Getting Muddy

Yesterday was spent driving to Cornwall for our holidays. Today the holidays started with a trip to the beach. Ali and Mikey went for a swim, I wimped out after a short paddle. Later we all went for a run before me and Mikey went out on the cross bikes. It was very muddy but lots and lots of fun! Great start to the holidays.

Cyclo-Cross South West Style

To finish the holiday I rode a cross race down in Somerset. I orginally had to intention of racing but Mikey talked me into it and Katie kindly lent me Ted. On the start line I looked around and noticed that not only was I the only femal but all the others looked like fit men, this was going to be hard and maybe just involve me riding round on my own.

On go we set off and I had a bad start for me and ended up right at the back, well there were two or three people behind me. All I could do was keep my head down and keep pushing. The course was mainly round a playing field and the only vaguely interesting bit was some off-camber through the trees.

There were also some hurdles, I at least did better than I had in macclesfield a couple of years ago and almost managed to take one of them at a run. The other was uphill and was a lot harder.

Mikey caugt me just over halfway through the race so my aim was that he didn't catch me again! Ali and Katie were out cheering and taking photo's which kept me going and show me pulling some fantastic faces.

Into the last lap and the guy who had been on my tail all race went past, I had to dig deep. Halfway round I passed him again, I had no choice but to run the hurdles. Ali was screaming at the finish as I pushed as hard as I could, just holding him off. I was ready to die after I crossed the line! I may have only been racing for second to last or third to last but it was fun. I was of course first female!

I enjoyed the race so maybe might think again about selling my cross bike. It's ages since I've worked that hard on a bike and I was so sleepy afterwards. Apparently intensity is what I need to get faster!

Can't wait to race with Mikey again!

Cornwall Holiday

Back from a fab time in Cornwall that involved bikes, geocaching, cake, cyclo-cross, swimming and friends. Lots of individual posts to come about the days. We got there on monday and had an easy pootle on the bikes on tuesday. Then on tuesday evening we planned the rest of the week, I think my friends were humouring me but I like to know what I am doing. Amazingly we stuck to the plan. So on wednesday we went geocaching on foot nearby, on thursday we went to Lizard Point, friday was riding day, saturday we watched Ali swim in the sea and then today we went to the cyclo-cross race.
Fab week and over way too quickly!

Getting some miles in

I'm currently down in Cornwall with Ali visiting my velocake pals. We've done more geocaching (post about this once I get home) but the last couple of days have involved the bikes. Yesterday we went to Lizard point. Ali and Katie went in the car while Mikey and I rode there and back giving us 55miles. For some reason I still didn't sleep brilliantly. Today we all went out, I had ice cream in Mousehole, the others had cake. Then we headed up to see the Merry Maidens stone circle to leave a travel bug that is trying to visit as many stone circles as possible having started at Stonehenge. From there we grabbed some food and then headed back. 26miles on the computer. Mikey and I then headed out for a quick 19miles giving me 45miles. Some miles were just what I needed and eventually i'm getting less anxious and more relaxed.