Sunday being the designated 'cycle for hours to make a multitude of body
parts complain' day, we did the great thing of finding out where the
local CTC's tea stop would be, planning our own route there, meeting up
for a good nosh and bit of chatter, and then limping home again.
Will *try* and keep it brief... As usual, what I refer to as hills you
might think are pimples or mountains, depending - keep your views on
that *firmly* to yourself ;-P
Headed out to 6 mile bottom again, in slightly windy but bright sunny
weather, but only once we'd straightened my front mudguard (very
necessary given the lack of clearance on it!)
Fairly hard work initially till my legs/body had warmed up, but noted
small hill was considerably easier work than previous, and a short small
climb in one of the Wilbrahams went virtually unnoticed (Yay!)
Cars tended to pass by pulling out too late - some were only barely
pulling out as they passed my back wheel, we (two) were cycling further
apart this time (I get to see the potholes a bit earlier that way!) and
I wonder if that had something to do with it - driver miscalculation on
when to start pulling out based on two cyclists with a gap (not big
enough to slot back into) rather than two cyclists with very small gap,
ie nearly one cyclist... But there were others that passed properly,
so not all bad.
Six mile bottom was reached fairly quickly (or so it felt - hard to
believe that was a major acheivement involving several rest stops a
couple of years ago) and we crossed over and up long climb to brinkley.
Always a killer on my legs, last time I managed to just get up it in
lowest gear - same this time except once round the slight corner and at
the top of that part of the climh I stopped to let the legs recover,
having ended up in the burning-leg zone of things, and then had another
mild bout of being unable to breathe, feeling very faint, etc.
This time I actually thought to look at the heart rate monitor I was
wearing and discovered a reason for this... I'd felt tired but ok on
initially stopping, the faintness etc kicked in a few seconds later - my
heart rate had gone from 176 on the climb to 100 in less than a minute,
suddenly the way I was feeling made loads of sense... so this is
something to investigate - it didn't happen again in the ride, despite
getting the heart rate way up there again, but for shorter stints perhaps.
Continued with small descent then another climb to Brinkley, then along
to Carlton. My recollections of the ups and downs from this point get a
bit sketchy, cos I've not shoved the data into the PC yet from the HRM.
I remember it as being fairly constant around the 100m mark, but some
rolling up/down parts to it.
Then it was on to West Wickham (I think), Shudy Camps, Castle Camps
(more hills) the legs were getting tired by now, but quite pleased that
they didn't fill up with lactic acid for a lot of the climbs that
previously would have killed them and ended up with me walking up them.
T'other half made my day by exclaiming with some suprise after a quick
stop for a drink, that my calf muscles were really quite visible. This
is quite an achievement, given the amount of flab, and proves the
muscles I've been discovering on my thighs aren't just all in the mind!
However, as we set off again, my inner thigh suddenly ached, and
though I pedalled on for a bit, with it not improving and an inability
to put any power through it (gosh, cycling one-legged's not as hard as I
thought it would be) a quick stop and prod and poke decided me I had
cramp (normally this is in calves and utterly agonising). More
squeezing and poking and I told my body it would just have to live with
it and set off again, hoping gentle use while the other leg did most of
the work would help loosen it up again.
Rain was threatening - I could smell it in the air and the clouds looked
ominous, and I *HATE* cycling in the rain - I've only done it once, and
it was possibly one of the worst rides I'd done to date - pedals like
ice with wet shoes. It managed to hold off though, and we arrived (much
looked forward to) Helions Bumpstead, and tea at the Three Horseshoes
with the others from the CTC rides. Fantastic tea there, too. Sarnies,
and the all important cake. YUM!
And the heavens opened. It rained. And rained. And got brighter. And
rained some more. And while I was very glad to be inside, my thoughts
were on slippery wet roads, pedals like ice, and the thought of cycling
home in the rain for 23 miles - which was NOT in the least bit appealing.
Eventually it stopped, and we headed out (quite some time after the CTC
left) - only for me to get a puncture a mile down the road. I think I
picked it up at the pub, or just as we left - and I wasn't the only one,
someone from the CTC on a recumbent got one in the pub carpark too!
New tube on, brakes sorted out, and we were off again, via a slightly
different route - past the Camps, along to Bartlow, climb up to West
Wratting, then heading down toward Six Mile bottom again.
This has to be the hardest bit of the entire ride (West Wratting/6 mile
bottom). The wind was strong and gusting, and I'm not experienced at
all in cycling in wind. Hedgerows and trees gave a little shelter, but
made it worse when the wind found a way over/through/under/around and a
sudden gust blasted you sideways. Very hard going even though it wasn't
a headwind - I could have cycled faster but the unpredicability of the
wind pushing me sideways wasn't pleasant. I made the decision to cycle
in the centre of the 'car' lane of the road, rather than my more
customary left-wheel-track sort of position - any cars would just have
to put up with that and overtake more carefully, I decided, given the wind.
And then the rain started. Did I say I hated cycling in rain?
It's actually not so bad. Yes, it was cold, my legs found it a lot
harder going once they were cold (wish I'd taken my waterproof
leggings), and they got to the burny phase at a lot lower heart rate
(another interesting discovery). I was snug and warm inside my jacket -
they're right when they say you just need to be dressed right to be
comfortable in the rain, and I NEVER thought I'd agree with that. The
rain's bloody noisy on both helmet and jacket. Helmet helped keep me
dry. Gets harder to see with rain on your glasses, and rain (as with
flies) has a habit of getting into the eyeballs over the top of the
specs somehow. Was very aware that roads might be slippery, so careful
not to do sudden little swerves around things, and braking was a good
deal less effective (and it's always been hard work to stop my bike).
Luckily the roads didn't end up awash with water.
6 mile bottom afforded some shelter and the rain soon cleared up, bright
sunshine on rain-dropped glasses made things interesting for a while :-)
By the wilbrahams I'd overheated and was wetter on the inside of the
jacket than the outside, so that got stuffed in t'other half's pannier
(purely cos it was quicker than re-folding and wedging back on my bike,
honest!). Then I quickly realised it was a lot chillier than I'd
thought from inside my snug jacket, but no way I was stopping again to
faff with it, I decided I'd just have to cycle faster to stay warm. So
nice to be able to decide that and have half a chance of *doing* it!
Short climb up in fulbourn was still hard work but not impossible, and
then it was zipping along the bypass with a tailwind (and me going
'wheeeee! Faster! faster!' to myself in my daft brain) and home.
46 miles of very pleasant though somewhat challenging cycling. And then
I proceeded to ache a lot, get stiff, and discover a blister on my bum :-)
Definitely getting faster - similar sorts of hills covered to the last
ride we did, and generally faster speed. Hills aren't as imposisble as
they used to be. Still not quite up to the level of the London to
Cambridge bike ride, which is coming up fast, but more and more happy
that I'll manage to get to the end of that (as long as it's not pouring
with rain or a stiff headwind) at an albeit slowish pace.
Can't help wondering why I didn't manage to get to this stage two years
ago, but I have to keep reminding myself that in the two years I've made
a lot of changes to the bike to get it to fit me better, and until I'd
done that the confidence just wasn't there, and with no confidence there
was precious little in the way of enjoyment either.
--
Velvet