because of a planned TT, tapering (laying off the bike) because of an upcoming TT, riding a TT, backing off, ride another, it just got monotonous and basically the fun was going. Last year I didn’t do any open TTs, these are the ones that are a bit more planned and formal. I still done quite a few club TTs and these were just as good. Planning my summers around TTs is obviously my own fault, nobody makes me do them, it’s my own desire to go as fast as I can. The covid lockdown/restrictions made me realise that there’s more to riding then going fast, have fun, don’t worry about speed. Explore, make it an adventure.

A couple of days before the ride to Tunstall, Jules pulled out due to work commitments.  A shame we couldn’t all make it but me and Lincoln were still going.  The day before the ride I picked the GT Mountain bike (MTB) up from Lee at Bikespeeds. Lee sorted the rear brake as it wasn’t working properly, it’s hydraulic and I haven’t got a bloody clue about them. Lee also sorted the front a rear mechs. I walked to Bikespeeds and rode the bike home, I bloody love this bike, and it worked wonderfully throughout  this ride.  It still had the Schwalbe Land Cruiser tyres on from the epic Peddar’s Way ride a few weeks ago, that was the main topic of my last/first blog. I was going to change the tyres to some knobbly Schwalbe Smart Sam tyres, but as the weather has been so dry and from what I had heard, the Viking Trail at Tunstall was really dry and rolling, I left the Land Cruisers on, a bit risky as some of the riding was going to be a bit technical, they have a slick tread in the middle, but they were amazing for this ride. The night before Jules’ plans changed and he was coming along for the first couple of hours then head back, better than nothing for sure!

On the morning of the ride, I woke up at 3:30am, excited like a kid on Christmas day. I had set the alarm for 4:30am, the standard hour for food and last minute faffing but I couldn’t sleep so got up at 4am. I watched a bit of Mark Beaumont’s Round the World documentary while trying to eat my porridge and bagel, eating food at this hour can be awful, but a 38 year old diesel engine doesn’t run without it’s fuel.  I was meeting Lincoln at 5:30am, then we were meeting Jules in Carlton Colville at 5:45am. I was running a bit early so went along Lowestoft promenade in the twilight and it was as magical as ever, I’ll never take this place for granted.

We all met up and headed south on the country lanes. Before we knew it we were all taking the piss out of each other, for no other good reason apart from the fact that we can. I guess us three idiots have a bit of an odd friendship, but friendships that strive on humour and stupidity, which suits me just fine!

It was a bright and frosty morning, I started singing Oasis’ song  Don’t Go Away, “Cold and frosty morning, there's not a lot to say about the things caught in my mind”, but there was loads to say about the things that weren’t caught in my mind, Liam was wrong.  It was a beautiful sunrise. “Blimey, just look at those colours in the sky!” I said. Lincoln looked up and nearly stacked it on a corner, pleb. I looked to my left a few minutes later and the sun had just come up, I thought to myself “It must be 5:55am”, I looked down and the Garmin and it was dead on 5:55am, what a nerd I am at planning.

We started wiggling our way through Benacre. There is a bridleway which can be really sandy when it’s very dry, a long narrow beach, minus the sandcastles and deck chairs. I was hoping Jules would fall off, his bike handling skills are a little, er, odd. As soon as we reached this beach, my Jeremy Clarkson influenced “Power!!” came to mind, just power through it, don’t steer, don’t react, if the front wheel turns a different direction, don’t worry, the rear wheel is only powering forward, it will all be fine. I had gone, Lincoln behind, the swearing from Jules started. “He’s down” I heard, “brilliant!” I replied. I do care, but it’s Jules, he’ll always be fine on something like that. I carried on and stopped at the end, Lincoln not far behind. We stopped and waited for Jules as he looked like he was in slalom, left to right, all over the place. 

“Lincoln, you should stop caring about him so much” I said laughing. We carried on towards Southwold, shouting out the sandy stretches to Jules to which we obviously got sworn at.

We soon reached the B1127 into Southwold, knowing that Jules has cycled in Africa, I asked him whether he had planned his routes around the deserts, I said how this must have been very difficult and asked him if he used a pedalo and just used the seas.  Lincoln nearly fell off his bike laughing, Jules too. Credit where credit is due, I thought that was a pretty good one. Was that pay back for a previous torrent of abuse, or was that sowing a seed for a barrage of verbal abuse for me later on?

Rolling into Reydon behind the other two idiots, I compared their legs. Jules has the biggest legs I’ve ever seen, apart from Robert Förstemann at Six Days Cycling in London in 2019. Where as Lincoln, well, his legs are just the opposite. But they are both some how just as quick as each other on a bike. I told them “Riding behind you both, I feel like I’m a kid out for a ride with my big old dad and my mum with little skinny legs!”. My barrage of abuse was surely coming at some point.

Crossing The Bailey Bridge over the River Blyth at Southwold/Walberswick, me and Jules were chatting away, Lincoln a bit infront. It was beautiful, no one about, a few oyster catchers on the river bank, probably wondering where all there oysters have gone, bloody humans and pollution. Me and Jules stopped and Lincoln carried on, we wondered how far he would get before he realised that we had stopped. Unfortunately he soon noticed and came back. Bridges bring a strange urge, the urge to stop and look into the water, along the riverbanks, just everywhere. The bridge was covered in frost, it was pretty slippery. Unfortunately Jules didn’t come off.

Past Walberswick we headed across a field on a Bridleway, “I’ve got an idea Lincoln, go the other side and we’ll throw some onions at you”. We all laughed, this goes back to a story last summer, there was a stack of hundreds of hay bales with the odd onion dotted around. Lincoln was one side and me and Jules the other, we lobbed onions over trying to hit each other, as you do. We had our helmets on, I’m sure they had the British Standards for onion impacts.

We headed across the reedbed between Walberswick and Dunwich, absolutely desolate and beautiful in the early morning light. “What’s that?!” Lincoln asked. Influenced by my dad, I have good knowledge of birds. “It’s a Moorhen” I replied, “I’m kind of disappointed, I wanted it to be a duck”, once again we all laughed. What difference there was between a Moorhen a certain type of duck, I still don’t know. Standing on the beach, Jules asked me why the beach was cordoned off, I then went into a lecture about the eating habits and nesting patterns of Little and Common Terns. “Bloody hell, it’s like a morning out with Bill Oddie and Monty Don!” said Jules after my ramblings and Lincoln’s prior talk about some flowers he had seen.

We then headed for Dunwich, then towards Minsmere through the bridleways. Around here are clear remnants of anti-tank defences from World War II. I have bored Lincoln and Jules many times about this and it’s a tradition to point it out and sound as though I know more about this than I really do. All joking aside, I do find this stuff really interesting and I know they do too. Fortunately enough, Lincoln had a bit of a mechanical, his rear wheel was playing up and he’d dropped the chain. As much as I tried to care, I just stood and looked into the anti-tank ditch, wondering how many people walk along here and haven't got a clue what it is. Then I thought I’d better show some interest and tried to help Lincoln. His biked seemed okay so we carried on, only to stop a couple of miles later at East Bridge as his bike was doing things that it shouldn’t. Wheel off, talk about it, is it safe? Yes. Admittedly I did wonder if we may have to abort the ride again. But after offering to sell my bike to Lincoln (he originally gave it to me before I changed loads of stuff on it), we carried on.  

The bridleways around here are simply fantastic, they all seem to link up. From East Bridge, they head east of Leiston, past Sizewell power station.  “Anyone need to charge their phone!?” I jokingly said as the big buried golf ball shaped nuclear power station came into view.

We got onto the B1353 and headed east to Thorpeness, hoping to grab a coffee before Jules headed home. Nowhere was open, it was only just after 8am. We said our goodbyes and told Jules not to fall off too many times. Even writing this a few days later I haven’t asked if he fell off, I just hope so.

Me and Lincoln rolled into Aldeburgh at 8:25am, wonderful. My vague aim was to get to Aldeburgh for 9am. We went to the Co-Op for some calories. As it was our lunch time (we had been up for 4/5 hours) it seemed socially acceptable in our world to have a beer on the beach. I say beer, Lincoln had G&T. I need new friends.

We found a bench out of the cool northerly wind and tucked into our grub, chatted with some locals, talked about our ride, talked about their dogs. One bloke had his dog in a big basket on the front of his bike. The dog was 16 years old and couldn’t walk far so he put him in the basket for a ride. The dog looked so happy as he sniffed the air, probably sniffing the fish from the smokehouse up the beach. We sat and discussed happy dogs. “People should be more dog. Grab a stick or run around after a ball, look, they’re so happy!” Lincoln said. How could I argue, he’s right!

We talked about house prices, the cost of these cemented patterns of bricks with amenities on the inside. The hideous amount of money wrapped up in this so-called seaside paradise, but when did these people last have fun and laugh?

After jokingly contemplating just sitting there drinking beer for another few hours, we headed off. I pointed out a house in Aldeburgh that I know has a turntable on the drive to turn the cars around. It’s another world here, a world that I’m glad I know very little about. We headed out of town on the Saxmundham Road, we were now heading to Snape, then the Viking Trail. I had spent quite a bit of time researching, looking for an off road route to Snape and found one on the north shore of the river Alde. I wasn’t sure, and I’m still not, if it was a bridleway or not. We tuned on our apologetic mode in the fear of someone not wanting us riding through here. We discussed how some people can be anti-cyclists, but in no way would we want any harm to the surroundings. This path was amazing, “If I was dropped here by helicopter, I wouldn’t have a clue where I was!” said Lincoln, and he was right. This stretch to Snape was the best out of all the 85 miles, just so quiet, idyllic. We purposefully stopped and just listened to the birds singing, no cars, no humanity at all, well apart from us. I’m definitely going to go back there soon. 

We rolled into Snape and past Snape Maltings and was met with the smell of bacon cooking. Although I’m veggie, it smelt great. A strange contradictory experience I struggle with but able to manage.

Heading for the entrance to the Viking Trail, we talked about how last March, just before the first lockdown, we were heading home from Chelmsford with a lovely tailwind on this stretch of road, homeward bound.

We pulled into the carpark where the Viking trail starts. There were a few cars and vans, but not as many as we were predicting for a lovely warm sunny spring day. We started the proper trail, I was a bit cautious of the Land Cruiser tyres. I said to Lincoln how it would probably be best if he stayed on the front, firstly so I could just follow his wheel and secondly, if I done a Jules and stacked it , he wouldn’t ride over the top of me. With all good intentions, that idea soon went out the window, I couldn’t believe the grip that I still had. Don’t get me wrong, if you started trying to be Danny Hart or Gee Atherton, you would most definitely end up snogging a tree with your teeth nestled between the pine cones on the forest floor. But for me, the tyres were great, nobbly tyres are over rated. The Viking Trail is only about 9 miles long, about half way we stopped and sat down in the sunshine. Talking rubbish, laughing, and as always, telling each other with complete sarcasm how we’re having a shit time. Going into the Viking Trail we had just clocked 42 miles and my legs felt fine. Always in the back of my mind was the fact that I had a TT the next day. I was conscious of this and never pushed it, there was no need today. The trails soon started to feel like hard work and the thighs were burning, no surprises I guess with a 40+ mile warm up. Most people, ourselves included, drive here, ride it and go home.  I had put Exotic rigid forks on my bike as this was a touring set up, this was the first time I had properly used them off road and they were great. With no suspension my wrists were starting to ache, my left more than my right, Lincoln had a theory for this. It was great to do a loop on here but we were glad to be off it.

A couple of weeks earlier I had stopped out this way while passing in my car. I went for a walk on Blaxhall Common, I had found a byway and kept this in mind for today. As Lincoln always trusts my navigation, he was fine with my suggestion. It was a long steady climb through the common that really zapped the legs, especially straight after the Viking Trail. We ended up in Blaxhall village and for the first time checked Google Maps for the directions, before this we had remembered all the turns. We were now wanting to head to Saxmundham, although we had been grazing on our snacks from Aldebugh, we were both getting hungry and wanting something more substantial than cereal bars and chocolate.

In this part of the world, the electricity pylons from Sizewell head either east or south east, if you can see them then you can have a good idea of directions. Heading north we saw a bridleway, without much questioning we went for it, what’s the rush? Why not? It went over the London – Lowestoft railway line, at the crossing a man in his mature years shall we say, was about to close the gates “Don’t worry, we’ll close them” Lincoln offered. The man grumbled something and shuffled along to his car. We closed the gate and carried on by the side of some fields that hundreds of pigs called home. The signs designating this as a bridleway had disappeared and we were guessing our route, aiming for the most used path. A few static caravans appeared as well as a crumbling house and some clapped out old tractors. The path we were on was about to go between the houses and the caravans. Skidding to a sudden stop, I said to Lincoln how it didn’t feel good. Rightly or wrongly, I am really aware of how people can be when there’s public access to their  land, especially when we weren’t entirely sure if we should be here or not. And rightly so I guess, they don’t know us and we definitely didn’t know them. I spotted a gate in the corner of the field and some signs designating some kind of path. I went and checked it out, it was a footpath across a marshy bit of land. Thankfully it was dry, although it was a footpath, it was the most favoured option. Giving  Lincoln the thumbs up, as he stayed at the top of the field like a Meerkat on guard, he followed as I went through the gate. “Let’s get the hell out of here” I said, to which my lookout Meerkat then told me there were a couple of blokes in tractors.

3 miles later we were in Saxmundham. We stopped outside a takeaway, we discussed having pizza, it sounded like a good idea. We needed something substantial but unfortunately their pizza oven wasn’t on.  We passed a bike shop, I decided to ask if they had any small tubes of lube. My chain was starting to squeak a bit and out of all the things I had put in my bottle cage toolbox, a small tube of lube wasn’t one of them. I asked a bloke at the door what lubes he had, he asked his colleague in the shop to show me. I followed him in “I’m afraid we only have a women’s one” I was told. How the hell is there a woman specific lube? What difference does gender make to your groupsets lube?  I was thinking. I know that the cycling world is full of gimmicks but this is a bit much, didn’t this bloke realise that April fool’s day was 17 days earlier? And then the penny dropped, I laughed, pointed and said “It’s not lube for down there, it’s for my chain”. The poor bloke, he then tried to flog me some biggish tube for £11.99. I declined the offer, I’d rather buy some olive oil.

Leaving the shop laughing, I told Lincoln what had happened. Lincoln as always had found someone to talk to, that bloke loves to talk, nothing bad, he’d just be crap as a sniper. The bloke he was talking to worked in a vape shop, “You need some oil, hang on”. He returned with some 3-in-1, brilliant! Just what I wanted, I wouldn’t put it on some of my bikes but for this one I wasn’t bothered about. We thanked him for his generosity and left to grab some over priced food from the nearby Waitrose, until Lincoln spotted a bakery, wonderful! Sitting on a nearby wall we ate our food and watched Starlings squeezing into an eve of a house above us to tend to their squealing chicks.

I checked the route, and we headed off  towards East Bridge to retrace our steps back. Clayhills Road was the road we wanted after Saxmundham, the name should have given it away, as we swung into the road it went up, pretty steep on now tired, rested legs on a heavy bike. “How can I be on the limit at 7mph!” I remember just about saying.  It was a shock to the system,  I turned my head round  to look at the climb, “Look at what we’ve just come up” I said, Lincoln turned his head. Infront was a right corner, and at the same time a car came round the corner, as Lincoln turned his head he swerved to the right on the wrong side of the road, to avoid the car he ended up on the pavement on the other side of the road. It doesn’t sound funny now while writing this as the possible consequences seem clearer, but at the time I laughed, bloody cyclists.

We carried on through country lanes, wondering if we would find Jules laying in the sand, impersonating  Psammead in the 90’s Kids TV programme, Five Children and It.

We seemed to be making good progress, not going fast, just nice and steady. We got back to East Bridge and through to Dunwich. I wanted to stop at Dunwich as there is a road sign which I’ve seen before but never stopped at. As we stopped I noticed that it was handmade, brilliant!

We decided to take a bridleway on the way out of Dunwich. Lincoln said he was thinking of my legs when he suggested this as it was avoiding a hill, I think he was thinking about his legs too. It was a lovely diversion through the forest and through the heaths. We stopped and sat for a while, basking in the sun like Cormorants on a groyne, bliss!

This route did bring us out quite a bit further out of the way than we anticipated but was still in the general direction that we needed to go for Walberswick.  We took a different bridleway into Walberswick which had a few bumps, by this time the legs were starting to protest at any incline, especially ones that resembled a big sand dune. Riding along a lane, a family had stopped to take a photo of themselves.  Dad and the kids on the right hand side of the road and mum on the left. They saw us coming and waited to take their posed snap. “Say cheese!” we both said in complete random synchronisation as we went through the middle of them as they laughed at our childish behaviour.

 

We crossed the Bailey Bridge again over the river Blythe and towards the back end of Southwold. We stopped at a bench on the main road into Southwold. We were far from exhausted but just a bit tired, stops were becoming more frequent. After a bit of people watching we carried on through Reydon before turning off again towards Covehithe/Benacre, re-tracing our route from 9 hours before. We got to the bridleway where Jules hit the deck in the morning, we could see where someone had come off their bike in a different spot, hopefully he had come off again, I’m sure he was fine.

We wiggled our way through the bridleways, I took a photo of a tree I always look at but never stopped at. Me and Lincoln discussed whether the only bit of life in it is from the original tree. We then realised it was Holly so obviously not, but was it around the big old oak when it was alive we wondered.

 Anyways, off again until we stopped, again, at St.Michaels Church at Benacre, Lincoln had to water the grass verge. There’s something that I find intriguing about churches, the age, the architecture and wondering about what will happen to these buildings as religion gets forgotten about. Big flash homes with open planned rooms and people rattling around in them with nothing to do, just waiting for the inevitable. Anyways……….

We crossed the A12 and into Henstead where I spotted a stall with an honesty box.  After Mary’s fudge in my last blog, I’ve decided to try and buy something from an honesty box on every long ride. The only ones I had seen today were eggs, so not exactly ideal. We stopped, the obligatory eggs were there, along with a guitar amp, an iron, a mirror, a book case and a clock in the shape of an aeroplane. The clock was the only option as it’s the only thing that would really fit on the bike. So out came the cable ties from the caged tool box thingy and it was soon tied to my bars. Lincoln just laughed at me, not really surprised by my stupidity as he’s just as bad/good. 3 quid in the honesty box and off again for the last 5 miles. 

The wind was northerly, you wouldn’t  think that when you’re only averaging just over 12mph all day that it would make much difference, but it was becoming a pain. The legs were starting to burn and the headwind just made it a bit harder. The thought of sending my apologies for the TT tomorrow kept entering my head, but it soon was told to clear off, I was still going to ride, I had a valid excuse, or more like a reason if I was crap tomorrow. We rolled into Carlton Colville at the back end of Lowestoft. Lincoln reminded me of some chocolate that I had bought in Saxmundham when I got some coffee’s from a sweet shop, it was still in my top tube bag! We stopped with only a couple of miles to go and inhaled the chocolate, we were both pretty hungry by now. A couple of miles later and we were home, 86 miles on the MTBs, with a vast majority off road, wonderful! Another great ride!

Back home, bike in the shed, get clean, eat, show my boy the new clock that I had bought him, get some stuff ready for tomorrow, go and see parents for a bit, check tomorrow’s forecast, crosswind, pack some more stuff ready for tomorrow, bed.

Sunday 18^th April, 6am and the alarm goes off. No way was I excited like I was yesterday morning, but still excited to have a number on my back again and to see what the legs had in them after 85 miles on the MTB. Yesterday’s ride was pure fun with mates, this was going to be hell on my own for 10 miles.

In to the shed for a 25 minute GCN warm up video on the old spin bike, just because it’s a spin bike, doesn’t mean to say I do spin lessons on it. This old bit of kit is perfect for some suffering, intervals galore, but none of those this morning. I ditched the warm up session when I started to sweat, that wasn’t the aim. The legs felt strangely okay. 

Then inside for a bit of yoga but I got bored. Time for some more porridge and a bagel and get stuff together. The amount of stuff I take, clothing, tools, spare wheels etc is probably a bit over the top. Especially when all the preparing equates to a ride time of 20 something minutes.

Me and my boy headed over to Hingham in Norfolk where the HQ of the TT was.  On the way over we were flashed by a car passing us in the opposite direction. We turned the corner to see a sheep on the grass verge, it had jumped over a barbed wire fence. A long story short, we stopped, rounded it up and got it back in the field with its mate. Random!

We arrived at HQ, I signed on, got my number and got the bike ready. No need for a warm up, I don’t think this was going to make any difference today. Just a spin down the road just to make sure the bike was okay. The great thing about this course is that the start line is literally outside the HQ, convenient or what!? The course is straight out for 5.5 miles, round the roundabout then back for  the rest, funny enough, 4.5 miles.

Bike ready and all my kit on, I sat on the back of my car with my brilliant excuse ready for a mediocre ride.  Watching others getting ready in the car park, I wondered how others had prepared for today. Some may have done no riding, some may have done some, some stared at pixels on a screen while racing people they’ll never meet, but I’m sure no one was getting lost in a pig farm and legging it across a marsh.

10:26am was my start time. I rolled up to the start line at 10:24, started the Garmin and put my lights on. Due to covid restrictions there’s no one to hold the riders for their start. So it was a case of push off and hopefully clip in first time, that or just look bloody stupid infront of your fellow riders. “5,4,3,2,1” I heard from Don Saunders, a legend in the TT world in the East. I pushed off and clipped in first time and off I went, passing my boy as he stood taking photos.

Time trialling is all about pacing. It’s not a sprint, but as fast as you can for the distance. Picking up the speed I settled in, a mile in I was averaging 24mph, I gave myself the aim of picking it up to 25. Compared to yesterday, nothing happened, it was all a boring blur, I don’t remember thinking about anything apart from the speed I was averaging, everything blocked out, the way it should be in a TT. I over took a couple of people which is always a psychological boost. At the turn I shouted thanks to the marshals, I often marshal at TTs and appreciate being thanked, so in a positive way, what goes round comes around. I continued to thank the other marshals on the way back. I hit the turn a bit fast and nearly over cooked it, in the gutter and through some gravel on the exit of the roundabout as I nearly ran out of road, whoops! More than half way, just hold on, dig in and try and get to a 25mph average and don’t chuck up your Mars Bar and gel Jonny. I was happy with the effort so far, my breathing was all over the place though, gasping for air. Looking back after the TT, my heart rate was up to 189 bpm, higher than any training I had done over the winter and spring. The valid reason for my average ride was ready, but it was going well.  

In the last mile I saw a carrot to aim for, in other words, a rider infront of me to aim to over take before the finish. Although totally irrelevant to either of our times, it’s a great way to have an aim, a purpose to dig even deeper than you already were. Coming up to the finish line, it was clear behind so I pulled out to overtake as he sat up way before the finish line. Someone blew up early, not me though, I paced it brilliantly. I passed the line, stopped the Garmin with an average speed of 24.4mph and a time of 24:36 in what would be 37^th place out of 57 riders. Brilliantly mediocre, not crazy fast, not exactly slow but as always I was thinking where I could have pushed harder, funny enough no one wishes that they went slower in a TT. I sat up and literally said “I still love that bloody feeling!” the feeling of going as fast as you can. I was greeted at the HQ by my boy who had saved some of sweets for me. Time to relax, have a coffee and some cake, catch up with a club mate, Brian Carr and head home, finished.

What a brilliant weekend of riding, two rides of complete contrasts. No glory, no prizes, no PBs, no shiny plastic medals,  but plenty of laughs, glorious countryside and a kick start to the 2021 TT season. As I previously mentioned, I didn’t want TTs to get in the way of fun, and this one didn’t. Of course I would have been faster if my legs were fresh, I was 1 minute and 20 seconds slower than my personal best on this course, but all things considered I’m happy with it.

Now to start planning the next big ride or another stupid weekend of riding, I have a few ideas in mind.