Proud of myself, but crushed.
I sat on the sofa all day Sunday. I did manage to work and in retrospect, it wasn't the best thing to do with my body but I needed to physically do nothing (got shit loads done at work but that's nothing to be proud of on a Sunday).
Today it's left me wondering, if that's how I feel after 100 miles, how the fuck am I going to ride that over and over again for up to 16 days in Ireland... on hills.
I just have to believe I'll get the hang of this, I'll get stronger.
We drove to Harthill and left the car in the carpark and set off in freezing cold air. My hands were icy for a good while before I suddenly realised, on a random country lane that they weren't any more. We pulled into Rufford Park at 11am, scurried inside the cafe and had an early lunch of pastie and cake. It was very necessary, more than I realised.
Fully fed, we rode across the footbridge past the ford - didn't fancy wet feet today - and continued our route.
I noticed TSK stripping off his liner gloves and riding fingerless. Although I wondered how the hell he could manage it in the cold, I suddenly realised my hands were kind of hot - in sealskins + liners and stripped back my own glovage.
We passed through a mix of open countryside, woodland, forests, crossed the A1 at Sleaford - a roundabout I used to fly across in the 90 degrees direction in the car on the way to Norwich - and then rolled into Lincoln, suddenly dodging cars. I loaded an excellent spring on a wing mirror of a car that mistook a bike lane with double-yellows for a parking space, not realising there was someone inside. The sense of satisfaction as I rode away from an angry beeping driver was immense.
The high street was nice enough - busy enough to make us push our bikes. We didn't get any further towards Lincoln cathederal than that.
The steady throng of people coming down the hill were shoulder to shoulder so we rode out along the riverside to the entertainment zone and had a "posh" bike second lunch in the Handmade Burger Co. at 2:30pm.
When I planned the route I imagined all of this and sure enough, as we left Lincoln and joined the bike lane I'd scouted on Garmin Maps, we rode side by side into the setting sun for mile after mile. Just as we thought the disused railway line was about to run out, it started up again, passing under road bridges almost all the way to Tuxford.
About 5 minutes from its end we eventually had to concede to put our lights on and then we joined the road again.
As I began to slip behind, TSK offered me a banana to eat. I knew I needed to eat but couldn't be bothered to get the cake stashed in the bag on my top tube. Silly, really. Eventually we stopped in Clumber Park on the bridge over the river - familiar from duathlons, not from riding into the night.
It went some way to making me feel better but as the country lanes and head wind hit again, I started to just feel very sleepy (it was still only about 7:30pm). This time I did root around and found myself an energy bar. It gave me enough of a boost to keep up with TSK a little bit more but I let him navigate back to the car, not complaining that we were cutting a corner off my route because we'd added some in earlier in place of taking a short cut through a field.
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| The silliness was earlier! |
We finally found a sign-post to Harthill at the second to last turn of the day with around 1.5 miles to go. Harsh. Really harsh. We argued over whether we would go to the pub for beer first or sit on the swings for a bit but we did neither and both flopped into the car, cranked the heating up high and drove home to get dinner delivered to our door by a nice man carrying a thermal bag.
In retrospect, I'd usually eat more on your average audax (an extra 1.5 to 2 hours longer) so it's hardly surprising I was so tired. Note to self: carry more food.
100 miles
8.5 hours
653m elevation
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