Of the worst kind of effort, and the best kind of effort.

Saturday 14th was a fixing day I bought stuff off the internet I really do want then loaded the bike, changed its saddle but all that reminded me I still need to change my brake hose to stop frame scuff and I got too comfy and didn't ride. I ran instead. I ran 40 minutes and achieved what 2 hours on the bike would do.

I didn't have an amazing time or any profound revelations. I followed my head torch beams, dodged tonnes of dog walkers and trudged through. I walked up some of the hills, particularly the steep slimy one. Eventually my body settled into a groove that did keep running and then I was back, damp in my coat and a bit sweaty.

The best part was the gratifying shower - physically. Mentally, I was encouraged by achieving 2 runs  of around 5km each in the week... as well as everything else.

I learned last night that if I am to reach 5k I have to follow the bridleway all the way up to the top road + drop back down to get the extra distance in. I wasn't peeved that I didn't last night, but now I know, it's another stepping stone to my 2x 5k. I'm so keen to start including the big Byway but I have to increment towards it, not just sacrifice the bike to running.

 

I ordered my hydro dry lights this week from Spain, no less, so lets see how those improve my wintry motivations.

On Sunday the weather was mercifully clear. I read an article about the benefits of dropping the big ambitions and focusing instead on the small, incremental daily habits that will stick, leading ironically to future endeavours going better. On that theme I went out for a better than nothing Sunday ride which turned out to be a pleasant zip over to the Bradfield side of the valley.

The sunset through just-enough-cloud to keep it atmospheric, though not enough to just make it grey. I left late so I sneaked home under dark. Nothing really hurt, I was just generically tired.

Tired enough to have Monday off? I did, but it felt like a bit of a mistake. My work day was stressful on my pm Q course and I struggled to sleep. Clearly I needed to tire myself out more often.

As the course went on through the week, I stuck to daily exercise but it dwindled from following my plan to surviving the course through stress relief... all of which worked but the entire process has left me feeling exhausted this weekend.  Today, I sat a mock exam and that was it.  Tomorrow I type like my life depends on it and hope for the best.

First difficulties

Last week's riding was wonderful but it was straight back to work on Monday morning and a week which was filled with office drama.  I tried to keep out of it as much as I could but got dragged into meetings when I could have been doing something more productive and had threats that my most successful and exciting project in years could be killed on the whim of some bureaucrat economist in Munich.

Mostly though, I raised above it, got on with my work and managed to ride three times and yoga twice and oh my! how those yoga sessions were needed.

My rides have been on the new bike (good) but not long (bad).  On Wednesday I felt like riding to Buxton to see the Adventure Syndicate but in the end we took the car and ate dinner out in a relaxed fashion and then got home near to midnight buzzing with excitement so resting wasn't great anyway.

There was a lot of talk of the dark places we go when we're riding long distances and through the night and how badly we may behave and how we're all sharing it.  Having the mental strength to deal with it.  I know everyone suffers it and it's how we deal with it that counts but I've never heard it so openly spoken about - and so individually too.

I think I've got better at managing melt downs.  Still I have the occasional moment when I plough on regardless and make things worse but increasingly I'm finding the will to step back, consider, stop and let things go before trying to proceed with more caution.

I still don't fail very often.  I'm too stubborn and maybe I just don't push myself far enough so I stay in my comfort zone or at least wobbling along the thin line on the edge of it.  I think TAW will challenge that for sure.  If not the race itself then some of the events leading up to it.

After listening to Lee Craigie and Emily Chappel on Wednesday I feel slightly more confident that I can complete but mainly, far less concerned if I don't.  While I have every intention of finishing, the start of my journey - plotting new routes around my same old backyard has already taken me down lanes I've never ridden on before and at times of day I wouldn't normally ride and I've had chats and conversations with people that have been more satisfying and more uplifting than anything I have ever experienced before.

After Wednesday's motivation, of course I rode to work both Thursday and Friday, taking the hilly ride home both days because it felt right and the hilly route in on Friday because I had to go to the post office.  The post man brought me my new tent which was so excitingly light, I spent the day at work picking it up out of my bag to appreciate its lightness.

I finished the week exhausted, staring down the barrel of 122 miles of riding to make up the week's miles (I won't make that) and bursting for more, as well as a rest week.  I reminded myself I get a rest week starting on Monday and got on with planning my Saturday ride.

The Dreaded Works Christmas Do

I have had a great day on my bike today.

I started the day in a bad mood, dreading the annual social parade that is the Christmas Do, the time of the year when I realise that my life is so very different from some others and I don't necessarily relish that difference or, potentially live up to other's expectations - not that I care anymore.

I did still want to ride to work so I tossed caution out the window, dispensed with image and rode to work wearing the trousers I intended to wear for the evening with a change of blouse packed.

The new Alpkit pants are very comfy for riding in and only escaped from the security of my socks once but avoided being snagged in the chain. They are incredibly sretchy - akin to being in a reasonably thick pair of leggings.

When I left the office at 4.45 it was drizzling so I put on rain legs and coat to be on the safe side and headed out into the traffic, remembering at that moment that I had meant to put makeup on but probably not a bad thing, given the drizzle and all. Of course I was soon away from the traffic on my canal route and enjoying the ride as the rain got heavier.

I was disappointed to find out my friend's indoor bike park is now more exclusive since he moved out so I parked the bike in the rain, marvelling at the number of buildings with overhangs and porches that could accommodate covered cycle parks under their wings and yet, there lie barren and bleakly well lit every night... I mean why spoil a building with the messy practicality of a functional bike park?

Still, I used the building cover to shelter whilst I  removed overshoes, helmet and gloves and reorganised my spare bag to protect clean clothes from messy cycling shoes as I pulledon my suede boots. I considered changing my shirt but concluded that I didn't need to be that hobo and this is Sheffield city centre on a Friday night, not a cyclo cross race car park. The restaurant would have to cope with my cycling jersey for a few minutes.

I seamlessly changed into my flowery blouse in the ladies' loo, despite the cubicle being so small the door clipped the toilet seat. I even treated myself to a pairof knickers instead of padded cycling shorts.

Once changed I rejoined my colleagues, relieved that mountain biking Simon had an empty seat opposite him along with Andy who was on his last day with the team. It was effectively his leaving do so I was glad to have spent another pleasant evening with him again (we were on site together last week).

After our lovely meal they tried to make me go in a spangly place filled with spangly people. I put my nose in the door and lots of spangly faces eyed my mucky Carradice and suede rigger boots suspiciously, drew their boggling wine glasses closer and shuffled in the uncomfortable shoes they had been standing up in for too long already this evening.  We seemed to be at the back of a long line of people standing at the bar to get a drink they could stand up and hug for too long and I was starting to struggle with claustrophobia.

I made brief apologies to Simon then bolted for the door.  Without a second glance for Andy  (who was still smoking at the door) I paced down the street to where Phoenix was parked. I sat down on the dry, covered steps and changed back into my cycling shoes, rain legs and waterproof jacket and added my helmet to my hat. Now, I know this isn't a good look - l checked in the mirror the other day and my face is too small for the ensemble - but I didn't care tonight. It was fucking warm is what it was.

As I wrapped the waist band of my rain legs around my waist the straps cut wet slithers of cold across my belly fat where the thin tops I was wearing were not tucked in to my trousers, I thought, 'this is the worst of Audax' - this cold and this damp. This recycling of wet cloth to be rewarmed with every disembarkation from the controls and yet I would rather be leaving a control right then.

I snaked through the streets of Sheffield and gradually the drunk people thinned out.

At home I briefly didn't feel like stopping and I nearly pitched the tent for a trial winter bivi in the garden but remembered why we don't do that - because cats.

So I put bread on to bake and settled down for an evening of recovery - recovery for furtherment of adventure tomorrow.

This week

This week has been hectic in a good way.  Lots of riding, running and one swim.  Lots of yoga.

I've been putting off taking any iron tablets as I want to show the doctor what my bloods are like without them but by Friday I felt so dreadful that I decided to take the few tablets I have left and see what happens.  If I suddenly feel massively better, I'll have to tell the doctor that.

I didn't feel  like training on Friday but I still took my swimming stuff anyway.

When I got to going home time I didn't feel like swimming but I did feel like a long ride so that's what I did - leaving my swim stuff at work (I can use it on Monday) and taking the long ride home.  I didn't get much time in daylight although I got to give my light a rest along the trail that runs alongside the M1, traffic free.  When I hit public roads again it was dark but clear.  A little chilly but lovely for riding.

I climbed I descended.  I didn't get cold, though I did get disco leg on the way down Jawbone hill and suffered some frightening wheel wobble for the first time... which just made the disco leg worse.  Over the hill to the estate before circling back to home to finish with a glorious ride up our hill!  All the way to the top.  Incredibly satisfying to be out.  I could've stayed out longer - if my stomach and legs would have let me.

Days that go by

Life is sometimes a bully. It grabs you by the ear and yanks you into a miasma of days that float by with a thousand things to do.

When that happens, the bike sits, sad, in the garage.

From here. Rocky Mountain Biker

I want  a  break from burying myself but that doesn't mean I want a break from doing things so today I finally got back on my bike.

I needed a break from Brexit and it cheered me up. I felt happy for a few things and found the occasional positive spin and  was able to laugh at it. I have never cared less for politics to be honest.  As a francophile I am all European. A dedicated innie. I just refuse to be sad over  politics life is too short.

But back to life and self absorbed mumbo jumbo. It's all it ever will be since it's mainly my diary on the world. If I ever grow old enough to become somehow immobile I can sit in a chair and read my own story.

Sometimes I do it now and often I learn something that I had forgotten about. 

But the story of how I did my second Ironman will take a little longer to come out because I am so tired of making progress and measuring progress and capturing progress that I forgot to enjoy riding my bike, running and swimming in the lake and god, do I hope I haven't missed summer! ?

I washed my mountain bike on Tuesday. I have been itching to ride it since but I had to wait for my body to catch up with recovery - first physically and then mentally. 

I  feel like I am in much better shape compared to post-Forestman which makes me really happy, given how tough the Kielder course is (and was on the day).

On Wednesday my body had recovered but my head was shot. I jumped at every little thing and swore violently,  like my life depended on it, when I lost something.  I lay awake staring at the wall and then finally got up to sulk at the Internet. You know when you realise that some people are unimportant and undeserving of the stress they cause you.  When you try to face their hatred with love and they throw it back at you?  No?  Oh just me then.

I tried to get to yoga on Thursday but slept in due to the late night. Thankfully a visit from Glyn put me in the right frame of mind to do some light vigorous cleaning and I went to bed moderately exercised, tired and ready for a great sleep on Thursday night. 

My ride home tonight in fading light with no actual attack on my personal space  (mental or physical) from motorists really was the best end to the day. I got slightly mucky on the canal bank, had to climb over a tree and then rode over curbs all the way back to uni, giving my mtb a bit more of the urban experience than she is used to.  I should have had lights on really but judge me on that after we've  nailed this big contract. 

Two hungry hairy faces met me when I got home. The cats are happy not to be left alone tonight and they're going to be allowed in the bedroom. 

There's nothing I have to do this weekend but I am going to have a day to myself and then go and hang out with TSK and his team at the Shenington  24 hr race because for once I am going to amuse myself watching other people suffer then I am going to go  back to work and pick up my job on Monday, EXACTLY  where I left it. While I don't aspire to make that too much of a habit it's one I can  enjoy in the short term. 

I lied, I guess washing the mud off my legs is also kind of a thing I have  to do. 

Back on the bike... again

I still hadn't got over the cough that's been plaguing me since December when I raced the 'cross champs 2 weeks ago... when, last week, someone brought me a new cough.

I fell properly ill again but soldiered through at work because I had important deadlines to meet and things were there to be figured out.

If nothing else, I decided to give the ironman training a break for a week so I stopped riding to work, stopped swimming, stopped running.  Just kept up the yoga.  The last thing I did was ride home from work last Wednesday after a lunctime run.

In all honesty say that it didn't seem to help in the slightest.  I went to the hospital for a chest x-ray on Thursday and they told me the results wouldn't be in for a week.

I have new running shoes to train in and no incentive to run in them.  My lungs hurt.  I keep putting it off but nothing is improving.

So yesterday, in a fit of fed uppedness, I resolved to pack for swimming and ride to work.

I rode to work in the sunshine drafting a lady on a carbon bike. Had to work hard to keep with her as I was on Lovely - a steel bike with panniers - but I had the best time riding the white lines to stay in the sweet spot behind her. On the way home I watched a lady on a bike trying to ride through the Arts Tower carpark with an A1 portfolio file. Talk about a cheap hang-glider.

OK, OK, the swimming didn't happen so I got really good practice at riding home from work with all my kit.  It was windy and wet and I didn't enjoy a moment of it.  It was hard but it wasn't cold.  I was depressed but I wasn't captivated.  For once, riding was just miserable.  It may have something to do with bits of my commute being closed and poorly signed but whatever it is, at least I am back on the bike.

I have one day of this week left but I think I might try and swim and run with it tomorrow and you know what, after all the effort I've put in this week, I don't care how late I am for work.  At least then I have covered all the bases of triathlon... and my grad will have an easy start to the day.  I think at least one person really loves it when I get to work at my normal time.

Then it will be Friday evening and my toys have arrived from the ski tuning shop and so for once, I will be repairing bases and waxing skis in the comfort of my loft on a decent set of clamps and not just balancing the planks on my otherwise under-utilised text books and swearing.  Life is looking good.

Black Friday nights

Tonight's ride started too late, caught the worst of the weather and although I tried to make it shorter, I only succeeded in making it a little flatter, more exposed, into a head wind, more off-road, downhill in the worst place (the tail wind, ergo - colder) and 10% longer.

It was bloody brilliant.

I explored new lanes, found posh houses I didn't know existed.  Rode to Wentworth Castle, looked down on the hundreds of red and white lights on the M1. I avoided 90% of traffic on black Friday, despite only leaving work at 6 and as the rain lashed torrentially I was in the middle of a field on the Trans-Pennine trail, approaching Wortley, laughing at puddles.

By Oughtibridge my rain leggings started to leak which is just where I started to get blown along at 30 mph, the rain flying straight up into my eyes, soaking my gloves and chilling my already wet toes.  I toyed with the idea of riding over the hill to avoid Hillsborough on a Friday night but I was *that* tired and cold I decided to face the main road.  So I pedalled downhill as fast as I could for 8 miles before the lovely warming uphill to my house.

I thought I would be sad to retire Phoenix as a race bike but with adventures like these, I am proud that we're growing old disgracefully together.

Bah Humbug Routes

A while ago, a truck driver pissed me off. He made eye contact with me just before deciding that was an invitation for him to cross my path. It forced me to come to a juddering hault and wait until he got out of the way before I could continue on my way to work. I had right of way.

I haven't ridden that way to work since, choosing to ride the riverside path all the way from town to MeadowHell instead. It's longer but I have been enjoying riding and there's fewer dickheads.

Today I simply forgot and was wearing the wrong gloves so time was of the essence. I rode along the busy road. Past the intersection where the curious incident with the truck occurred and approached Forgemasters for the first time in weeks. It's after the steel mills that I noticed the new bridlepath being built to supplement or perhaps replace the section of 5 wiers walk that is currently closed on my commute. I thought they were refurbishing the path but hadn't realised they were replacing or supplementing it.

It will make a good new route and I will look forward to it opening.

On to the path around MeadowHell where my dismay at having to weave round double buggies in the bike lane (because people are too ignorant not to walk in single file through a gap) was outweighed by the joy of finding the Christmas Experience at MeadowHell has not spilled over into the bike lane this year, causing an over abundance of tragically patronising signage.

My day has only been improved by the inevitable arrival of true winter, convincing most people it is time to start Christmas shopping and improve my cycling experience with the warm wintry glow of the smugness I experience while riding past queues of traffic.

Season greetings every one.

This week in training

I won't beat about the bush.  This week has been a bugger for work.  Not particularly unpleasant because I now have a small team of two (me and AN Other) but just busy, wanting to do the best we can.  It's been... long.

After a tough trophy race in Durham I took the day off on Monday and took the car to work.  I needed it.  The legs were definitely on go-slow.  When people hold the door for me and I make them wait...

Tuesday I felt like I needed to make up for it and because it's Polo night for TSK, I don't have to rush home - or feel like I have to rush home.  It is effectively home alone night.

I took the bike in to work via the gym and a yoga session with Chris who was incredibly apologetic for missing his class last week.  After yoga I was still riding slowly to let the legs loosen up but made it in time for the working day to start well.

We worked until 7, getting costs into a spreadsheet and calculating pipeline losses.  Transferring knowledge to the next generation of engineers is way more interesting than doing the same old same old on repeat.  Still, by 7pm I was feeling invigorated and had been snacking on pistachios and goji berries all afternoon so I set out for a ride.  Typing this whilst gales and rain rage outside is weird but on Tuesday night the weather was sublime.  Within 20 minutes of riding I had to take my waterproof jacket off and unzip my fleece to the waist to cool off.

I was still loosening off really so the pace was steady along the bridlepath.  As I negotiated my way around the Penistone Road, the pistachios started to wear off so I decided to cut my usual route ever so slightly shorter and tackle the route to the (minor) Woodhead Road slightly differently.  I took one of those lanes that you always look at and think, "I wonder where that goes" and came out at the other end at a junction that I looked at last time and thought, "I wonder where that goes".  So result all round.

Less looking at the map this time, more clean riding so the route passed much quicker, which meant the climbs passed much quicker.  I was getting pushed up the hill by the early stages of Abigail's arrival so I can't claim all the benefit.

Before I could really feel the hill I was over the top, ripping down the dark woodland road and into Grenoside and the long climb over to Oughtibridge.  The pistachios were well and truly spent.

I whipped down Jawbone hill, carefully negotiating gaps in hedgerows where the wind swept me sideways.  I was trying to hold my line but it was increasingly difficult with an ambulance sweeping past me.  Clearly the wind was affecting my ability to descend this hill faster than the vehicles usually do.

At the bottom I was out of patience and sneaked up the footpath to avoid the one way section and put myself on the last climb out of Oughtibridge and down to Wortley and Stannington where my journey ends.  I walked in the door 5 minutes ahead of TSK.

On Wednesday I had definitely got into it.  I packed my running kit, full of the intention to get away on time and go out with Dark Peak this time - something I have been intending to do for weeks and still not quite made it.  

Wednesday was our review meeting and we were all beevering away to get the proposal into some kind of shape whilst all the concerned people were in the room together.  Conversations were ongoing till late in the afternoon and the reviewer was phoning his wife at 4pm to let her know he was going to be late.  Bollocks.  The group was on a roll and I wasn't going to be the one to spoil the party.

We didn't finish particularly late for a working day - the normal 5:30 - but it's just late enough to know that you're not going to make it to running... but just early enough to think that you might.

I tried to be clever, to take a different route into the city and a different route out to catch the traffic just right.  It had the opposite effect and by the time I had to call it on running, I was already out of the way of the house.  After my elongated drive home, I wasn't in the mood for discovering I'd left my keys in my other jacket in the office.

At least I still had my running kit with me and could, therefore, get changed and go for a run.  In an attempt to stem hunger pangs I had already consumed every half-eaten energy bar that was kicking about in my car and the bottom of my rucsac. I proceeded to get changed in between every passing commuter walking down the street (not that many by 6:45) and set off for my run.

I saw no-one out there except a large crocodile of (school / scouts) children clothed in hi vis and equipped with head torches which they kept shining in my face.  I almost hip-checked one into the river but otherwise we passed without incident.

After 28 minutes I was spent.  Not incapable of running but starving hungry and starting to get wobbly.  There was no point in me going straight home, I'd still be locked out.  I sat on the bench, turned my headtorch off and thought for a while about the coming weeks.  The passage of the 'cross season, weather, impending snows, christmas celebrations, projects, running, swimming, travel.

When I started to get cool, I made the decision to keep going.  Then I still felt wobbly so I made the decision to turn around again.  Then I realised I was almost at the end of the trail so I might as well run back on a different path.

Up to Rails Road and along the A57 for a short jog where I actually thought of running back the easiest way - along the road - instead of up the bridlepath it was so quiet.  Fortunately before the path began, 8 or more cars passed and persuaded me it wasn't so quiet after all and I set off up the rocky slope.  Running was by now out of the question so I continued walking, still thinking, musing, dreaming and generally enjoying my own company.  In spirit, I sometimes still walk with my dog.

It always impresses me that sometimes students make it out here.  I know runners and cyclists pass this way in the dark quite frequently but it's always nice to see the occasional group of drunken students in "civvy" clothing - just out for a walk.  They sit on the crag and drink beer.  It gives me hope for the future.

I dropped off the quarry path and set off down the trails which lead around the edge of Crookes, travelling slowly on my feet allowed me to carefully figure out the best way to Bolehills BMX track without getting too hung up on roads filled with angry and stupid motorists.  Although I had a headtorch with red and white flashy lights, I had no hi vis.  I managed the whole return journey with no more than 50m on an un-footpathed road.  Managing a run down hill but walking all of the rest.

In a timely manner, I jogged down our hill, just as TSK was texting me to say he was in.  It's a long time since I have been so close to chewing off my own arm to stay alive.  We ate dinner very late for the second night in a row and my brain chewed through both food and the complexities of my bid at work.

Everyone knew Thursday was going to be a long day so I at least made it to Yoga in the morning to give my brain a bit of time off.  I gave my grad the project to deliver himself and he decided to be out of the office on Friday so we had to get his bid ready on Thursday.  There were no excuses to be had.  I was prepared to work late Thursday, my body had nothing left to give so I might as well use my brain. After a difficult night's sleep my spine was twisted and contorted and I wondered if I'd actually be able to lie on a mat on a hard floor, never mind sit cross-legged and upright.  I managed it though and there was just the right level of twisting in the yoga practice to gradually tease out the stress and frustrations of the previous day.

I arrived at the office with a scrawled list of things that were left to do, all written between midnight and 4am.  We progressed slowly through the day then sat down to review and tick off the last items into the evening.  We printed, formatted, reprinted, picked through, calculated, almost cried, then fixed things again.  We ended the day with a quality document and all the boxes ticked.

That's it for Thursday really.  My brain was ready for reset button overnight.  I finally slept well, knowing that the proposal was in someone else's hands on Friday but Friday, as far as training is concerned was a write-off.

I headed to the loft with my laptop to do my timesheet.  Another 42 hours done by Thursday evening.  I kept the day to minimal input and broke off at 11 for a yoga session in the loft.  After lunch some minor details were taken care of but I was too tired to think and I packed my stuff away at 3pm.

Monday will be welcome as the first day in months without a fixed deadline at work.  The weekend will be even more welcome.

An unexpected delight

Yesterday, I went out for a walk with my mum and dad.  It was a beautiful walk but it took us rather a long time to do and so, with chatting in the garden included, we were probably in baking sunshine for the best part of 6 hours.

When they left I was feeling a combination of depression and hyperactivity.  So lovely to see them and they are doing OK but things were worrying me and I had an evening of sulking - up until about midnight.

I fell soundly asleep at midnight but woke up at 5am choking.  I felt like I'd inhaled some feathers and wet out for a drink of water.  I promptly fell fast asleep for 2 hours, waking feeling groggy and puffy eyed.

It was starting to drizzle so I drove to work, taking my running things just in case.  I was too tired to drive, really, never mind ride my bike.

The day was dull as dishwater and towards the end of it my mind turned to the targets I am setting myself for Bala.  As I got changed I agreed with myself some ambitious targets for the race which sit somewhere between unachievable and going too easy on myself.  I have surprised myself recently so I don't want to under-egg it.

In order to then go on to complete the 3 Peaks Cyclo-cross I am enhancing this plan with some endurance hill climb type training - which I decided to start today with a longer run home via two long hill climbs.  They go up Herries Road outside the Northern General Hospital and from Hillsborough up to my house in Walkley.

My colleague asked how long it would take.  I said, "usually an hour and a half but today I am taking a different route so I don't know and of course, because I am going over Herries Road, I might get abducted, raped and murdered but hey", (at least I won't have to come to work tomorrow - was the insinuation).

I have been ranting this week about people not saying "hello" on the bike path home.  It just seems rude and mainly annoys me because normally people are so nice.  It seems that the good weather has brought out all the people who don't know the rules (or have any manners?).

Tonight, as I ran through Tinsley, I said Hi to four white youths.  They called me a "Tranny" which I take as a compliment.  I am looking quite muscular now, yes thank you.  I thought of threatening to prove to him my gender but didn't want to damage his young eyesight.  I was most amused by the fact that his mate couldn't hear his jeers so as far as he was concerned, his commentary was lost on me anyway.

On the canal I said Hi to a gypsy lady.  She blessed me.  Get in!  Those targets for Bala seem all the more achievable now.

I had a horrid time leaving the canal to make my way through a shopping mall area near to Meadowhall, around the back of the SIVL adminsitration buildings and on to the road approaching Forgemasters.  Just carparks and pavement and cars and crossings.  Ugh, but no pain no gain when it comes to 3 Peaks training.  Finally I was at the aptly named Grimesthorpe crossroads and could start my hill climbing.

I said Hi to an aged Indian man with a beautifully groomed white beard and he said, "Kip joggin deah" in a quiet voice as I passed him by.  I was elated.

So much so that I didn't even notice the scary roundabout (although a pretty blonde lady waved me across in front of her car) and the scary crossing by the hospital.  The hillclimb was done with a few extra breaths and then the downhill was underway.

I ran right alongside the fence, looking down at the brook through Scraith Wood, trying to see if there was any path and, failing that, to pretend that I was in the woods.  Finally a gate presented itself and I ran gleefully along the path with the road way below me and nearly out of earshot before boof! I was prevented going any farther by a palisade fence (a good job since there was a cliff-face on the other side of the fence).

I retraced my steps to find the last turn which threaded sharply up the hill and left me with precious little choice but to scrabble up the near-vertical dusty cliff face in my skinny road shoes.  More than once I thought I would slither back to the bottom but insanity prevailed and I made my way over to the fence line to see where it would take me.

The years had been unkind to the fence up there and it lay overturned, a mess of steel cable and concrete posts.  To further prevent people from pushing cars off the edge onto the factories below, concrete bollards about 3 ft tall and 3 ft diameter lined the edge of the cliff.  A path made its way along the edge, just on the other side of them so I joined it.  Now, running to the smell of milk chocolate and liquorice - one of the factories is a Cadburys Trebor.

I looked out over the sports centre, the B&Q and the towers of Stannington beyond and tried to pick out our house.  There were buildings I didn't recognise and a track?  Oh yeah, the dog track.  I could hear the announcements drifting on the breeze like they sometimes do when we are at home.

It quickly turned into a downhill to be proud of and I stretched my legs, thinking all the time how awesome it will be to ride down... until I got to the 12 steps at the bottom.

I heard the gentle, then more ferocious tinking and clicking of the railway tracks as a bridge came into view then the gurgle of a diesel engine as a train roared underneath.  I just sneaked a glimpse of carriage after carriage of steely ingots being transported away from Sheffield.  Destination and final product undetermined.  It is one of my favourite things about living in Sheffield.  Its core history and how, despite all the odds, it is still functioning as a multicultural vibrant city that remembers its past.

As I am still reeling from the awe of tonnes of steel winding its way into the countryside at 40 miles per hour, my breath is snatched by the dead.  First one gravestone, then a pair, then rows of them - one after the other, right next to each other, spreading back far into the trees.  The moss on the names is bright green, the stones black with age and pollution but the sun shines through the trees in an orange bask.  There are a lot of people here, yet only three are walking.

I take a photo and jog on.

As I exit the grounds via the foundations of the old building and a monolithic memorial stone, I find the river Don.  I get very excited because I have tried to follow the Don home a number of times, only to end up diverted on to the main A61 and a bit miserable.  I only have time to appreciate it a little before the way home takes me onto the road and around the dog track, this time straight into Hillsborough village without even needing to concern myself with the A61.

Within 20 minutes of painful uphill blasting I am home.  This time enriched and enlivened by the lovely people (and "humorous twats") I have met along my way.

Now that's how to wash down a bad day.

Ripper

Ripped into work yesterday at high speed and then much to my amazement, managed to do the same home.  Rode up the hill in the middle ring - something I've never done - collecting a high five from a team mate running down the hill the other way.

What an evening!

Alarm went off this morning for a run to work but I couldn't get up until 1hr 40 minutes later.

Sometimes your body gives you no option but to listen.

Worry Beads

A really good day at work

A nice long knitting train journey to site instead of the office.  Lock up the bike and potter around site measuring sewage with a bit of string tied to a rock.  A chat with the maintenance lads.  Catkins.  Bumblebees.  A pheasant and a crow sitting on the wall of the humus tanks like old friends sitting at a bar.

Being laughed at by two old ladies at the train station.  What for? Riding a bike? Wearing my hi vis?  Not wearing a skirt?

Train 2 stops to Wakefield Kirkgate where a band, complete with instruments, are running for the Westgate train on the other platform.

An hour-long ride to the National Coal Mining Museum for an afternoon safety-stand-down day (running with scissors?).  Colleagues have seen me wearing the company vest and ask if I had a nice ride.  No-one except the environment manager bats an eyelid at me carrying my Ortleibs into the cloakroom.

A pretty boring safety talk or two.  I fix the rack on my bike during the coffee break as a bolt came out on the way over.  I guess I didn't tighten it up in the morning.  I take my coffee to a bench and bask in the sunshine in my black sweatshirt.  Sometimes I like to indulge in being the introvert that I am and not putting on the networking face.  I am like a cat.

From NCMM I decide to ride to Barnsley station to get the train home.  After a brief navigational misadventure I am cutting across the Pennines like a knife.  Not on the main roads but at 90 degrees to uphill and down dale.

(Borrowed photo.  My camera died)

I am at Emley moor at 5:20.  The cloud is thick enough to obscure the detail of towns in the valleys but is thin enough to shadow overlapping moorland in varying shades of silver and the transmitter looms large like the relic landmark of the foregone radiowave TV era.

At the decision point for Barnsley, it is obviously too nice a day to get on a sweaty train so I continue and am rewarded by lifting cloud, happy walkers, a lapwing flitting in the chill spring air.  His wings are like flappy paddles, propelling him left and right in a chaotic territorial display.  A pheasant stands on a wall barking and a farmer sits in his tractor cab on a half-ploughed field drinking coffee from a flask and watching the sun set over his land.

I sweep down from Denby to Midhopestones watching a big red disk in the sky disappear behind a cloud bank then set about staying upright crossing the main road into Sheffield and instead wobbling over the potholed road to Stannington.

I give up the ride to Bolsterstones and stick with main roads, only being harassed by a couple of trucks before I enter the cosy 40 - 50 mph speed limits of the city.  I am home for dinner y 8pm 62km and 1200m of climbing later.

Back once again with the renegade master

I was on a flier tonight on my way home from work - sprinting up the hill, my knobly tyres rasping on the road as I dashed towards the comfort of a cuppa tea.

A group of hoodies were crossing the road right by my turning onto the bike lane around the dog-fields.

"Scoose me guys, can I squeeze through the middle?" I bellowed, confident as the cold, foggy air would allow.

"Sorry!" they crowed, and herded to the edges, watching my every move. In the Ortons I half expected them to jump me for my 50p and sweaty underwear but instead they yelled, "Cheers mate!" after me as I rode off shouting my "thanks" back.

I wonder if my rebellious underdog biker sides me with the yoof pack or if they were still just trying to suss if I was a big bloke in disguise.

I is down with the hood' I is.