The Last Few Weeks of Biking Goodness

I've just finished a spin session in the living room and thought it best to sit down and catch you all up on the last couple of weeks (I have been a pretty slack blogger). The legs are feeling a little tired and heavy, but it feels good. I feel like I'm getting stronger and I'm well on track for Cape Epic at the end of March. Over Summer, I'll aim to get out onto some more technical areas of trails down Levin and Wellington way to hone some technical skills on top of (hopefully) some good base fitness.

Anyway, three weeks ago, I headed down to the PNP race at Victoria Park, which, to be honest, ended up being an abysmal display of riding and preparation from me. I've only ridden there once before and from what I have heard, that place is sketchy (although fun) at the best of times. So we were heading towards Wellington and could see the storm clouds gathering above the city. It was only at this time that I remembered that I still had Stans Raven tyres on my bike from the dry, untechnical Day Night Thriller the week before... Bugger... Long and short of it, the race was a mudfest and I ended up pulling the plug before the last lap after walking/sliding down 60% of my previous lap. Disappointing, but I kept reminding myself that as long as I "finish when it counts", these races are all experience and training.

The following weekend was quite a nice weekend. I had started my gym program again on the Friday night and had somehow managed to go a little hard on the deadlifts (oops!), so I spent the weekend on the bike adequately crippled and in considerable pain (with a headwind). Asides from that, though, it was actually a really nice weekend and I found a really wicked road ride loop heading up the Pohangina Valley and across to Colyton then back into Ashurst... Lovely!

Last weekend was the most awesome weekend I have had since my Day Night Thriller outing with John and Alex. Saturday was a beautiful, still, clear Spring day and I headed up to North Range Road and through the windfarm. It's one of my favourite rides on a nice day because there's some good climbs and amazing views and very little traffic once you turn off Pahiatua Track. This particular Saturday was so still and clear that I could see right across to Mount Ruapehu and Mount Taranaki (pretty special huh?). I climbed up and over and most of the way down the other side before coming back over to be home by lunch. On my way down the other side, I encountered a Mummy sheep and her two lambs who didn't seem to understand that if they just moved over to the side, I would go straight past them, so they kept bowling down the road in front of me until the little lamb's legs couldn't carry them anymore (poor little things)... Mummy sheep did a really impressive sideways skid to come back to them and I carried on past them (I would be really interested to see Mummy sheep handle a mountain bike... I think she would be capable of some pretty mean skidz). I really enjoyed the day out and whilst I didn't feel too overexerted, I felt I climbed solidly.

Sunday was the final Winter race for Manawatu Mountain Bike Club and they were running a "double race" day, with a short course race in the morning and the full XC race in the afternoon. The short course race in the morning was about a 2km lap which we just smashed out for 20mins plus one lap. It was great fun and a good, high intensity workout, but my low average heart rate told me I'd had a good hard week and was maybe a bit tired. I came in third woman in the short course and then rested the legs up as much as possible for the next couple of hours before the main event. The afternoon race was great fun too and my legs burned as I propelled myself around the course. The thing about Santoft is that there is no rest. It is so flat that you have the hammer dropped from go to woah, and being on my hardtail made fast but hard work of it. I came third in that one, too, and I must give full credit to Manawatu Mountain Bike Club for putting on such a wicked series. They're a great bunch of people. The next series coming up is the Mitre 10 MEGA Summer Race Series which starts on November 17th... Looking forward to it!!!

To add to my weekend, I then headed out with my friend Sasha Smith for a hill climb session on Wednesday night. We'd done this last week and I'm hoping it can become a relatively permanent fixture on our schedules because it's really great to have someone to train with and to push me. The ride out to our favourite hill at the end of Turitea Road took me nearly twice as long as usual with a nasty headwind and the hill we were climbing was also into a headwind. Regardless of this, I still posted better climb times than last week, which was a good sign considering I wouldn't have been as fresh this week as I was last week. Sasha is climbing really well at the moment and the crazy woman rocked up on her single speed (for hill repeats??!! And people think I'm crazy for riding my bike in circles for 24 hours!!!), which she probably regretted for how smashed it made her, but forced her to knock out some pretty impressive times on her climbs. After nine of our 5 minute smash fests, I hitched a ride home with the wind (only 15 minutes to get back!) and made a fool of myself once again fending against the local magpies (the residents around there must think it's hilarious!).

This weekend I'll enjoy another nice long-ish ride on Saturday and then the PNP race at Makara on Sunday, then one more hard week before a rest week and the Whaka 100... Bring it on!!!