Getting the Miles in

January has been a good month so far. Plenty of steady miles, plus some threshold work to start working on a bit of speed.

It's all downhill from here

Recent training

• Sat 14th – 70 miles – 4 hours – 17.5mph –  Long ride to Lambourn and White horse.
• Sun 15th – 27 miles – 1.50.00 – av 15.0 mph – Slow recovery ride
• Mon – rest day.
• Tues 17th – 42 miles – 2.05.00 – av 20.0 mph – Fast ride, with about 1 hour at threshold level or just below. For this section was averaging 23 mph. Fastest ride of season. Felt good. But, temperature was cold. I’m glad it wasn’t any longer.
• Wed – off day
• Thurs 19th – 40 miles – 2.07.00 – av 18.8 mph. First hour and and a half steady ride to Buckland. Last half an hour included 20 minutes at threshold level. With strong tailwind, I was averaging over 25 mph, which felt great fun.
• Fri -20th – 30 miles – 2.05.00 – av. 14.5 mph. Very steady recovery ride. Usually, I find this kind of ride quite boring. But, I really enjoyed this recovery ride to Oakley. I think I enjoyed it because my  mind was quite quiet and I enjoyed the quiet you often get on January days, when no-one else is out on the roads.
• Sat – 21st – 85 miles – 5.00.00. Av 16.9 mph. I did think about doing a 100 miles, but the first 40 miles was all into a strong westerly headwind, ad it felt tough going. At Stow on the Wold, I turned round and enjoyed the tailwind on the way back. It was 4pm by the time I got back and starting to get dark, so I was glad I didn’t go any further. It may have been only 85 miles, but at this time of year, with winter training tyres and strong wind it felt like 100 miles! It was still the longest ride I’ve done for over 8 months. I can’t believe how many energy bars I got through on the ride. Perhaps 9-10. For a two hour ride, I might have 1. But, on this 5 hour ride, I was really burning a lot of calories.
• Weekly total = 220 (+42 commuting miles) = 260 miles. I’m definitely motivated by national 100 mile Time trial hence the effort to do more miles at this time of the year.

In addition, every day, I have a 6 mile commute to Oxford and back. I usually start the day in a coffee shop and do some work and blogging. Those first 6 miles are good to see how legs feel. I work in the morning because after cycle ride, I don’t feel like working!

I have been mostly keeping up my New Year’s resolution to stretch for 10 minutes at the end of every day. Definitely starting to feel a little more flexible, easier to touch the old toes.

Related

• Training for longer distances