Broken Bones and Life Resolutions

A few things have happened since my last post, the most prevalent being that I came off my bike during a TT warm up just before Christmas. I cracked my ulnar, crushed my triquetral, and sustained severe concussion, along with all the usual cuts and bruises. Obviously this put a stop to my riding, as I am in a cast for 6 weeks (only 2 weeks to go, as I write this!). This not only impacts upon my physical fitness, but also my 'psychological fitness'. For me, riding a bike is not just about pushing my body, seeing the world around me and shouting at car drivers, it's about clearing my head and sorting through life's troubles. I hadn't really realised just to what extent I rely on cycling as an almost spiritual part of my life, it really is like meditation. This is the part of riding a bike that I have missed the most. 

As with every new year, resolutions have been made. Rather than 'new year's resolutions', this year I have made 'Life Resolutions'. Being in my last year of university and faced with the prospect of finding a job and moving into the 'real' world, I have been feeling both extreme excitement and trepidation about my future. I have been very complacent with myself in the last few years, rather than actually chasing and achieving my goals. This is changing. 2013 is going to be a new beginning for many different reasons. 

The planning for my Norway trip (an example of a previous goal/dream that I am actually going to achieve this year!) is progressing, the route is basically finalised now, and once my exam timetable is released at the end of the month I will look into booking flights. It's getting real, which both excites and scares me. Training will resume as soon as the cast is off, not just for Norway, but I am also riding from London to Paris in 24 hours in April, which will be another, although very different, adventure!

So much to look forward to; I would say that I cannot wait for it to begin. But it already has.

Back On The Road

Dean Moriarty, in Jack Kerouac's On The Road, said that 'it's an anywhere road for anybody anyhow'. Although the Tour Divide won't be happening for a while yet, that's not the end of the road; other adventures are on the horizon. 

After an extremely vivid dream involving my late grandfather, I have been inspired to cycle the length of Norway next summer. Roughly 3500km of incredibly undulating terrain going from Bergen to Kirkines (on the Russian border) is not going to be an easy undertaking, especially considering I'll be riding on my own for the bulk of it. There's the possibility of Amy riding the first few days, but the rest will be just me and the bike. 

Talking of the bike, I am currently building up an old steel frame my dad has had lying around into a touring bike. The picture shows it in its current state (tactically chosen titanium-coloured paint...), post being stripped and re-sprayed. Hoping to complete the build over the Christmas break to give me and good few months to hone everything before setting off. 

I will hopefully keep this updated fairly regularly with how planning is going, but now, I am off to fail miserably in a 5 mile TT and probably throw up. All for a good cause, I guess...

A Quick Update (With Photos...)

This week's long ride was a fairly last-minute affair, mainly due to the change in weather forecast meaning that Saturday was the only day over the weekend without heavy rain and gale-force winds. If I learned one thing this weekend, it is that online route planners cannot be trusted when gauging the difficulty of a ride...

What was planned as a fairly leisurely 55 miles turned into a grueling 6 hour ride. We left a couple of hours later than planned (my fault for not sorting out the chain earlier in the week) but made it to the lunch point on time. One cooked breakfast, a bowl of nachos and a baked potato later, we headed back out. Some beautiful moorland, some brilliant descents and a mile long section of 20% followed, but at around 3:30pm it was started to get dark and we were still about 10 miles from home, without lights. The decision was made to ride 5 miles to the nearest station and get the train the last bit, rather than ride the main, unlit, road back home. 

The hills (roughly 1600 metres of climbing) really took it out of us. Where neither of us had ridden this distance for a few weeks, we weren't expecting it to be easy, but the online planner certainly underplayed the gradients in many places....

Apologies for photo quality; my phone camera isn't the best!

On the way to Princetown

Dartmoor, so desolately beautiful

There is a rainbow pretty much in the centre of this, but barely shows up

The bottom of the 20%

And the top! Notice who started second and finished first.... BOOM! (to be fair, Amy's thigh was playing up....)

More climbing!

What makes the climbing worth it

My (generally...) trusty bike