Di2 loving! Plus late night training.

Week 4 was busy at work. A trip to Northern Sweden was planned on Tuesday and Wednesday, so squeezing in training around that meant for some early mornings and late nights.

Late nights are something you seem to get used to with kids. The ever decreasing time that you get to be an adult, and actually have quality time with your partner shrinks down to the time from when the kids go to bed, and when you go to bed. Then, when that time actually comes, all you seem to have the energy for is to lie on the sofa and watch TV together. Which, can be nice, but it's perhaps not the best setting for meaningful communication! :-)

A pretty tough week this week. Tuesday was an early morning, organising my trip, dropping off at day-care, and then a quick hill training session before heading off to the airport. The hill reps were supposed to be pretty long, which proves challenging here in Skåne. Finding a hill which takes 8 minutes to climb, but ideally within reasonably close cycling distance to home is impossible. So I have to ride a 5 minute hill, keep the power up over the top, and then turn around as quickly as possible to climb again to the highest point. Works pretty well apart from timing with traffic!

Wednesday's session ended up being pretty late in the evening. I had determined that the only time I would have time to squeeze it in was after coming home. My flights were luckily not delayed, so the plane landed in Copenhagen at 21:05, quickly through customs to jump on the 21:26 train, which luckily wasn't delayed either. Change at Hyllie due to the passport controls going on there in order to get the quickest train ride home, train arrived in Lund at 22:07. Ride home, say hi to Malin. Poke a head into the kid's rooms, then down to get changed. Out on the bike in the cold by 10:39. Have to say my legs felt pretty heavy for the first 20 minutes or so, but then the exercise was just what the doctor ordered, and I slept pretty well!

Onto Thursday, and decided to give Zwift a bashing this time. 2 x 20 sweet spot intervals was actually really good fun. Even when I got caught and passed by a race including my old mate Paul Hopkins (aka chicken legs). I sat with them for a bit until somebody attacked and they all disappeared. Must give one of these races a go some time, looks like a good laugh!

Getting into the swing of indoor training again now

Friday was a well needed rest day, before Saturday's MTB technique ride with the club. We had planned to do some technique drills on a specific course, but unfortunately they were hunting, so we were forced to find some alternative spots. Riding on 'spång', or bridges was first. Then onto some cornering technique, jumps and then a particularly tough off-camber corner with various line choices. Good to see so much progress by some of the kids. I've had a good couple of weeks on the Di2 now, and I can safely say I love it! It's like a good saddle when riding for me now, as in, I don't think about it. My hand/brain combo has got the hang of the lever positions, and I just shift without thought. Click the button, the shift happens. Sounds obvious, I know, but how often do you have to hold down the lever to get a downshift, or shift down again after an accidental double upshift. More than I thought apparently, as now I have the experience of Di2 I have noticed how nice it is to just click the button and know it will work directly. I like the light action of SRAM XX1, but one thing I did have a problem with was accidental double upshifts, for some reason. Hitting a bump just as I was carrying out an upshift and my thumb hopped off and on the lever again, leaving me in too high-a-gear. Only split seconds to put it right, but still thought going for something that should require no thought.

Sunday I had decided would be spent in the local park where we have had a few cross races. I was going to ride 3 x 15 sweet-spot intervals, so I thought it would work pretty well. It turned out to be a cracking session, just a little bit of mud on top of hard, frozen ground. Not too many people about in the cold, so I could ride pretty quick without risk of upsetting anybody. My reasons for wanting to do a CX session were the CX world championships was going on in Luxembourg, and I had also heard the tragic news of a friend in the UK who had lost his son only a week before. He and sons are/were very talented cross riders (and mountain bikers), and so a cross ride felt like a fitting tip of the hat to poor Charlie.

My CX01 - still my favourite bike at the moment!

#rideforcharlie