I’d like to be more positive

sadly I’m not really.

However I did have a great weekend down in Marlborough for the Salisbury Gravel event. I use the word great but challenging may be better. Got done on my booking.com booking with no contact from the agent and then had to get a hotel. I don’t even want to try to explain this but I seem to have lost my money. We got a hotel and met up with Matt L and Kathy for coffee where once more we fixed the world. Nah we just talked rubbish for an hour.

Verity and I had a good few hours on the bike going to visit the Avebury Stones. This was fun some of which was caused by my navigation and I had no gears due to failure to install the battery – OOPS. We got on the ridgeway and just had a few relaxing hours together on the bikes.

I did the gravel event down at Salisbury the following day but sadly my friend Matt F put his back out so I was riding alone. Not an issue really as I wasn’t racing and this allowed me just to ride to my own power plan and be social where it suited me. Stopped early to help someone out who had tyre issues and then caught up with Christina and David who were having a chilled day out. It was nice to chat for a few minutes before pushing on. Rode with Joe whose bike I am taking to Portugal, it was nice to meet him and ride together. Sadly at 25 miles it became apparent I had a rear flat so I pulled over. Looking at the wheel it looks like one of the dings in the rim has become too weak to support tubeless so I had no choice but to put a tube in. Although not hard to do it was time consuming as The Rene Hersh tyres don’t come off and go on too easy. I was also left with a storage challenge as I had a tyre liner in. Solutions found and I rode on. Confidence improved as it became apparent the tyre with tube was working fine. I didn’t enjoy the 2nd half of the course as much due to the amount of fields ridden. Being on Salisbury Plains I really expected to be on more of the hard pack so coming to the last feed station(Always planned to stop here) I was not very happy at having 12 miles to go. Fortunately a call to the boss and much more solid ground made the run in quite fast. All in all a good day on the bike with me getting the efforts I wanted but it has made me realise I still don’t train enough to do these events properly. The Gralloch will once more be a very hard day out on the bike and I fear probably my last proper effort at these longer events.

It’s Dirty Reiver is this week, this is my final long prep ride for the Gralloch. I’m “only” doing the 130k(81 miles to us normal people). Sadly mentally I am struggling with bothering to go. Having realised that once more I feel under prepared for the Gralloch I have accepted it is time to stop trying to be something I am not. I really don’t enjoying slogging for hours on the bike in crap weather. Really I only like like long rides when in the sun in the Alps. I like hard charging racing and training sessions of a few hours so this is the beginning of the end for me as a longer distance gravel racer.

A little bit of history and some facts, when I was younger I rarely did anything that lasted longer than 90 mins. Used to joke that my tolerance for all activities is about the length of a football match. Looking back over the years you can see it reflected in my training. I may train for 4 hours a day but often its 2 x 90 and a single hour. When I was a ultra distance runner I improved and got better with going for 2 to 3hrs but often raced so I would do the sessions over 2hrs.

Oh I did a Crank It MTB event and volunteered. No major offs but even though I felt like I was pushing hard I just languished down in the middle of the field. I rode ok but the result was pretty demoralising. That said I entered the National at Cannock as it is based 4 miles from my house. Sadly god intervened with bad weather and it was cancelled.

So I have been putting this off but time to talk Karate. It’s starting to feel like a member of the family who you don’t always get on with. I love Karate and don’t want my family to stop which means I am still training. However, there are problems, no doubt I am part of the problem and have made some poor choices but I have also had a number of challenges thrown my way which have made me question my involvement as a Sempai and as a student. It is possible I do not have the right temperament to do Karate as my continuing challenges with subjective analysis and results is still causing problems. Right now I am not enjoying myself and when it’s not fun I always tell people I coach that we’re not professionals so why do something you do not enjoy? There in lies the family member conundrum, I don’t always like the family member but when we get on it’s brilliant. I am a searcher and believe I will find a way through this that allows me to continue but it will be different. Things have changed.

It’s not all doom and gloom in here, SUMMER is coming…….. MAYBE !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

This was supposed to be

the blog that wrapped up the Cyclo-cross season with stories of great results at Nationals instead it’s going to be a rapid update of racing while ill, thinking I was better and how it all ended with a trip to Scotland to watch the racing.

We started with a trip to NWCCA for Betley Court and not being called to grid but managing to ride from the back row to 10th. Sadly this is the highlight of the blog and I am so disappointed with it that I don’t want to dwell on it beyond saying I won’t be signing up for this league next year for personal reasons.

The day after I thought I had a bit of a head cold but to be honest I trained pretty well all week until the Friday so made the big call to have a total rest day from training, it was the Christmas period after all. Having trained easy I travelled to Coventry for Boxing day cross, 45 seconds was all it took to tell me I was not well enough to race and I rolled round when I should have got off and got warm.

Knowing I was racing again on the 30th and with the cold dragging I backed the training right down. This is relative when you are me.

So, Nick and I travelled to Peel Park(turned out I had DNF’d a Nationals there a few years ago) and with the best part of 100 riders I lined up at the back of the grid. Although not 100% I raced well compared to boxing day, HOWEVER after cleaning the bikes it was obvious I was very cold and quite properly ill. BOLLOX I had really cocked things up.

The next day I took a Covid test , negative but I was done. Spent the next 4 days mainly in bed before getting up to go see the doctor and discover I had a chest infection that needed antibiotics. Avoiding the Hat-trick of stupid I didn’t ride BMCR nationals still in the hope of recovery and BC Nationals in Falkirk.

I managed some light training so thought I may be ok as I was no longer coughing. I travelled to Scotland with a view to making the final call at pre-ride. All hail common sense as 2 slow laps were all it needed to convince me it wasn’t my year. I actually returned my number there and then. By the time racing started I was coughing again.

It’s Jan 18th now, I am back on antibiotics and have been referred for a chest x-ray. 2024 can already do one !!! Over the years I have got better at listening to my body but it is safe to say I got it wrong for those last 2 weeks of 2023. What I’m saying is be careful, it is hard to back off sometimes but the reality I have learned is nothing is worth this. I’m an amateur and pretty average at CX so it really isn’t worth the impact it is having on the rest of my life.

Once I recover I will try to write the 2024 targets blog but until I can actually train there seems very little point.

I should say in closing even with the last month going to utter rat shit this has been my best Cyclo-cross season for about a decade so there are lots of positives to take from it and I assuming I recover from whatever this is I am already excited about CX.