I was not in a good mood this morning.  Hey, if you could see the state of my daughter’s bedroom, neither would you be!  OK, it wasn’t just that, but we’re definitely talking straws and the broken backs of camels.  So it’s a darn good thing I had a ride planned, as there is no better way of clearing the cobwebs away, and of getting some head space and perspective.  Of course the fact that the sun was shining was an added incentive, and I was feeling better within about two minutes of leaving the house.  I picked up George from her place as arranged, stripped off a couple of already superfluous items (buff and gilet arms) and we headed south for the winter.

It was gorgeous out there as you will see for yourself.  Practically no wind, blue skies, sunshine…absolutely beautiful.  George is still recovering from her knee op so we were taking it fairly easy.  I got to go up some hills – Notting Hill, Woolavington Causeway, Priory Road, Pedwell Hill, Mudgeley Hill, and Lascot Hill.  Which makes it sound really hilly, but it was only 1160 feet of climbing.  But I enjoyed it.  Look at me – deliberately making a route to include hills as opposed to avoiding them.  Haven’t I come a long way? *grin*

Water near Woolavington - see how much wind there wasn't?

Water at Westhay - no starlings though

Top of Mudgley Hill

It's a sign...

Now I lay me down to sleep...

Rug Hill - it's pretty much all downhill from here 🙂

So you can see how lovely it was out there, right?  I was out longer than I’d expected but didn’t notice as I was having such a nice time just being on the bike.   I keep not going for a ride because of the weather, the timing, the lack of light, the moon being in aquarius, whatever…  Maybe I need to make more of an effort to just get out there.  It’s all training, and it’s definitely good for the head.  I feel much better now :).

Cycling time: 2:31:00 hrs
Distance: 38.03 miles.
Avs: 15.0 mph
ODO: 11033 miles

PS: for the observant of you, that’s another 1000 miles on the odometer, and under the belt :).

I went for a recovery ride with Mim today.  Just a couple of hours of essentially flat.  It was a cold, grey, drab day, and it wasn’t the most exciting ride in the world ever by quite some way.  Let’s face it, there is not a lot of new and exciting to be had around here ride-wise these days.  But at least I was on my bike.  Surprisingly my legs were feeling pretty good too, unless I attempted to sprint or the up was a steep one.  As ever I am impressed by how much the human body can do, and keep doing, on very little.  Yes, for the first few miles my quads were aching and, as I said, there wasn’t a lot in them today, but my legs were still there.  They were still going around at, considering the amount of talking going on, a fairly respectable speed.  For a couple of hours I was out of the house, riding my bike.  And that’s a good thing :).

Cycling time: 1:51:29 hrs
Distance: 29.08 miles.
Avs: 15.6 mph
ODO: 10950 miles

When the alarm goes off at 4:10am on a Sunday morning, it’s a pretty safe bet that it’s a sportive day, and today was no exception.  In fact today’s Wiggle Devil’s Punch Bowl Sportive was probably the last of this year’s season too (*sob*).  Having pretty much gotten the hang of getting myself ready and out of the door by now, I was on the road a bit before 5:00am.  2 1/2 hours, one sunrise, two owls, one fox, several bats and one badger later, with a quick stop in West Meon to eat my muesli, and I was at the Hollycombe Working Steam Museum, from whence the event started.  Amusingly entrance was being intermittently blocked by randomly wandering peacocks, which is hard to beat for sheer novelty – you don’t get a lot of peacocks at sportives!

The steady stream of arriving cars parked up on the grass, discharging cyclists from nice warm cars into very cold early morning air.  Air that was being moved around quite a bit by a very wintry wind.  Nice.  However after registering and hiding in the back of my car a bit I acclimatised a bit.  Besides, I had one set of kit options and one only and I was wearing them.  Well, it saves on faffing right?

Look - there really were peacocks!

Traction engine marks the start of the car park

After a quick briefing, including a warning about leaves on the line (sorry, road), we were away a little after 8:00am.  And man, was it ever nippy for the first few miles until we’d warmed up!  Even after that it was never precisely balmy.  Did I forget to mention we were a we?  My L2P friend Kevin, living considerably nearer to the venue than I, came along for the ride ;).  Anyway my kit choice turned out to have been correct – all bar the lack of overshoes, which is hardly my fault since I’ve ordered some but they’re not here yet.  I can’t wear what I don’t have, now can I?  Sadly this did mean my feet and I parted company at some point and weren’t happily reunited until quite some time after the end of the ride.  However I don’t need to be able to feel my toes to pedal, so it’s not as bad as it sounds.  It may have been chilly but it was dry, and fairly bright, which considering that it’s now November, is pretty darned good I’ll have you know, and way more than you can count on, so I don’t want to sound ungrateful :).

It was an uneventful ride.  Lots of rolling up and down.  Not massive amounts of climbing but plenty enough for my third day in a row of riding, and there were some very lovely descents too – albeit approached carefully as advised and warned by the ample “caution” signs.  There were plenty of autumnal colours going on.  Pretty property.  Pretty impressive property.  BMW owners very keen to reinforce all the stereotypical views of BMW drivers (job done!).  The closest encounters of a dangerous kind were with a flash burgundy Porsche (now there’s a surprise), and a cream Smart Car.  However the Smart Car’s turbulence made all the yellow leaves on the road dance and swirl around in a most attractive fashion so I’m half inclined to let him off ;).

Isn't it pretty? Spot the rider in the distance?

I bet this place calls itself a cottage...

Holiday cottage? 😉

Several things made me smile today.  Want to see?

Pumpkins. Obviously 🙂

Bet he has a BMW...

Yes. But...

…at least what goes up must come down, right? *grin*.  And it was the North, and South, Downs.  And ups ;).

Towards the end of the ride the sun came out, and we picked up a couple of hangers on, after overtaking one of them at speed downhill.  Apparently this isn’t good for the fragile male ego so they felt the need catch up, overtake, and then drop back and tailgate us.  Which is all very well if you’re going to take your turn at the front but if you’re not…shame on you!  *tut tut*.  On one of my turns at the front we hit a stretch of up at speed, which made my knees ache and my quads burn, which I’m guessing is a lactic acid thing.  That’s the second time that’s happened lately – and it’s new to me.  The novelty is wearing off very quickly!  Towards the end of the route there were a couple of final kicker hills and I slipped back since I didn’t see why we should dragging our parasites all the way to the end.  After those, the last climb up the drive to the end demonstrated that there was absolutely nothing left in my legs.  Zero, zilch, zip.  Nada.  Just as well I didn’t need them anymore really *grin*.  Kevin had crossed the line a little ahead of me, and we grabbed our goodie bags and sat in the sun on a bench until I’d recovered my equilibrium sufficiently to go back to the car and get back into civvies.  Final ride of the season – done!  Never say never though ;).

Cycling time: 4:24:53 hrs
Distance: 71.18 miles.
Avs: 16.3 mph
ODO: 10920 miles

Gold standard was 4:35.  Will we have made it?  Well we didn’t stop at the food stops, but we did stop and take photos, and we obeyed traffic lights like the good little cyclists we are.  I pushed for some, but not all, of the time.  You know how it is, enjoy the bits you can to make up for the bits you can’t!  So I guess we’ll see when the results are published tomorrow…ooh, the suspense!  *grin*.  It was a really well run event, and we had a lovely morning’s ride.  What more can you ask for? 🙂

UPDATE: b*gger – missed Gold by 3:46!!!  How close is that?! That’ll teach me to take so many photos! *grin*.  Ah well, Silver will have to do :).  Official time: 4:38:46.

A few more photos for good measure :

Full traction engine

Bike under pedal power, engine under steam.

The Wiggle tent in the sunshine

Sometime you just have to put one in the bank.  Yes I rode yesterday.  Yes I have a sportive tomorrow.  But I was offered the chance of a ride today, and, as I put it when asked: coffee is good, company is good, forecast is good, gym is boring…  I might have ridden better today if I hadn’t ridden yesterday.  I might ride better tomorrow if I hadn’t ridden today.  But then I wouldn’t have had the fun I had today.  Yes.  Sometime you just have to put one in the bank :).

Cycling time: 1:49:18 hrs
Distance: 32.40 miles.
Avs: 17.7 mph
ODO: 10848 miles

In case you were wondering, GB and I went to Fairyland, which lived up to its reputation as ever.  Today’s highlights are brought to you by the witch who was 5 days too late, the lady rocking a great deal of voluminous pink to go with her dreads, and the guy on a vintage Kona fixie with a fabulous “Suck my cog” sticker on it, who engaged us in conversation for rather longer than was entirely comfortable.  The coffee was as good as ever, and just as well since it was cold when we got going again and I needed the kick to sprint for a bit to warm up!  Having cycled over there rather faster than either of us had realised, we attempted to take it a little easier on the way back.  GB did his best to rein me in in consideration of tomorrow’s event, and, in a once in a blue moon, please take note, it does happen occasionally, deviation from the norm, I actually did what I was told, and sat on his back wheel for most of the way home.  Which was not quite as much fun as sitting on the wheels of the apple laden tractor that overtook us on the way out of Wedmore.  Now that was wheel sucking big stylee *grin*.  Given that it’s usually a trade off between aroma and advantage, the apples made a nice change :).  Sadly it couldn’t last, he turned right, and left us to not sprint down the usual straight and home.  Very restrained of us.  Practically unprecedented *grin*.

There you go.  That’s what riding is about.  Or should be.  It’s about enjoying it, about the company, the craic, the being out there.  And this was all of those things :).  This isn’t to say that it isn’t sometimes hard work.  But it isn’t work.  Other than in the sense that today was a good day at the office *grin*.

Since then I’ve been a good girl and drunk my recovery and eaten a rather lovely chocolate orange recovery bar.  Eldest has washed the bike again – man he’s useful! – so I just need to clean and oil the chain and check over a few things in preparation.  Oh, and faff around a lot getting my kit clean and dry, deciding what to wear, what to take, blah blah blah…which should take up the rest of the day nicely *grin*.

I don’t know why I bother with weather forecasts.  Think of the stress I would avoid if I simply woke up in the morning, looked out the window, stuck my head of the door, and carried on accordingly.  Last night the BBC weather forecast for today threw a spanner in my mental cycling planning works by predicting rain all day, with the possibility of thunder as the cherry on top.  After a horrified text to George last night, I went to bed fully expecting to wake up this morning to torrential rain, and to having to cancel our planned ride.

Fast forward to this morning.  Open the curtains to…grey with bits of blue, no wind and…more importantly…no rain!  The weather forecast was still predicting rain but since it hadn’t yet arrived and, as time passed, showed no sign of doing so, I got ready to ride.  George has a tendency to go out whatever the weather anyway, so I layered up, filled the bottle, and was ready with plenty of time to spare.  Just as well as she was proper early.  Apparently they’d cancelled the school church service, and voila, there was George on my doorstep.  By the time we’d both faffed appropriately we probably left at around the scheduled 9:45am anyway!

I’d been press-ganged into planning our route – 40 miles with a few hills – so that’s what I did.  As the forecast was totally rubbish, as I believe I may have mentioned already, we decided to do the route anti-clockwise, and hopefully not get caught out on the top of the Mendips, where nasty weather can be proper ‘orrible, when/if it hit.  George is in recuperation mode, having recently had surgery on her knee, so I guess you could call her knee-dicapped instead of handicapped *grin*.  This has the advantage of slowing her down going up hills, so we chatted our way up Cheddar Gorge, which helped compensate for the fact that I’m never warmed up enough by then – it’s too close to home!  It wasn’t too much like hard work to be fair, and the same went for all the hills on the route, proving that I haven’t lost it just yet.  So – the ups were fine and the downs were fun.  The descent of Burrington Combe was an absolute blast, even though I did approach it with a degree of caution as it was wet underfoot.  Or underwheel.  Undertyre? 😉  Anyway, nothing wrong with being a little careful, what with me preferring to be on the bike, not off it!

The rain held off until we after we left Weston and started the climb up Bleadon Hill from Uphill and by that time we were properly on the way home and unlikely to be too disheartened by it.  It’s only water right?  I flew down the hill after the Webbington without braking, which was unusual for me, so it took me a little while to realise I was minus George, and after a u-turn I discovered her by the side of the road fixing a rear puncture.  She had said she’d been meaning to switch from slicks to winter tyres…and now she was really wishing she had!  She made changing it look easy though, and since we were still gassing, it seemed to take no time at all until we were back on our way and, shortly after that, back at my house.

Cycling time: 2:44:13 hrs
Distance: 41.11 miles.
Avs: 15.0 mph
ODO: 10816 miles

A slightly longer ride than usual, which made a nice change, and it was great to have company, and to catch up 🙂

So, in other news, my website has been tweaked and changed a bit, which you may have noticed.  Should you feel the urge you can now “like” my posts, and share them on Facebook, or even share them on Twitter.  Ooh, I’m so social media savvy ;).

PS – not that savvy – having button issues, so they may come and go for a while!

The infamous Mendip Rouleur (aka GB) planned a long ride for today, and opened it to all comers.  Which meant that him and I left the Square at a little after 9:00am this morning.  Go figure.

Even though it was just the two of us, a plan is a plan, so we stuck to the route he’d created.  Which was, as promised, mostly flat.  There were some hillier bits in the middle, and quite a few roads that were new to me, which is quite an achievement after years of cycling around here.  It was also warm, if cloudy, and not too windy.  That wind was, as is always best, in our faces on the way out and, in so far as it was ever behind us, it was behind us on the way back.  It was also all very seasonal.  Cloudy, mild, and attractively autumnal, with a great many leaves of varying shades, and copious quantities of mud.  Lots and lots of mud.  Mud on the roads, mud on the bikes, mud on us.  In fact we had to stop and scrape the mud off the bikes at one point, before it started interfering with how things worked.  But mud washes off, right?  Apparently it’s easier to wash off if you don’t have hairy legs or, as in my case, you’re wearing longs.  I still don’t think that’s a good excuse for MAMILs shaving their legs though.  MTFU and scrub harder ;).

GB had found a brand new venue for coffee – at Fenny Castle.  After a patch where things got darker and greyer, by the time we arrived, 43 miles in, it was warm and sunny enough to sit outside to eat exceedingly good carrot cake, and drink very acceptable coffee.  Considering that the carrot cake also had dried apricots in, I reckon that counts as two of my five-a-day, right?  Definitely one to go back too :).

Cycling time: 3:42:47 hrs
Distance: 59.01 miles.
Avs: 15.8 mph
ODO: 10763 miles

We’d have been faster if we hadn’t had to slow down so much so as not to end up on our behinds in the mud.  Or if we hadn’t been chatting.  Or if there hadn’t been hills.  Still, even with all of that it’s not like we were slow.  Actually I’m pretty impressed, since within 10 minutes of setting off, my legs made me aware of the fact that I climbed a lot of hills on Friday.  Aerobically I was feeling fine, though maybe not on tip top form.  However, the legs?  Achey.  I can’t explain why, but I’m oddly pleased about that.  It’s been quite a while since I’ve had any after effects from a ride, which presumably means I’ve just been operating within my capabilities.  Mind you, I don’t normally do a ride like Friday, and follow it by another long ride two days later.  Still, it feels good to have proof that I worked hard.  I’ve been pretty tired since I got in too, so I guess that’s double proof :).

I have to admit to having cheated when I got in.  Do you remember when you were a kid and got paid to wash the car?  Well I paid eldest to wash the bike.  Considering the state of it, it was possibly the best £1 I’ve ever spent.  Well even if he did a bad job, it was going to end up cleaner than it was.  And he didn’t, he did a very good job.  Two birds with one stone – bored teenager occupied for a while, dirty bike clean.  Result!  Knew there was a reason I had kids 😉 *grin*