MORPHING INTO A CYCLIST

NOTE THE YELLOW MITTS MATCHING THE BIKE

On Monday morning we had a brief glimpse of summer......the sun was shining and it actually felt quite warm.... an ideal day for a nice bike ride. 
I had arranged to drive over to my daughter's house and go from there on a ride with my son in law Scott. 


I hadn't ridden with Scott since January when he ran out of steam about half way through a thirty mile loop on the Purbecks. 
Since then he has been out on a number of rides with a friend of his who is a bit of a keen sportsman, the odd solo ride and he also  did a 42 mile short sportive a few weeks ago. 


The sportive represented his PB in terms of mileage on a single ride that he had achieved to date. Interestingly the first thing that Scott asked me as we were about to set off was "how far will we be riding today?" I just told him that I had a good route in mind and that it wasn't too far. 


The route I was intending to do was a loop of about 51 miles that meanders through some really lovely inland Dorset villages along some nice country lanes that encounter very little traffic. I thought that the route would be a good one for him to do, as although a bit lumpy, it would stretch him a bit but wouldn't be so tough as to drain him totally.

LUNCH STOP IN THE VILLAGE OF ASHMORE

After all the rain that we have been having it must be said that the route wasn't as tidy as it normally is. A lot of dirt and muck had been washed off the fields and onto the lanes meaning some extra care was required on corners and faster sections. 

One lane near the village of  Farnham was quite badly water logged but still passable although a few days ago it would have been impossible to cycle along it on a road bike due to flooding and all the mud.......We stopped for a short lunch break in the village of Ashmore.....

 

Up to this point Scott had been riding well and I even had to suggest to him that he ease back a bit on his average speed as I didn't want him to 'blow up' early in the ride. 

As it was Scott completed the ride pretty well. 

He had certainly improved since our last ride together earlier in the year and has all the makings of a good cyclist if he can put in the time and effort in training...which is always difficult for a time strapped young family man. 

I dropped him on a few occasions during the second half of the ride, but that is only to be expected as 'going the distance' in endurance terms is the area that he is working on as he builds up his ride mileage. 

The ride was another PB for him as the 51 miles covered was the furthest on a single ride that he has done and he managed to complete it at an average speed of 15.5mph which considering the terrain was a pretty fair average. 

As his performance is improving he is also morphing into a cyclist in terms of the look.....He now has yellow and black cycle mitts to match his bike and he also told me that a yellow cycle jersey has also been ordered to help complete that look. 

It won't be long before he has the full ' Bene in Selle' (looking good in the saddle) as the Italians like to call it........