This post is largely for the benefit of a certain Mr Clegg (*waves*) who told me off for not updating my blog when I bumped into him last night (in my defence, I didn’t know anyone was reading the thing). Even though I have been out on the bike, I haven’t done anything much of interest and I haven’t really had time to write about what I have done because real life keeps getting in the way. The above snap was taken last Sunday afternoon when I managed to get out for a couple of hours after dropping the boy off at his grandparents’ for the afternoon, and that’s the only ride photo I have from the last few weeks. It was quite windy, and I dealt with this by admiring the views whilst pottering along very slowly indeed, which made a refreshing change from staring at a wall whilst trying to murder my legs on the turbo trainer.

I went out yesterday evening too. I was supposed to be doing a proper training session, but when the weather is sunny grinding away on a stationary bike in the garage feels like an offence against all that is right and good in the world. Also I can’t really do intervals properly because I managed to smash the screen on my Garmin, but I’m not talking about that, it’s still painful to me.

I compensated for skipping the formal structure by absolutely bloody caning it round a favourite local loop instead. My previous best time for this 16km-ish off-road course was about the 1h05 mark. Yesterday I got back to the start in 49-and-a-bit minutes (taking out a couple of Strava KOMs on the way, which is a novelty). Even if we’re being generous to my earlier efforts that’s nearly a 20% improvement. Apparently this training lark does actually work. Remarkable. Now I just have to try and translate what might generously be described as something approaching “form” into a better result on Sunday, when I head back to Lee Quarry for round two of the Hope XC series.