One of the things I really appreciate about mountain biking is that there’s nowhere to hide if you’re not up to it. If you get things wrong, there’s no “deferred success”, no letting you down gently. You don’t “not pass”, you fail and there’s just the smack of you hitting the dirt. That was how . . . → Read More: When your teeth hurt… you know it was a proper crash!
|
I hate whiny blogs. So there were no posts for a while as I tried to sort things out… Trying to do a big event always seems to push everything else harder. It takes so much time and energy that wrinkles in everyday life seem like mountains. And holes in the plan for the event . . . → Read More: All the usual troubles (and some success!) I often think of training as being a process that shifts my idea of what’s normal. At the moment, going out and doing 70-100 mile rides every weekend seems normal. “Normally”, that’s not normal. The new normal I’m going for now is doing the same rides, but on a loaded bike. I’m working towards getting . . . → Read More: Creating a new normal Food is pretty vital to riding. In the Alaska Ultrasport last year, I made a bit of a mess of it. As people pointed out (too late for me, unfortunately!), I had gone too far down the path of the spreadsheet. I calculated calories per gram, and stocked up with large bulks of the foods . . . → Read More: What to eat? The makers of the mountain bike video, Seasons, probably didn’t think of me slogging around The Chilterns when they came up with their concept but I did think of them as I photographed the same corner in a succession of seasons. To me, it says a lot about riding in the UK. We go out . . . → Read More: Seasons When I was asked if I would teach a course in East Ham, it did seem like the ideal opportunity to get some base fitness going again after NZ. The ride over there is 25 miles and gets interesting at Battersea as it ploughs through central London, crossing Tower Bridge, before heading out via Tower . . . → Read More: Big smoke, big ride There are a number of “Great Walks” in New Zealand, and it had been our plan to take in a couple while we’re out here. The Kepler Track (yes, physics fans, that Kepler) is a 60 km track in the Fjordland area of NZ that starts near Te Anau and takes in lakesides, forests, rivers, . . . → Read More: The Kepler Track A few days into New Zealand and we’re getting things done. We bought a van… We had a swim… And I did some kayaking… It’s odd being in a foreign country with our own Queen on the banknotes and where cars still drive on the left. Kiwi hospitality has been just as exceptional . . . → Read More: Like Wales, but bigger There’s always a time of year when my bikes all start falling to pieces. It’s come now, just as I was getting over a Christmas-acquired cold and disrupted my plans to get some good training in for the TD. The current bike casualty list is: Stuck front brake piston on Pugsley Worn out BB on . . . → Read More: It’s bike failure season, so lets sleep out Why eat malt loaf when you’re riding? Because it makes your spit brown, so you can pretend you’re a tobacco-chewing cowboy without having to chew tobacco. Now, where’s that spittoon? Zp-ting! |
