Just for fun, I’m going to compare myself to a supermodel. Well it’s not something I get to do very often *grin*. Linda Evangelista was once misquoted as saying that she wouldn’t get out of bed for less than $10,000 dollars. In similar fashion, I find it hard to see the point of going for a ride that’s less than two hours long. However, that said, considering that I was just out for a pre-event spin, there’s no need for those two hours to be hilly or challenging, so I dug out my flattest route possible and headed out a bit after 10:00am.
It was quite tempting not to go to be fair, what with it being grey, windy, and occasionally drizzly. However I’ve been to the gym a lot of late, which does get a tad boring, and it’s not like the weather is going to get better from here on in, so I made myself. I layered up, doing my best not to wear anything I might need on Sunday, which I just about managed, barring gloves and socks. Which reminds me, I should be putting the washing machine on…
Anyway, I think the guys from BBC Weather should go back to Weather school. Or Meteorological College. Or wherever it is that such people go to learn how to make consistently unreliable guesses as to what the weather may or may not do. Temperature, check. Clouds, check. Wind from the NW? Yeah right. And don’t give me any of that “two out of three ain’t bad” rubbish. West I’ll give you, and more than there should have been, but definitely no N, and quite possible some S instead. Considering that I’d planned my route partially around the forecast, I was less than amused. It did not make cycling down the A38 any more pleasant, I can tell you that for free. But it’s swings and roundabouts with wind, and when you find yourself doing 25mph down the main Wedmore – Glastonbury road, you know where the wind is! *grin*.
Probably thanks to the wind I was one of those auditory hallucination days – you know, the ones where you’re constantly convinced that there’s a car behind you but 99% of the time when you look behind you there isn’t? Still, better safe than sorry, right? :). As it turns out, I did more over-taking other cyclists than being over taken by cars. However, you know those moments when a car comes past you oddly slowly? There were a couple of those today. You know that 5 minutes ago they’d marked you down as a cyclist, an annoying slow obstacle to be overtaken, and were planning on hurtling past you. However as it turns out that you’re doing 20+ miles an hour and actually they’re creeping past looking a tad sheepish *grin*. Is it just me that finds that amusing?
I don’t know what happened, as I didn’t feel like I was going that fast, what with the wind to fight, and bearing in mind that I should just be spinning my legs. I had to add the odd bit to the loop as it became clear that two hours was over-estimating it, but no matter what I did, without being daft and adding something gratuitous like cycling up the bypass, I had clearly dragged myself out of bed for less than $10,000 ;).
As I came back up Upper New Road from Cheddar, I came very very close to becoming an ex-cyclist. An ex-everything actually. Out of nowhere a small metallic blue car swerved round me so close and so fast… I reckon he’d not seen me at all and had had to swerve at the last, but luckily not my last, minute. At something like 50mph on a 30mph road. 30 seconds later there would also have been a car coming in the opposite direction. A whole lot of luck going on there… I may have called him a twit. May have. It’s odd though because I didn’t bother with being that cross or shaken up. Well let’s face it, by the time I was aware of it, I was already still alive, and I tend to think that that’s a good thing :). It does make you think though…
Cycling time: 1:52:11 hrs
Distance: 34.05 miles.
Avs: 18.1 mph
ODO: 10443 miles
Oh dear. It doesn’t look like I was tapering very well does it? *grin*. I can’t explain it. It was very flat, and the wind was behind me for while but then, as is ever the way with circular routes, it was also in my face for a while. Maybe I’m just faster now. As long as there are no hills involved that is, so I’m doomed come Sunday ;).
Back to the supermodel thing. Since there is a little less of me than there was, I can now see that the end of my right collar bone is definitely knobblier than my left one. That’ll be what happens when you land on it once (or twice!) too often ;). Mind you, even if I was as skinny as one of them, I’d need stretching a good 8 inches top to toe! 🙂 There endeth my supermodel dreams *grin*.