A weeks training

With only 152 days till the start of the 2014 Absa Cape Epic, it only gives me about 120 chances to ride the bike. Almost every ride now has a reason, endurance, sprint, top end, hills, recovery etc. The next landmark for me is racing at the Highland Fling, a one day- 110k race that closely resembles an average stage at the Epic. 2500m of climbing, single trail as well as fast unmade farm roads. Last time I did this race was back in 2008 and after a good start, I had a big fall on the one of the fast downhills and went over the bars at 40kph. The result: 4 broken ribs and a shoulder broken in 4 places - the result....a DNF.

Who would think this packs up so small?

Easy to travel with

Training last week was pretty good. Tuesday was the Manly Fast Bunch ride. 60k at a high intensity. Felt pretty good and put a few little attacks in off the front on the way back through Narrabeen and Colloroy. Short lived as they were, it is a good sign of some form coming back. Thursday and Friday were early rides in Perth with the South Perth Rouleurs around the Swan River. One of the perks of my job is that I get to travel to different places and get to ride in some area that are pretty special. Perth is one of those places and they certainly know how to ride fast - averaging over 40kph for 45k. Some strong boys driving the group. About 60 start the ride and about 15 finish it, with guys being spat out the back all over the place. Saturday was a bit of a sleep in as the flight didnt get back in from Perth till late and I couldnt get up at 5am for Coast and Toast....the best ride of the week. 100k up the Northern Beaches Coast of Sydney, and back through the National Park hills for the Toast part back at the cafe in Manly. I went a little late and met the group as they came through Church Point. They were about 40 riders and they were moving along pretty well. We hit the 4k climb at McCarrs creek which hits 8% gradient for about 1k and it was on. Alex Gardener, one of our Fixed Wheel race team hit the gas and I struggled on to his back wheel. Later when reviewing Strava, he went up as KOM and I was the 6th Fastest. That was out of over 4300 riders and 43,000 times people had been up that hill, so I was pretty happy with that result.

Packs up pretty small

Sunday was a few of us on the 29ers for what is fast becoming my favourite ride of the week - the Mountain Bikes. We are riding well and had 80k planned at pretty full intensity. I had to cut the ride short and only do 50k as I got called back home with a sick dog. He ended up all ok after a trip to the Vet, but I wasnt happy missing my longer ride.

So 5 times out and roughly 280k for the week. Solid, but have a long way to go.