I proved it by going back to work today, and what a Joyous Occasion it was. Headspin all but gone, and I actually feel as if I could ride a bike again. Misschien Woensdag.
It's a relief to be fully operational, because I went back into 25 year regression mode on the weekend. When it intersects with the y-axis, the slope is approximately tangential to any thought I might have had. That doesn't even make sense to me.
By way of example, I learned that Keith Parkinson died of leukemia. I appear to be a bit out of touch, because he passed away 18 months ago. I also discovered a whole archive of Wormy cartoons and investigated the parallel between doping in pro cycling and using bits of other people's work in your own paintings. Most people don't want to know how the artwork is created; they just want to admire the finished product. But when it breaks copyright laws, problems can arise. According to the Book of John, copyright is too restrictive anyway. 10-15 years should be enough. If you can't make money out of your work in that time, then it's worthless and you should put it in the public domain. Or just burn it.
Speaking of burning books, which I wasn't really but there you go... I've written a synopsis for my own firestarter (that was a totally unintentional reference to The Prodigy, btw). It was tricky to write because the book itself hasn't actually been written. It's a useful exercise, though. This week's the last in our course, so I need the synopsis and any other material I can get hold of for our end of school bonfire. We mustn't let the flame be extinguished! It's important to stay warm, after all.
Weather: 20ish, sunny. We remarked today that we could be in Barcelona. Except that we're not, we're here. Well, most of us are. I'm mostly not, preferring 1982 to the present.
Monday, April 30, 2007
Friday, April 27, 2007
Blah - reprise
Being sick is boring. Not much has happened since Monday and my head still feels the same: it's like being slightly drunk all the time without any of the benefits. Sleeping has no effect, except that it uses up time.
I did drag myself out to reclaim my Flandria from John's Bikes. No go. The gear shifter works brilliantly now, but the bottom bracket is dead, the chain is as good as dead, ditto the cluster, the brake pads have seen better days, and the cables need replacing. I left it there.
For some reason on Thursday, there was a big push from work to join Facebook. I'm there now and I have to say that it's a far better site than the horror that is MySpace. The geographical networks are mildly annoying though.
I see the Pope has officially given the thumbs down to Limbo. Damnit! Does that mean it never existed or has it simply ceased to exist now? I should become a reverse engineer for the Church. There's probably a few jobs going there now.
Lindt Madagascar chocolate is not nearly as good as the Ecuador model.
I did drag myself out to reclaim my Flandria from John's Bikes. No go. The gear shifter works brilliantly now, but the bottom bracket is dead, the chain is as good as dead, ditto the cluster, the brake pads have seen better days, and the cables need replacing. I left it there.
For some reason on Thursday, there was a big push from work to join Facebook. I'm there now and I have to say that it's a far better site than the horror that is MySpace. The geographical networks are mildly annoying though.
I see the Pope has officially given the thumbs down to Limbo. Damnit! Does that mean it never existed or has it simply ceased to exist now? I should become a reverse engineer for the Church. There's probably a few jobs going there now.
Lindt Madagascar chocolate is not nearly as good as the Ecuador model.
Tuesday, April 24, 2007
Blah
It had to happen sooner or later. A stomach virus of some sort has reduced me to a pitiful state, which means I'm watching Eamonn Holmes' 50 Film Favourites on The Hits. It really doesn't get much worse than this.
There's not much point in eating at the moment, except that it passes the time in between lying on the couch and visiting the bathroom. I went to the doctor today and she gave me an detailed oral examination lasting all of four minutes. She asked me what was wrong and I told her I thought I had a virus. Without getting any closer than five feet away, she diagnosed me with a virus and told me to 'go with the flow'. I've been taking her advice as literally as I can, and it's been knocking the, er, stuffing out of me.
The last time I had a virus was three years ago, and the doc told me not to exercise hard for at least a month or I could drop dead. I'm going to err on the side of caution and take his advice rather than merely 'going with the flow'. So no riding at all for a week and no racing for another four. Time trialling can wait.
The weekend was good anyway, apart from the general lethargy. Friday, drinks with P+L + Polly and friends. Saturday, drinks and poppadoms with P+L + some Forbes', Ant, Lesley, Nick and Sally. It was the only night out of the last five that I've felt vaguely human.
Random conversation with Ant about the Virginia Tech shootings: Ant noted that the National Rifle Association said that if all the students had guns, then Cho wouldn't have shot so many people. A brilliant piece of forward thinking there by the NRA. What was required in that situation was an escalation of violence. It worked wonders for the construction industry in Iraq.
There's not much point in eating at the moment, except that it passes the time in between lying on the couch and visiting the bathroom. I went to the doctor today and she gave me an detailed oral examination lasting all of four minutes. She asked me what was wrong and I told her I thought I had a virus. Without getting any closer than five feet away, she diagnosed me with a virus and told me to 'go with the flow'. I've been taking her advice as literally as I can, and it's been knocking the, er, stuffing out of me.
The last time I had a virus was three years ago, and the doc told me not to exercise hard for at least a month or I could drop dead. I'm going to err on the side of caution and take his advice rather than merely 'going with the flow'. So no riding at all for a week and no racing for another four. Time trialling can wait.
The weekend was good anyway, apart from the general lethargy. Friday, drinks with P+L + Polly and friends. Saturday, drinks and poppadoms with P+L + some Forbes', Ant, Lesley, Nick and Sally. It was the only night out of the last five that I've felt vaguely human.
Random conversation with Ant about the Virginia Tech shootings: Ant noted that the National Rifle Association said that if all the students had guns, then Cho wouldn't have shot so many people. A brilliant piece of forward thinking there by the NRA. What was required in that situation was an escalation of violence. It worked wonders for the construction industry in Iraq.
Wednesday, April 18, 2007
My first '10'
The Wednesday evening 10 mile time trial is one of the strongest traditions in British cycling. It's a good distance and doesn't take too long to run a race. I did my first one this evening: Chippenham's regular weekly 10.
I knew most of the course, because we do it on the Saturday ride. It's as flat as you'll get around here and on fairly lightly trafficked roads. The course record is 21'39. It was about a 30km ride from work, which gave me a fairly solid number of km today.
I was talking to Ben at the start. He's more of a TT specialist and has been going well of late. Ben had done a 22'35 last week and wasn't sure whether he would improve it. He reckoned I could do about a 24'00 on my normal bike, which would have been a shade over 40km/h. I was hoping for a bit quicker, given the fact that I've been able to hold about 360W on longish climbs without blowing a gasket. 360W on a dead flat road with no wind on a normal bike equates to just over 23'00. With tri bars, aero helmet, skinsuit, shoe covers, aero frame and wheels, it should be possible to do around 21'50 with that power output. Minus a bit for course undulations and corners.
It was a painfully enjoyable experience, sitting on 178bpm in my 53x15 for most of it. I caught my minute man after 10 min, then my 2 min man after 20 min, and I could see my 3 and 4 minute men just ahead as I finished in 23'20. Ben started just behind me and almost caught me, as he ended with 22'23. Nice ride for the quickest time! I'm pretty sure I was fourth, as there were a couple more under 23'00. I'm looking forward to doing it on a proper TT machine :-)
Alas, me and five others got a penalty (not sure how much) for cutting one of the corners by about a foot. It was fair enough. I wasn't exactly sure where I was aiming for, but as soon as I went round it I knew. Next time, I'll make certain I get it right.
Ik ben naar Londen op het weekend om de familie te zien.
I knew most of the course, because we do it on the Saturday ride. It's as flat as you'll get around here and on fairly lightly trafficked roads. The course record is 21'39. It was about a 30km ride from work, which gave me a fairly solid number of km today.
I was talking to Ben at the start. He's more of a TT specialist and has been going well of late. Ben had done a 22'35 last week and wasn't sure whether he would improve it. He reckoned I could do about a 24'00 on my normal bike, which would have been a shade over 40km/h. I was hoping for a bit quicker, given the fact that I've been able to hold about 360W on longish climbs without blowing a gasket. 360W on a dead flat road with no wind on a normal bike equates to just over 23'00. With tri bars, aero helmet, skinsuit, shoe covers, aero frame and wheels, it should be possible to do around 21'50 with that power output. Minus a bit for course undulations and corners.
It was a painfully enjoyable experience, sitting on 178bpm in my 53x15 for most of it. I caught my minute man after 10 min, then my 2 min man after 20 min, and I could see my 3 and 4 minute men just ahead as I finished in 23'20. Ben started just behind me and almost caught me, as he ended with 22'23. Nice ride for the quickest time! I'm pretty sure I was fourth, as there were a couple more under 23'00. I'm looking forward to doing it on a proper TT machine :-)
Alas, me and five others got a penalty (not sure how much) for cutting one of the corners by about a foot. It was fair enough. I wasn't exactly sure where I was aiming for, but as soon as I went round it I knew. Next time, I'll make certain I get it right.
Ik ben naar Londen op het weekend om de familie te zien.
Monday, April 16, 2007
Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind
That's the way it is at the moment, with the mercury hitting 297K this weekend. It's been amazing weather for the last two weeks, and I haven't yet had to clean the Ridley. I'm sure that time will come :-)
I've taken advantage of it to do a bit of bike riding. The week's stats:
Riding time: 24hrs 18min
Distance: 725km
Climbing: 8200m (broke all my climbing records this week)
Beer consumed: 0mL
Chocolate devoured: quite a lot. Really.
Schwartz burgers and chips eaten: 1 serving
Ice cream counter: 3 tubs
Coffees drunk: about 10, because I was only in the office for two days
Weight lost: 0mcg
Implication: I've eaten nearly 5000 calories per day, on average. Bloody hell!
Related stats
Book chapters revised: 2
Movies seen: 2 (300, not bad, a lot of death), The Lives of Others (very good. I must start a Stasi file on myself)
Hours spent contemplating the meaning of life: at least 40. Immanuel Kant's words on enlightenment were quite good.
Paris-Roubaix watched: 1. How good was Stuey? Maaaate.
I've taken advantage of it to do a bit of bike riding. The week's stats:
Riding time: 24hrs 18min
Distance: 725km
Climbing: 8200m (broke all my climbing records this week)
Beer consumed: 0mL
Chocolate devoured: quite a lot. Really.
Schwartz burgers and chips eaten: 1 serving
Ice cream counter: 3 tubs
Coffees drunk: about 10, because I was only in the office for two days
Weight lost: 0mcg
Implication: I've eaten nearly 5000 calories per day, on average. Bloody hell!
Related stats
Book chapters revised: 2
Movies seen: 2 (300, not bad, a lot of death), The Lives of Others (very good. I must start a Stasi file on myself)
Hours spent contemplating the meaning of life: at least 40. Immanuel Kant's words on enlightenment were quite good.
Paris-Roubaix watched: 1. How good was Stuey? Maaaate.
Sunday, April 08, 2007
Oxygene 2
No, it's not the name of the latest wonder drug, but it does have a bike racing correlation. Well, maybe only in my twisted mind.
It's part of a suite of electronic muzak by Jean Michel Jarre and was used in the 1981 film Gallipoli. I remember seeing this with a friend, aged 10, and it was the saddest ending to any movie I've seen, including Borat.
Rewind to Thursday night in the pub, when I had a long discussion about Italian composers with a friend of an ex-colleague's. He kept asking me about Albinoni, and I told him that he's only famous for one piece (Adagio in G minor) and he didn't even write it. Another Italian did in 1958, using Albinoni's bass line.
Friday: race (see previous post). Castle Combe, big open track that almost looks like an oval. Green grass in the middle, gently curving circuit on the outside, nice sunny day.
Saturday: 140km to Hungerford and back, feeling really good - 20 minutes quicker than the last time I did it. I love this new bike.
I got back and looked up Albinoni on Wikipedia, and found that it was used in Gallipoli. So of course I looked that up and it led me to this music. 25 years ago, and it came flooding back.
I remembered a scene from the movie where Mark Lee (Archie) and Mel Gibson (Frank) were running against each other at a sports meet around an oval. And in a beautiful tie in, it reminded me a lot of the race on Friday. Cue: 'What are your legs?' 'Steel springs.' 'What are they going to do?' 'Hurl me down the track.'
No, I still can't come to terms with winning a sprint by 20m after starting from last wheel in a 50+ rider bunch with 1km to go. Twice!
I am not a sprinter and I've done a total of one (1) sprint in training in the last six months. I've also consumed rather a lot of beer, with the emphasis on 'a lot'. I suspect it says more about the strength of the field, the beer and my new bike than it does about my sprinting abilities, but hey, I'll take it.
Sunday: had to help out at our demo day at Thetford Forest. I left Bath at 5:30 and didn't get back until 9pm. But I get Tuesday off in lieu, in addition to Monday. Almost like having another weekend. No Easter eggs but.
It's part of a suite of electronic muzak by Jean Michel Jarre and was used in the 1981 film Gallipoli. I remember seeing this with a friend, aged 10, and it was the saddest ending to any movie I've seen, including Borat.
Rewind to Thursday night in the pub, when I had a long discussion about Italian composers with a friend of an ex-colleague's. He kept asking me about Albinoni, and I told him that he's only famous for one piece (Adagio in G minor) and he didn't even write it. Another Italian did in 1958, using Albinoni's bass line.
Friday: race (see previous post). Castle Combe, big open track that almost looks like an oval. Green grass in the middle, gently curving circuit on the outside, nice sunny day.
Saturday: 140km to Hungerford and back, feeling really good - 20 minutes quicker than the last time I did it. I love this new bike.
I got back and looked up Albinoni on Wikipedia, and found that it was used in Gallipoli. So of course I looked that up and it led me to this music. 25 years ago, and it came flooding back.
I remembered a scene from the movie where Mark Lee (Archie) and Mel Gibson (Frank) were running against each other at a sports meet around an oval. And in a beautiful tie in, it reminded me a lot of the race on Friday. Cue: 'What are your legs?' 'Steel springs.' 'What are they going to do?' 'Hurl me down the track.'
No, I still can't come to terms with winning a sprint by 20m after starting from last wheel in a 50+ rider bunch with 1km to go. Twice!
I am not a sprinter and I've done a total of one (1) sprint in training in the last six months. I've also consumed rather a lot of beer, with the emphasis on 'a lot'. I suspect it says more about the strength of the field, the beer and my new bike than it does about my sprinting abilities, but hey, I'll take it.
Sunday: had to help out at our demo day at Thetford Forest. I left Bath at 5:30 and didn't get back until 9pm. But I get Tuesday off in lieu, in addition to Monday. Almost like having another weekend. No Easter eggs but.
Friday, April 06, 2007
Back in business
First race, back in the money. Gotta love that. And on my Ridley Noah, which is a very, very nice machine. As I hoped, it has the same smooth handling that the Damocles had, but it's also very stiff. No wonder McEwen likes it.
Weather perfect: 19, sunny, not much wind. It should stay like that over Easter too. Pre-race preparation: going to the Porter until midnight but not drinking beer. That was a significant break from the activities of the previous 11 days.
The race was at the Castle Combe motor racing circuit, which is about 3km around, very wide, non-technical and has some slight undulations. The finish straight is gradually uphill, which I was told is hell when there was a strong south westerly blowing.
I procured a Chippenham Wheelers jersey and pinned three lots of numbers on it. I made the mistake of putting warm-up balm on my legs in the canteen area. They didn't like it. I love it though - it always reminds me of the start of a Belgian kermiskoers.
We had 54 starters for the Elite/1/2 race (they tend to chuck all the top divisions in together) and two others from Chippenham: Andy and Ben. My plan was fairly simple: sit at the back and get some training in, and maybe have a couple of digs. That's exactly what I did, too. I love it when a plan comes off.
Our race was 17 laps (51km), with three primes. I knew it was going to be hard to get away on this circuit, so I just assumed the position (last) and watched little breaks go and get caught in the opening laps. After about three or four laps, the whistle blew. I know what that means: there's money on the line at the end of the next lap!
Instinct took over and about halfway through the lap, I decided I'd better move up to see who was going for the prime. Towards the end of the lap, there were a couple of small groups off the front, so I decided to test my sprinting legs for the second time in six months and took off. Caught the first group, which sat up, so I continued on to the next lot of three. They were urging each other to roll through, with the finish line about 300m away.
Bugger that! I put in my third sprint in six months, and no-one came with me. Big gap. Well, if that was a prime, then I'd definitely won it. Cool!
After that I got sorta carried away with the moment and kept going instead of sitting up. Two others came across, and we stayed away for the next couple of laps. But I knew it was going to be rather hard, and the bunch came back to us.
Soft pedal to last position, wait for the heart rate to get back down to 150 and enjoy the lack of scenery.
A few laps later, nothing had gotten away. My ears pricked up when I heard the whistle go again. I was a little cooked from the first effort, but the lure of lucre was too much and I started to move up with about 1km to go. This time, there were three or four guys serious about getting the prime, so I jumped across to them with about 500m to go. They started sprinting from fairly early, so I stayed on the wheel of the quickest guy, undergeared myself a bit, but still got around him in the last 50m.
It hurt a bit, but I was chuffed. I didn't expect to win two primes at all. Andy and Ben said well done as I drifted past them to the back again, feeling a bit knackered. It probably wasn't the best place to be to get in the winning breakaway of 13-14, which went a couple of laps later. Oh well, I didn't expect to get in that anyway. Andy managed to, and ended up a very creditable fourth.
Once I recovered a bit, I had a go at getting across what looked like too big a gap. One other guy came with me, but he couldn't do strong turns. We got within 5 seconds before he blew, then I blew and that was that.
I moved up for the sprint for nothingth place (they don't pay top 30 here) - more for the practice than anything else - and got 6th for about 20th in the race. 43.5km/h average, which is not surprising on this circuit.
It definitely feels good to be back.
Weather perfect: 19, sunny, not much wind. It should stay like that over Easter too. Pre-race preparation: going to the Porter until midnight but not drinking beer. That was a significant break from the activities of the previous 11 days.
The race was at the Castle Combe motor racing circuit, which is about 3km around, very wide, non-technical and has some slight undulations. The finish straight is gradually uphill, which I was told is hell when there was a strong south westerly blowing.
I procured a Chippenham Wheelers jersey and pinned three lots of numbers on it. I made the mistake of putting warm-up balm on my legs in the canteen area. They didn't like it. I love it though - it always reminds me of the start of a Belgian kermiskoers.
We had 54 starters for the Elite/1/2 race (they tend to chuck all the top divisions in together) and two others from Chippenham: Andy and Ben. My plan was fairly simple: sit at the back and get some training in, and maybe have a couple of digs. That's exactly what I did, too. I love it when a plan comes off.
Our race was 17 laps (51km), with three primes. I knew it was going to be hard to get away on this circuit, so I just assumed the position (last) and watched little breaks go and get caught in the opening laps. After about three or four laps, the whistle blew. I know what that means: there's money on the line at the end of the next lap!
Instinct took over and about halfway through the lap, I decided I'd better move up to see who was going for the prime. Towards the end of the lap, there were a couple of small groups off the front, so I decided to test my sprinting legs for the second time in six months and took off. Caught the first group, which sat up, so I continued on to the next lot of three. They were urging each other to roll through, with the finish line about 300m away.
Bugger that! I put in my third sprint in six months, and no-one came with me. Big gap. Well, if that was a prime, then I'd definitely won it. Cool!
After that I got sorta carried away with the moment and kept going instead of sitting up. Two others came across, and we stayed away for the next couple of laps. But I knew it was going to be rather hard, and the bunch came back to us.
Soft pedal to last position, wait for the heart rate to get back down to 150 and enjoy the lack of scenery.
A few laps later, nothing had gotten away. My ears pricked up when I heard the whistle go again. I was a little cooked from the first effort, but the lure of lucre was too much and I started to move up with about 1km to go. This time, there were three or four guys serious about getting the prime, so I jumped across to them with about 500m to go. They started sprinting from fairly early, so I stayed on the wheel of the quickest guy, undergeared myself a bit, but still got around him in the last 50m.
It hurt a bit, but I was chuffed. I didn't expect to win two primes at all. Andy and Ben said well done as I drifted past them to the back again, feeling a bit knackered. It probably wasn't the best place to be to get in the winning breakaway of 13-14, which went a couple of laps later. Oh well, I didn't expect to get in that anyway. Andy managed to, and ended up a very creditable fourth.
Once I recovered a bit, I had a go at getting across what looked like too big a gap. One other guy came with me, but he couldn't do strong turns. We got within 5 seconds before he blew, then I blew and that was that.
I moved up for the sprint for nothingth place (they don't pay top 30 here) - more for the practice than anything else - and got 6th for about 20th in the race. 43.5km/h average, which is not surprising on this circuit.
It definitely feels good to be back.
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