So I led the Saturday Shop Ride

Following the all clear from the practice nurse and a MTB test run it was so great to get the opportunity to lead the C&DCYCLES Saturday Shop Ride. The route for today has some of my very favourite local roads. Plenty of ups and downs and pleasant quiet country lanes. 

18 of us left the shop but unfortunately a newbie who'd bitten off more than he could chew retired in Rothwell. Having set off in two groups the quick lads caught us by Kelmarsh after ruining the unfortunate chap. Today's ride was the perfect mix of regulars and newbies. One ride virgin was my good friend and former housemate Nigel. We had a riot as single men in the 90's but for the sake of both our livers it's probably a good thing that Mrs Lindsley stole his wife (yes I did Nigel's ironing too!) On top form today Nigel exceeded even his usual standards of confusion. When asked about the other rider in white Nige said he'd only seen one person, then realised as he was also wearing white 1+1 might still be 2. 

Thanks to brother Dunkley, the coolest of cool beans. Whose mere presence today brought amorous attentions of lady horse riders "you all look so handsome," she said...oh yeah sorry...thanks to Darren we had a route deviation. Lord only knows what Steve had in mind when he announced "we like to be deviant." The deviation in question was to go through Braybrooke, over the river Jordan and the up Griffin Road, a pretty testing climb for Northamptonshire. Excellent detour Darren!

The point of this blog, well one of the points of this blog is to bang on about how good the riding is round here. Once you're out of the towns, away from the traffic lights and the potholes there's just miles and miles of top quality action. That's why the number of other Lycra clad groups we see is definitely on the rise. It might also be why The Women's Tour is gracing us on May 7th with a stage from Oundle to Northampton. The club members lucky enough to have that day off are planning a ride to see the start and finish, if you can I'd advise you to join them.

On return to the shop we were supplied with drinks and cake by Andy. Now he was clearly disappointed not to ride today so we sympathised in the only way we know. Yes that's right unsympathetic banter. We're lucky he has a sense of humour but also he benefits from the character building effects and of course anyone who can't needs to #rule 5.

Tomorrow, they say, tomorrow is just another day. Well not for me. It's Sam's 9th birthday and I can't wait to see him on his new bike! 

Happy pedalling!

Ubiquitous action shot

Nigel

Quick stop at Naseby

Well earned rest at the top of Griffin Road

No worries dude

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Back in the Saddle

So I got the all clear from the practice nurse, my wound has 'healed' and the swab came back clear so no infection. Now to look at that ugly gash on my leg you'd be forgiven for thinking neither of those facts was true!

It's a Friday so it was time to do my Pitsford loop whilst Joe had football training. Now there's a thing with Pitsford and the thing is for a couple of weeks in Spring there are hideous clouds of black flies. Guess what...this was one of those weeks! The clues were all there, Pitsford was crawling with anglers because the fly hatch sends the trout into a feeding frenzy. I even saw a lucky angler land a not so lucky fish. The flies are in dense clouds and there was a pop pop pop as they bounced of my helmet. I was very glad of my glasses but also wished I had my buff to use as a face mask.

Did all that spoil the ride? Of course not! It was great to be back in the saddle. I also clocked up a few PR's, which is nice. I'm really looking forward to tomorrow now and jointing the brothers and sisters of C&DCYCLES.

Happy peddling!

GASH

FLY

So I'm not in training...

There's no pictures and no route from Strava to post. I did have plans tonight. I had a 28 mile route around the Naseby battlefield site. I was going to tell you about the decisive battle in the English Civil War. I was going to show you Prince Rupert's and Fairfax's view, the monument, the churchyard in Marston Trussell where the atrocity happened and wonder about the weirdness of sleepy old Northants being the epicentre of a cultural change that shaped democracy across Europe. More importantly I was going to delight in the quiet roads and rolling landscape that make cycling here such a joy. But no! I'm sat on my arse drinking homebrew, filling my face with junk in the sulk to end all sulks. I feel like an OAP whose waited all day for countdown only to suffer a power cut just before it starts.

The source of my woe is the self inflicted gash in my right calf. I had thought it was healing well. They didn't tell me in A&E not to ride. I may how somehow forgotten to ask but they definitely truly 100% did not say stay off the bike until the stitches are out. I also did some research. I found a triathlon forum where an actual doctor said it was ok to swim in stitches so I assumed cycling was fine. I may have chosen to ignore the bit about cuts on muscles that move a lot during exercise (do we use calf muscles in cycling?) Anyway the practice nurse delivered the killer blow this afternoon. The wound is not fully closed, come back Friday and absolutely no cycling. Friday? I was going to do a big ride up and round Rutland on Friday, not massive only 80 miles(ish), although if I was going well I was going to push it to 100 to complete the 160km March Gran Fondo. This was met with disapproval. I don't think she understands. I also think it was exceptionally poor advice that I should:"take up being a couch potato!"

So now I'm in a bad mood. Cycling is addictive. Crack cocaine is probably easier to give up and possibly safer in my case (this is a joke kids, class A substances are not to be messed with.) How did it get to this though? Well this pleasant little hobby gets under your skin. You start out with a bike and a plan to get a bit healthier and before you know it you desire full carbon, bikes for every known two wheeled escapade, industrial quantities of Lycra and the latest scientifically proven nutritional products. You'll be signed up for every sportive going and wondering if you'd go ok in a time trial. Is this a problem? No! It's flipping fantastic. The only downside is every now and again you have to put your backside on a sofa instead of a saddle. Oh well I suppose I'll have to properly plan a few routes for when I'm fit.

Happy peddling people!

So I might be in training

My thoughts are turning to Sportives with my first of the year probably being the Squires and Spires on Star Wars day (May the 4th be with you.) Before that happens I want to be as prepared as I can which essentially means I'm now in training. You ask most cyclists what they want to improve and they'll say: climbing and average speed over a ride. We're obsessed with it and once again I firmly blame Strava.

Right now I feel I'm a bit of a slouch or as Ty Webb might tell me, I'm a tremendous slouch. For those of you not familiar with caddyshack, what on earth is wrong with you? For those who are please enjoy the full version of that quote:

Judge Smails: You know, you should play with Dr. Beeper and myself. I mean, he's been club champion for three years running and I'm no slouch myself.

Ty Webb: Don't sell yourself short Judge, you're a tremendous slouch.

Ok so that's the problem, I don't feel fully fit and I want to perform better in the sportives. I was pants in the 3 counties and everyone had to wait for me. It really was a case of: fail to prepare, prepare to fail. The quotes don't end there. This is the one I'm drawing inspiration from:

"Do today what others won't, so tomorrow you can do what others can't." - Jerry Rice San Francisco 49ers legendary wide receiver.

Right then let's get to the point of all this rambling. I decided to do hill intervals. I picked the hill from Rothwell to Orton because it's about half a mile, as steep as anything around here, leaves me out of breath and it's quiet. I did the hill ten times, riding to the top turning around and using the descent to recover. I thought doing this would be tough and it was but not nearly as hard as I thought. I either need a bigger hill (imagine doing this up Rocky,) or I took it too easy and need to ride as hard as I can on every climb. Either way I tried it, I can do it and I'm going to do it some more.

The enemy

View from the top

The awesome power of the one23 extreme bright light

C&DCYCLES Saturday Shopride

Once again the highlight of my cycling week was this 30ish mile loop with my good friends from the C&DCYCLES club. Of late Big Steve Major has led a lot and he's doing a great job. On the ride. Today we had a bit of an issue. One of our biking brothers, a newbie called Gary, was knocked off his bike by an inpatient van driver. For those of you who know it, there's a bridge over the Nene at Woodford Mill narrows to only allow one vehicle. People travelling towards Ringstead have right of way and that's what we were doing. Unfortunately red van man valued the next ten seconds of his life so highly that with disregard to us lycra clad loonies he decided to cross the bridge at the same time. Someone in front of Gary had to take evasive action. Gary slammed on the anchors, locked up and bounced off the vans wing mirror. Gary was battered bruised cut and his jacket was wrecked. The van nan did the right thing and took him home and I hope Gary is ok. This isn't a cyclist v motorists rant. I'm both and I've made plenty if mistakes on bikes and in cars. The thing is our sport can be dangerous. It doesn't have to be and this us one of those times where it was totally unnecessary. As someone once said to me: it's better to arrive late in this world than early in the next. The rest of us continued and the the ride concluded without further incident.

The ride itself was typical Northamptonshire rolling scenery. For those following you'll know about my relationship with certain hills. Another PR on the hill out of Thrapston suggests to me I might be starting to win some of the gravity resistant battles. 14 other PRs is a great return and whilst the shop ride isn't about personal goals I'm pleased with that. Roll on next week and hopefully incident free cycling.

Another Friday another trip to...

No not A&E just a return to the crash scene and a successful completion of the planned route. I have to say I remembered something tonight. I bloody love cycling. This is a good route. Nice bit of off road, interesting features and some interesting animals. It's also a good time for a blast around Pitsford because it's quiet. The reservoir bike track can get very busy and too right too. It's a fantastic local resource that we're lucky to have. The wooded sections were splendidly lit up by my trusty one23 which added a nice bit of atmosphere to the ride.

The main thing to report is I still have stitches in my calf but I was absolutely fine. So it's game on for  the C&DCYCLES shop ride tomorrow.

Tonight's bike was my classic Orange P7. This steel framed beast from the early noughties has served me so well. It's so dated with calliper brakes and rigid forks. It's also so brilliant. I can't explain why but off road it's just really agile. I'm told it's the geometry and also replacing the forks would ruin this. I've also ridden her on the Oxford - Cambridge charity ride for the BHF. I'd love to get the updated version 2011 Orange P7 or maybe the clockwork orange 29er. Great British bikes. Unfortunately you can get nearly as much bike for a lot less cash in other brands so this maybe the only Orange I ever own. The biggest laugh of this is my total cluelessness when I bought my Orange 2nd hand for £270 in 2006. I had no idea what a great bike it was and absolutely no idea that putting slicks on it to ride to work was a complete waste of this bike's talents. If I didn't know before, the bike shop manager at Cannock Chase virtually coming in his pants when he saw my P7, was the icing on the cake.

The dreaded ford and scene of last week's crash

Lovely bit of off road action

Llamas or are the alpaca?

another life lesson

Ok so tonight I learned another valuable lesson. If your riding through a ford for the first time take it easy! I'm writing this in A&E. I have a gash on my leg, probably caused by my chainring after a heavy fall! Mr tumble strikes again. In better news there is no apparent bike damage.  

So here's an update: I got five stitches and have to lay off the bike for at least a week. The place I fell is notorious and in fact my Dad has come off on the very same spot. I'll ride this route again in a few weeks and explain the pics etc, I won't be using the ford, I'll use the footbridge next to it.

The gate of many tools at Holly Lodge, a feature on this route

The folly on spectacle lane, about 200 yards from the ford of tumble!

Yeah it hurts!