New Post Shocker ..........

Its been a while, so I thought I would remind you all what I look like. In fact its been so long I'm not sure where to start. 'The beginning' would be too far back. 'The present' would miss a lot of recent going's on and 'a long long time ago in a galaxy far away' has been used before.

I started this blog to keep track of my cycling activities so that seems like as good a place to start as any. 2009 has seen me out on the bike a LOT. More than 3000km on the clock since March with even more planned over the next three months. All in I have ridden more this year than at any point since 1994 when I was much younger and surely less wise. Why all the riding? Well I entered the Marmotte did'nt I? I hasten to add 'entering a marmotte' is not beastiality, although its most definitely painful. The Marmotte is a one day ride in the French Alps, 174 km and 5000 meters of climbing. Col du Glandon, Col du Telegraph, Col du Galibier with a finish on Alpe D'Huez - yowsers! Naming the event after a cute furry mammal is (I think) a French attempt at humour, or perhaps the name refers to the creatures which pick at the corpses of fallen riders. To help motivate me to do the necessary training I prefer to think of the ride in the words of Dr Langley, he calls it 'the circle of death'. We will see come July.

So this year has been all about riding. Whilst I am still not confident that I will have a good ride in the Marmotte I can say I have come a long way in fitness since March. My training was given a big hand up early in the year since I was made redundant by TomTom. Bit of a shock at the time but as they say every cloud ... So I was in the fortunate position of being able to fit in four or five rides a week whilst looking for work, which helped lay the base for the bigger stuff I am doing right now. I also landed a job with Nikon as Senior Product Manager so it worked out very nicely. The training has gone well thanks in part to my decision to heed the advice of the coaching books and ride slower than I would (could) normally ride. Surprise surprise after a few weeks of riding within myself the efforts became a lot easier and I was covering the ground a lot faster. The unexpected benefit of the slow and steady start was I actually started looking forward to going out to ride as I knew every pedal stroke was not going to be a lactic loaded suffer fest. I even started using the indoor trainer for specific workouts! It looks like I AM wiser than I was in '94.


The trainer. A necessary evil.


The view from the trainer. Looks like '89 Tour, a necessary distraction.

Along the way I have been to the US with the bike twice. France once where I rode up Ventoux from Bedoin and broke a spoke on the descent down to Sault (I had a score to settle from 2006 but it seems I was not supposed to settle it on that trip).


The bike travelled with me, happily it too arrived safely.


The Blue Ridge Parkway - Virginia in March. Four hours, 110k, 1100m, 4 cars! Who said America is the land of the automobile?


Ventoux in April, Col Ferme. Cold, windy, miserable and steep but I loved every moment of the ride up. I forgot just how steep and narrow the climb is through the forest.


Broken spokes and descents do not mix.


The second trip to the US in 2009. Robinson Canyon, Carmel Valley CA. A beautiful May morning to be riding in the hills.

I have also completed four UK based sportives so far this year, last weekend I was in Wales and caught up with Nigel who despite saying he has not been riding much was flying. He finished 5th overall in the 130k ride putting a good 25 minutes into me. I was pretty happy with my ride which I took quite conservatively. I took a beating two weeks ago over a slightly longer (but equally hilly) sportive so caution was the watch word. I was travelling up the hills quickly (no doubt thanks to the 6 or so kg I have dropped since Feb) and I was sure to pay a lot more attention to drinking and eating. Good lessons for the Marmotte.


Chiltern Hilly May 31st - 160k / 2500 m. Appearances can be deceptive, I was in the pain cave for 5 hours on this one - it almost killed me.

Am I in good enough shape for the Marmotte? Not sure, it's a big day and my biggest day so far this year has been 160k and 2500 meters climbing. I have a sportive lined up this weekend which is 160k and 3800m, if I can knock that one over and live to tell the tale I can be cautiously optimistic for the Marmotte.

Ham sorry for the delay, thanks to all for checking in its great to know you are out there reading. Until next time.

Bertren in late May - Day one

Inspired by the fantastic Rapha book 'Great Road Climbs of the Pyrenees' and spurred on by some conversations with Nigel I decided to spend a couple of weeks in the Pyrenees riding the roads which I enjoyed so much in 2006. I would spend week one staying in cycling friendly accomodation in Bertren (80k east of Lourdes). Bertren gives ridable access to a whole host of cols I have never ridden before, Superbagneres, Col des Ares, Col de Mente, Col du Portillon, Port D'Aspet and one that struck fear into my legs Port de Bales. The second week would be spent in Lourdes at the residence Foch where I would meet up with Nigel (who would fly in to join me) and Mark - a friend of Nigel's. Both Mark and Nigel were along to recce the etape which would climb the Tourmalet and Hautacam. Sadly Nigel who was originally scheduled to join us had to pull out of the trip at the last moment due to some health issues. So it was going to just be Mark and I in Lourdes.

I loaded up the 'motor' on Friday evening and headed off to Ashford with a stop scheduled just north of Paris that evening. I recall getting stuck in traffic in Paris on our journey south in 2006 so was keen to 'clear' the city when traffic would be scarce. However this meant more than 300k to be covered once I was in France.

Traffic in the UK meant I missed my scheduled 'sailing' So an hour and a half later than planned I boarded the train. All went smoothly until the Parisian suburbs where running low on fuel I followed my trusty TomTom to a petrol station on route (one of dozens nearby). Unfortunately I took it for granted the the Parisian garages would be of the 24 hour variety. No problem they have pumps that accept payment by card. Wrong! When my cards were rejected at all of the half dozen garages and my fuel range was registering 0 kms things were looking grim.

Should I continue to search for a garage hoping to find one where my cards would work but running the risk of running out of fuel (driving a diesel I would therefore require mechanical assistance to get on my way again as woe betide running a diesel engine dry). Or should I hole up for the night at a garage which would open in the morning. After around 10 failed garages I made my mind up that the next garage on the list would be make or break. If my cards did not work I would spend the night on the forecourt.

Thankfully the gods were smiling on me and my card was accepted and I could continue the final 10k to my now long overdue bed. It was now gone 2am and not wanting to make the original crack of dawn departure I had scheduled on so little sleep the chances of making Bertren early enough to get a ride in were looking slim.

Hamsters on the move

Was in Amsterdam for business this week. I am over there at least once a month these days. Whilst I was away I caught up with Ham's most recent blog update so as I was waiting to board my flight home I dropped him an SMS to wish him safe passage to the US. It was a great surprise to get a message straight back saying 'I am in an airport heading to Heathrow for the evening to pick up my connection to the US tomorrow morning'. What luck! A flurry of SMS ensued and two hours later Ham and I were having a beer together and talking about timings for an Italia '09 trip.

Unfortunately I did not have a camera to add some images to this post but it was great to see Ham so unexpectedly. Its good to text. Good to see you Ham all the best in your new 'cage'. For all you other bloggers out there standby for more details of the Italia trip. In the mean time check out this post and images from a cyclist of his recent trip to the Sella Ring in Italy. Stunning! http://jeredgruber.com/site/?p=475

First post ........

Well this is the first post of (I hope) many to try and keep those who are in the know up to date with my two wheeled adventures as I attempt to turn myself into a sometime very keen cyclist into a always very keen (and riding) cyclist. Stay tuned for further updates ............