afan quiets

Relaxed and happy weekend with a select band of warriors.

Saturday - 99km in the sunshine, baggies and ballons for the birthday honorary girl (any race kit in evidence penalised with additional decoration, white socks exempt), full Skyline, tea and Cake#1, down to Penhydd and the Wall (but no birthday pie), back up the railway trail towing injured member ("what do you mean it's all uphill"), beer supper banter (and blatant flirting) at the rammed and rowdy cafe, a slice of Cake#2 and a deep and cosy sleep warmed by recovering legs.


pic Nigella Foskett

Sunday - Whites Level, misty and atmospheric and more like the M25 but then again it's pretty nice to bimble up the climbs having a good old chat every now and again rather than breathing out of your arse and seeing only stars at the top before rocking the downhills and showing the boys how it's done. Bwwwaaaaaarpppp.

Top weekend, funny tan lines, plenty of cake and giggling. Highly recommended.

Duathlon training, now with added aliens!

I'm racing a duathlon on May 24th, it's 5km run, 22km bike, 5km run. My plan for today was to do run, bike, run to cover those distances, not necessarily at race pace, but just to make sure I can get round on the day. Due to husband having to work, my much needed trip to the hairdresser and a 3000 word essay that doesn't seem to be writing itself my plans went completely off track. By 5pm I realised I was never going to do my mock duathlon and I managed instead a strange triathlon of a 7km run followed by 0km on the couch to watch Doctor Who battle some aliens and then 15km on the bike. Possibly not the most comprehensive training plan ever, but it was fun!

Vikki

Mud

Slick tyres off, cyclocross tyres on, commute home transformed from A-road caution to muddy trail fun!

Vikki

Wind and wine.

Friends are visiting. A couple of days of too much food and drink and not enough sleep meant there was a danger of them driving home again with their bikes having seen nothing but the inside of their car. The Lancashire weather lived up to it's current form and this morning gave us gave us howling Easterlies mixed in with intermittent drizzle. Despite the elements, fatigue and fat we forced ourselves out to ride just long enough to justify a big roast dinner and the opening of another bottle of wine! A good time was had by all.

Vikki

honc if you're hungry

Yesterday was our annual Cotswolds excursion for HoNC. Since I started doing this event the number of 'cross bikes present has dwindled to a handful and is swamped by mountain bikes of all sorts. Which is odd, really, because why would you take a 6" travel bike on a 100km ride which has an absolute minimum of technical trails, a fair amount of tarmac and not one mountain? Hmm.



We'll stick with the (pictured, dishing out sweeties) niche, I think. There's always a fair amount of satisfaction in picking off mtb'ers one by one on the descents. And the climbs. And the long flat drags into the wind, heckling as we go. Yup, cross bikes rule. And it's got to be a unique event where you see a Daimler pull into the car park with a Whyte Preston on the back...

As for the legs - happy. Climbing well, easy spinning along the tops, descending not too mince-ily and the hollow bell of an empty tummy only made itself present at the top of the very last descent from Cleeve. Rah.

nearly there...

of the north, more later. for now - this evening. rode with an old friend. favourite trails, warm sun. much chat.
lovely.

j.

Competetive moment

I wouldn't describe myself as a naturally competetive person, but on my commute home last night I had a definite moment. Downhill from a set of traffic lights I was having to apply a bit of brake as my fixed gear legs were in danger of whirring into a situation of no return when another bike passed me. I can't quite put my finger on what it was about being passed, a situation that never usually bothers me, but something just caused me to make a ridiculously determined effort to catch up with this other rider on the following uphill. Out of my saddle stomping away I just managed to be a wheezing, near puking wreck of a girl right on his back wheel at the next red light. Fortunately I came to my senses and let it go, the rest of the ride home was without incident.

Vikki

North of The Border.

Me and a few friends just had a long weekend away North of The Border in Scotland, first time I've ridden the trails up there and it was ace. Did a Cycleactive skills day on Friday at Ae Forest, a bit of a refresher on some of the basics plus learning a few new techniques, much grinning when mastering the wheelie! Then over to Peebles for riding at Glentress. This bit of the trip was absolutely tip-top. Superb riding, rooms booked at The Hydro meant haggis as an option for breakfast and post ride jacuzzi and steam room. The best cakes ever and a bike shop full of shiney niceness at The Hub and the snow seemed to keep the midges down. Hibernian cycling heaven.

Vikki

celebration

the clocks have sprung for spring and this is 7.30pm:



so it's definitly time for the last one. i saved it for the end of winter; just like i always save a little bit of christmas for the end of winter, because january and february are long, lean times and somehow all that festivity never seems to do much more than underline the endlessness of the later, longer quarter of the year. a week's perfectly timed holiday awaits; the work is done, the email is off, the batteries are charged and the bike is loaded. may it be a long one.

terror!

so, today has been like christmas, knocks on the door all day - mostly work stuff, but also a big box of GDR equipment from the lovely people at Snow & Rock... and then these arrived:



cue several very excited laps of the kitchen before i dared risk handling sharp implements.

s o e x c i t e d !

thirty thirty zero

so, eleven was the stopping point, not just of the challenge but of the winter. prior to commencement i had embarked on the rest week that marked the end of the big volume miles for this year. it is a well known fact that rest weeks are when you will get sick, if you have overdone it (well it's meant to be if, with me it's usually when...). i overdid it so much that it took the whole rest week and another week of still feeling inexplicably tired and not really doing very much and then i got sick. ha. cease all activity, 'just' sleeping, daytime tv, no energy to be bored or even really worry about the shrinking legs, 'just' two weeks and the healing is done.

the first ride back was glorious, not least because it confirmed that less is more (a lesson i am apt to forget), my legs were still there and i hadn't missed spring, at all - rain sleet hail snow sleet gales, repeat.

unfortunately now every time i stick my nose out the door i am greeted with an endless procession of these big fat bulldozer clouds, rolling in on a north-westerly and full of weather that doesn't rain so much as torrent down out of the sky taking all the colour with it.



still, rivers for trails means no tyre tracks and hence all the super-local-super-cheek is currently fair game and i've ridden every day this week without really thinking about it and with a fat grin on my face. lovely.

Weather beaten

Rode last night with Amy. As tough as we are, we are not tougher than Mother Nature. Hail, sideways rain and blasting winds. Out on the moors, it became near impossible to keep going, common sense prevailed at some point and we got back to the road. We pedalled against the wind downhill. Soaked to the skin, numb hands, shoes full of water. The Black Dog at Belmont was a welcome sight as we finally made it to our patiently waiting other halves. Much needed good food and beer soon had Amy deciding that actually the weather hadn't been that bad, and what a good ride it had been, I think I'll need to get some rose tints fitted to my riding glasses before I can agree with her.

Vikki

A whisper

While lurking on the Singletrack blog I caught a whisper of news that some extra places were available for SSUK 08 I fired off a quick email to the race organisers, and I'm in! So 44 days to transform myself into either a race whippet or a girl who can hold her beer. Training needed either way!

Vikki

Surprise parcels

Ohmigod..... pink Sit 'n' Spin pants and Twizzle skirts just arrived from Canada. Running round trying to get Mr Minx to take a photo so we can put them on the site. One of each in my size already snaffled for (ahem) work wear.

Minx

Jamie knows nothing!

Jamie Oliver TV adverts about hot cross buns meaning winter is over, ha, that's what I say! Get up here and ride the rolling roads of the West Pennines. The first 15 minutes of todays ride was dry the rest of it was wet, cold and some more wet. My toes went numb (I have scrounged some overshoes for my next ride). A tad over 20 miles of this was enough so we headed to the safety of Amy's house where I had to borrow dry clothes and glug hot tea. Thanks to Ali for rustling up lovely plates of warming pasta. Apparently I do this for fun!

Vikki

six seven eight nine and ten

six - harveys run via cheeky trails
seven - the annual excursion to yorkshire for a beasting, which turned out to be rather fun thanks to a Pace 305, good friends and great fish'n'chips
eight - frenetic woodland tech, far beyond my current limits and only broadening the grin
nine - easing stiff driving legs with a spin between hailstorm and sunset
ten - the only let-down - 60 minutes and 27 seconds on the turbo because i was justifiably too scared to ride outside with bits of fence and rooftop whizzing about the village...

j.

Punctures!

A lot of singlespeed crunching and pushing uphill to Peel Tower. The reward of the nice bit of riding from there over the moors was stolen away by a series of punctures, a lack of planning to bring enough spare tubes and an impending menacing weather front. Ride abandoned. I have however discovered I can run alongside my bike at quite a pace over a surprising distance if I think my car ride back to my dinner depends on it.

Vikki

Struggle

Rode this morning and it was a struggle. I didn't seem to have the energy and the legs for the climbs and I didn't seem to have the nerve for the descents. This made for a lot of frustration and more pushing than I would normally do.

Vikki

5/30

just a spin, shifting snot... forgot that proper recovery weeks of doing bugger all* leave me with the fidgets like nothing else. gngnnh.

j.

*yes, i am aware that 10 hours of riding a week is not actually bugger all but it's all relative, isn't it...

Cake, shopping and giggling.

Road ride today with friends, 58 miles. A fab food stop, really good cake. 2 bike shops visited for a little spend (mmmm new road shoes). So much giggling it bordered on hysteria at times. Top day out. I'm a bit tired now though.

Vikki