Yearly Update

It's been nearly a year since my last post, so this one is actually early by my standards.

Firstly, I'm of two minds as to the name of this thing. I am quite fond of it, but, on the other hand, we no longer live in a Shire of any kind. If any of you have any suggestions for an equally awesome name (a silly notion, but nevertheless), I'm all ears.

Ok. Some of you know, and the rest of you can probably infer, that I haven't been doing anything aside from working with bikes, and then riding them around in my own time. As a result, I have very little going on in my life to fill the pages here, which is why I'm going to fill them with just that (not very little; with bikes). The format will be more or less thusly and such:

I ride my bike, then tell you about it.

Really, I'm just going to use this as a training diary of sorts, with bits of non-bikey content inserted as it happens. The reason I'm not doing much else these days is all because of something that will be over within an 11 hour period in a few months time.


A little over a month ago, a friend of mine inquired if I would be interested in joining a few of them whilst they rode their bikes over some hills in Victoria, during an event called the 3 Peaks Challenge. I'm always up for a challenge on the bike, especially if there are hills involved, and there was plenty of time to prepare so I was definitely in.

Yes please!

What that has meant is that on my days off and for a few hours before work on 3 days I'm just getting km's and elevation in the legs. 3 weeks on, rest week, 3 weeks on, etc, until March 10th.

Mostly I'm not overly concerned about completing the 235km ride with around 4500m elevation (one website has it clocked at over 4700m). It won't be easy, but I'll get through it. Unless...

My biggest fear is weather. Even if it's perfect, It's going to be Alpine in nature, so cold at the top, hot at the bottom. In years past, people have had to pull out due to hypothermia, snow, nearly 40C, constant rain, wind, etc. Basically, you'll get some measure of all four seasons in one day. The cold and rain is what will destroy me. I'm not a fan of high winds either, so I'm just hoping that the weather holds out. It's been pretty hot this year so far, so finges crossed. At least there are a few of us that can suffer together.

I also really need to make sure that I take the week leading up to the event really seriously. Good rest. Good food. Staying hydrated. Taking it easy on the bike. A few weeks ago I knocked off a 180km  ride with 4000m climbed and felt surprisingly good about it. Yesterday I did 160km with a little more than half of the elevation and felt terrible. The last thing I want to happen is to wake up on March 10th and just not have the legs on the day.

That's the background. My weekly training schedule is roughly this (my days off are Sunday and Monday):

Tuesday: off
Wedensday: morning ride before work, hills, usually 40-60km. Medium effort.
Thursday: off
Friday: morning ride before work, hills, usually 40-60km. Medium effort.
Saturday: flat ride, 50km, fast cadance, medium/high to high effort.
Sunday and Monday sometimes alternate, depending on what rides are happening. One will be a big day (150km+, lots of climbing), one will be medium (70-80km, climbing, but not as intense). If there is a big ride on Sunday, Monday will be a bit of a recovery ride, if it's on Monday, I may go out for an easy flat ride along the coast to recover on Tuesday.

Yesterday's ride was a biggish one. Only 3 of us turned up, but being new years eve and the morning after Saturday night during the holidays, I suppose it's to be expected. It was going to be warm with a few big hills, but not constant. Most of it was a bit rolley.

Willunga Hill (part way up), as featured in the TDU every year

The area surrounding Adelaide could not be better for cycling, all things considered (though I'd love some real mountains). Quiet roads, beautiful scenery, plenty of hills, generally decent weather, year round cycling. Yesterday we went south into McLaren Vale and hit some of the big hills in this wine region. It was a gorgeous ride, only sullied by my feeling stiff, tired, unable to get comfortable on the bike, getting slowly ground down by a pesky head wind, and eventually dehydrated and borderline sunstroked by the end of it.

Today I am resolved to sit on my butt and relax. I've got to build up for another big one on Sunday. I'll try to remember to take some pictures while I'm out there, but they'll be on my phone (as above), so don't expect anything spectacular.

Oh yes, happy new year.