shibbyonline

24th And I’m At Home

It is the morning of the 24th September; around 8:30, and by all accounts I should not be here.
In fact I should be some where in Scotland on a bike making a dash for the border, taking part in another end to end cycle ride. Yet instead I’m sitting here with a laptop trying to decide what to do today.

Beginning of the month everything looked to be on track for another crack at cycling the length of the British Isles. I’d booked the holiday, started the training and was feeling in good form for the event. Then with only a week to go the company that Dave works for; who originally set this up as a charity event, pulled the plug! Not a compromise or a deal to be struck just a rug pulled out from under us.

To say I’m gutted is a bit of an under statement, the last few months have been spent clocking up the miles. I even built a bike for this year’s ride and had great hopes for it.
Now I’ve still got the week off so I’m sitting here surfing YouTube and generally just wasting time. No matter as Halo3 will be out in a couple of days…

end2end: redux

The idea of taking part in another end2end cycle ride has always been at the back of my mind.
In fact Dave did talk of it after last year’s ride but due to work commitments and the like it was quickly forgotten.

Now that there is a bit of a cycling buzz back in the air with the Tour currently taking place the thought of trying again is strong.
So strong in fact that we have set a date to work too; Monday September 24th.

Last year there were four of us, this year however Rob is pre-occupied with a new born and Harry is re-covering from surgery (rumor has it is was sex change related) and so that just leaves Dave and I.
Merlin and Goose hitting the road again; there is some sense behind the names, not a lot mind you.

So far we have not decided which way we will tackle this, South to North during the summer is the best to take advantage of the gulf stream winds, but during September there could be the first signs of Northern winter winds. The best option is keep an eye on the long term forecast and make a decision closer to the date.

It is un-certain if we will be going for another sponsored event, as nice as it was to raise money it don’t half get in the way of the cycling. You really need your mind on the prize and not on who owes you what. But if that does change I’m sure we will call upon Joe Public for a bit of a donation

Lows and Highs

This morning started with a defiant low, I closed the front door on Lucy knowing that I would not see her again for another two weeks.
Lucy is on her way to North Carolina on business for the next 14 days to try and help sort out the partner company in the USA. She has been whisked away before but so far it has always been during the week, never at a week end. This helped as I never had time to really stop and sit back and think too deeply.
Now this time is started at the beginning of the week end, this is different. I keep wanting to make a brew for two, or walking around the house a bit lost like.

To take me mind off things I opted for that ‘high’ feeling. I walked into town and handed the local BHF shop over £1100 in donations! I would love to say it was from my own hand but alas it was the final lot of the money from the end2end ride. It was a great feeling to see the looks of the girls faces when you hand them that. They truly appreciated the gesture and it gave me that great big warm feeling inside.
What a day, start at one end of the scale and end up at the other end; feeling a lot better.

The Big 4

It’s official, next year we will try the end to end ride in 4 days!

The knee injury is only just calming down and the doctor said I can start riding again yet the talk of knocking a day off the ride has been spoken about since we got back. Last night Dave came round for a chat and a catch up and to drop the bombshell; “do you want to go for 4 days?”
Now it might be fact that I was watching Tom secure the yellow jersey in stage 3 of the Tour, or the fact that Lucy was not there to talk some sense into me but the words hell yes just flowed off my lips.

Of course this is a big ask, it was bad enough doing the ride in 5 days but to then ‘lose’ a day somewhere is going to take some serious work. On the flip side I now know what is to be expected, when I’m told about a climb over Berrydale I know that the climb over Berrydale is a CLIMB over Berrydale. I know the terrain and I know the effort I required last time, I should then be able to build on it and perform better.
My big problem is just my knee, I need to know in my own mind that I can rely on it and put that force through it again without it failing. Time to invest in a good physiotherapist I think.