Some days it’s about riding the bike.  Riding it hard.  Riding your mood and worrying mind away.  Concentrating on the riding; too focused to think too much.  Riding until you’re too tired to be thinking anyway.  Riding to see how fast you can go; because like it or not, you’d like to get up that hill faster, or you know there’s a segment to beat, and also because easing back feels like slacking.  It’s all working together, it’s hard to rage against the machine when it’s working so well…and it’s all working out.  It feels good.  Good to be out there, out of in here, better out than in.  Better.  Definitely better.

And then life puts things even further into perspective.  Narrow country lane, head down in head space, pushing onwards, and around a corner and then you’re there and so is a large white lorry coming the other way, and you brake and skid and he brakes and skids and there you are face to face just feet away from each other, counting your lucky stars.  No harm no foul, no fault no blame, all’s well that ends well.  We exchanged rueful relieved grins, agreed that that was one hell of a way to be woken up, and went on our separate ways, a little shaken but not stirred 😉

Unsurprisingly on days like these, you don’t stop to take photos.  And inevitably where you do have to stop; junctions, traffic lights etc, is less than photogenic.  So you’ll have to take my word for it when I tell you I went for a ride in the semi-sunshine to the seaside and back.  And if you don’t believe me, there’s always Strava, right? 😉  When it comes down to it, today I kicked ar*e and didn’t get killed by a lorry.  I’m fairly sure that qualifies as a good ride *grin*.

Cycling time: 1:53
Distance: 32.3 miles
Avg: 17.1 mph
ODO: 5576.3 miles

Tomorrow is the big day.  One more sleep until Christmas comes for the Cinelli.  My shiny new wheels arrived from Cycle Division on Tuesday, a day late, but better late than never.  I am still, predictably, mad excited about it all.  Not much longer now though…just a little more patience.  And then wait and see what I do to those Strava segments 😉