Today I was Fabian

Well in my head at least. I was dressed like more like Anthony Charteau, but I'm getting ahead of myself.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthony_Charteau

Today was Sunday, and as the enforced rest of the past two weeks seemed to have done me so much good, and I want to retain my enthusiasm for cycling through the Winter, I figured I wouldn't ride today. I hadn't had a day to get all the jobs done, you know the ones that have been lingering for a long time. So I dutifully cleared out the old food from the larder, took stuff to the dump, moved the old table around, that type of thing. I even cut my hair, well shaved it all off with clippers.

I finally got round to cleaning the Red Madonne, although it wasn't too dirty, only yesterday and Friday have had it in anything like rain or muck recently. To cap it all off I cut the grass, straightened out the saddle on RM (I'm a traditionalist at heart!) and put a new inner tube in my unicycle. I recently won a unicycle lesson in a charity auction, and the lesson is this week, so I dug the unicycle out of the shed and spruce it up a bit.(I may be over-stating the competitive nature of the auction, as I suspect I was the sole bidder).

If you are wondering how I let that statement go by about the unicycle, well you will just have to read the blog after Friday, it's technically still cycling isn't it, so I don't see why I shouldn't blog about it. Actually I can blog about whatever I like as it's my blog. That told you.

Well, after all the jobs were done, I sat down for a bit in front of the TV. What should be on but the Commonwealth games road race. In Delhi. Some Australian won, David Millar got the bronze medal, but it was a good race to watch unfold. Despite the almost pan-flat course, the riders contrived to put on a good race, the end result of which was Mark Cavendish trailing in disconsolately in seventh, having been out-thought by the other teams, and suffering from a lack of Isle of Man team members to support him.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/commonwealth_games/delhi_2010/9077588.stm

By now the sun had come out. In my garden, not in Delhi. The sun was already out there, it looked boiling. My bike was clean, it was 20 degrees, in October. I didn't want to do a big ride, but it seemed like one of those opportunities not to be missed. And I have only worn my polka dot jersey once, and that was under a gilet, I always promised myself I would wear it after I completed the Raid Pyreneen. If I went out on my own I could do a bit of hill-climbing practice. So I decided to go out for an hour and do just that.

I have often done repeated circuits of my village, which of course end in a climb of the hill that our house sits on. Just below the top, and although it's only a 300 feet climb, it is 12%, so makes it interesting. Today I extended the circuit out to Sandford and Banwell, which gave me the opportunity to put a few more short climbs to the test, including Dark Lane, a 10% stretch in Banwell. I did the circuit twice and it was a bit like a bumpy time trial, or prologue or something. Only slower because it was me doing it, not Fabian or David Millar or even Anthony, polka dots or not. In my favour I did go at the climbs as fast as I could, in fact I went at the whole thing as fast as I could.

Great fun, and took just under an hour, even in the fairly stiff north-easterly breeze it was still quite warm. Statto fact coming up. The first lap was 15 seconds slower than the second, although it felt a lot harder. Why is that do you think? Bunny (who is married) is always telling me to do specific training and I think doing these short type of sessions at maximum effort must be good preparation for the forthcoming Exmoor Beast.

http://connect.garmin.com/player/52427344