Into It

What a difference the weather makes.

I made it out Friday and decided to try out a new route, following the road to Hayle for ten miles before opting for the back roads towards Camborne and returning home. I mapped it out to be a 20 mile ride which should have taken under two hours, getting me home just in time for it to get dark. Unfortunately I took a wrong turn, made it back on to my intended route and then came across a closed road, meaning I had to divert a mile or so out of the way. A mile or so turned into a few miles or so and I finally made it back 50 minutes late, well after the sun had descended and the roads were pitch black having covered just over 31 miles.

Today I decided to take it easy on myself and went for a route that I knew well, towards Redruth on the back roads and returning along the same route. While on the course I noticed a massive descent into the village of Stithians (I know, the place with the reservoir...of course there are going to be descents, right?). Having climbed to the top of the hill to go down it I decided to get back on to the road for the return journey so I wasn't doing 20 miles of hill training and this gave me a great idea - I should do this all the time. Thus, I am now planning back routes to neighbouring towns with a nice, fast paced return through the traffic of Cornwall.

Both journeys had little rain and limited wind, although on Friday the wind started to pick up as the ol' sun disappeared. I was on my way home by then though so didn't much care.

I also had a relaxed, almost two mile run on Saturday with my lovely children as we're all working towards a virtual running 10K medal each.

This is my weekends from now on.

Definitive Differences

Wednesday (inside), Friday, Sunday training is going to work really well. However, I've just finished my second outdoor ride of the week and both were considerably different - Friday's 25 miler was very wet with no wind, today's 15 was very windy with no rain. I hated them both. 

I've also noticed some big differences between cycling and running aside from the well documented 'they use different muscles'.

1. Cycling is 100% uphill. There's no such thing as a flat in Cornwall as the whole county has been built on a V or ^ foundation. This means there are downhills but, as Ella Eyre noted, gravity gravity, oooooooh, gravity and even on a bike you can conquer a twenty mile downhill section in four minutes...just in time for the next twenty mile uphill section.

2. Cycles take maintenance. I never once had to check the pressures on my shoes or lubricate my chain, if you know what I mean. Shoe up, bugger off. That's running. Also there's a lot to turn off when returning - I left my lights on after my ride on Friday and, being a very cheap set, they're now good for nothing.

3. Riding takes longer. A 100 mile bike ride is equivalent to a 26 mile run, so a ratio of around 4:1 in London Marathon organiser standards. However, while a six mile run takes me around an hour a 24 mile ride is just over two. I have to put this down to being at the start of my training but I need to get an awful lot faster to make the running/riding ratio stack up. A 15mph average will get me around the course within the eight and a half hour limit so that's my initial aim, though this is still just under an hour and a half for a 24 mile ride.

4. I cannot ride empty. When partaking in a marathon I would have four breakfast biscuits, go to the toilet seventeen times and then run. I'd take on a few gels towards the end but I wouldn't eat much at all until after the race when I would binge on everything in sight. I was knackered after my ride on Friday and put a lot of it down to hunger, meaning I also have to eat before a ride which takes up even more time.

There are plenty of similarities, such as the need for layers in the cold months. I had one pair of socks on in the wet and my feet were numb by the time I got home. Today I put two pairs on because I figured they don't take up much room in the washing machine and hey presto! Warm feet. I'm more than a little looking forward to riding in the Summer, however if I wait until then I will have no stamina so I'm not too concerned with the shorter rides for now.

Incidentally, is this the world's shortest cycle path?

2018

This is it, now. This is the gig. I don't mind admitting I've been a bit slack over December - very slack, in actual fact - however this was a planned inconsistency that was achieved through complex planning and training from previous adventures.

There are many athletes out there who can happily compete in their sports over and over again, a state of mind I have become familiar with when running. I love to plan a distance, nip out and achieve it, get back and know that I've got those miles in the bag. When training for a specific event though I can find very long runs stagnate and I end up resenting my chosen sport for a period of time until the actual event arrives. I found it with the London Marathon, vowing never to do another marathon again as the training needed to do such a distance is so time consuming and gruelling. After a few adjustments to my training plan I then managed to do two marathons within seven months of each other.

The adjustments were things I'd never considered possible during training - relaxing, allowing myself to fail and reducing training to fit in with my life. Rather than doing four 20 mile runs before tapering I did four half marathons and it did the same job as long as I did some faster short runs as well. Applying this logic to my current situation I'll be using the indoor bike to try and increase my speed which should allow me to ride sensibly and get used to being out on the roads, perhaps making 60 or 70 miles my end goal before RideLondon rather than creeping up to 90 miles. It all seems a bit wishy washy at the moment but consistent riding on Wednesdays, Fridays and Sundays is a concrete plan and the only thing that really matters when training is consistency. I'll also be running on Tuesdays because I can't bring myself to give it up, even for six months.

Today is the first day of this concrete training plan. This is it, now.