Sweeties, Pies and Ginger

The Triathlon Club's swimming session was cancelled this morning as the National Relays were on or something and everyone was away at that. Instead I decided to go for a bike ride that would encompass one of the local time trial courses. For the last few weeks I've been wanting to cycle out towards Six Mile Bottom and the further East as there are more rolling hills out that way.

In the end I decided to go to Bottisham and ride either the E2/25b course or the E3/10 course. I wasn't sure how far it was going to be to get to the courses, so I decided to make my mind up when I got there. In the end I plumped for the E3/10 course I was a bit late in starting and a bit slow in getting there as I was taking it really easy to conserve energy for the main effort.

Once onto the course I got down on the tri bars and got into the big ring and tried to give it some welly. Oh my god, I was absolutely crap! I don't think it helped that I was in not very much clothing and it was overcast and a bit windy, the predicted sun hadn't made an appearance. I'm not sure what time or speed I did over the course as the bike computer can't do laps (I might have to find one that does), but it certainly wouldn't have been near thirty minutes.

The course is surprisingly hard as there is quite a bit of up and down on it, although there is also quite a lot of flat for making up time as well. Once getting back to my starting point I cycled home for a total trip of thirty five miles and one totally trashed pair of legs.

I'm glad I went and did it as it will prove to be a useful training tool to gauge progress over the winter when I go and do it again. It's also not too far away to get there and back, around twenty five miles, so the E2/25b course is also feasible with out having to drive over to it.

I think the thing I learnt the most from doing this session was that I need to increase the intensity when I'm out ion the bike. It's no go just going and doing forty miles at an average speed of 17 miles an hour, I need to get my legs used to going flat out for as long as they can. I might try and incorporate the E2/25b into a training session in the next couple of weeks, we'll see how it goes.