Tuesday, August 03, 2010
Redirect
Blogger just can't do what I need it to do any more - which is to keep the LLC clutter out of this blog. So I've moved to a Wordpress site which can do a little bit more. I'm still playing with it to make it look pretty but suspect that wont happen before next Monday when I set off.
Monday, August 02, 2010
August 150
I am, despite my better judgement, taking part in @phillconnell's August 150 target for miles ridden in a month. I must confess, the canal ride will form the body of my 150 miles and I am slightly ashamed of that, but riding that distance in 3-4 days will mean, hopefully, that next month I can do 150 easily just at weekends.
The rules can be found over at Phill Connells Blog (the link is to the description of the June 100 but the rules remain the same, only the distance has increased). Commuter miles don't count which is what has stopped me entering before - I'll be riding 30 miles this week meaning legs left to do leisure miles will probably be zero - so it all has to come from weekend riding and I'm just not fit enough yet to rack those kinds of miles up in a normal month.
So, because Every Trail threw a fit every time I tried to insert a camera picture, my only proof of the miles I've done today is a pic from the odometer of my new Strada which I used for the first time today. It strikes me as quite fitting that I opened it on Saturday evening, thus meaning all miles on that odometer until the end of the month contribute to the challenge. It seems.....appropriate.
Yep, it says 10.2 miles. Not 6 months ago, there is no way on earth I could have done what I did today. I got to 5 miles and was still talking about going around again. The only reason we didn't go around again was a pressure headache due to impending clouds and possibly storm which can be rather beautifully illustrated in the shot below.
The 17% climb which preceded this view did nothing for my head either. However, the descent down the other side, once I'd brave the herd of cows (yes, I know) was a wonderful reward. Steepest I've ridden down, slightly loose and shaley, nice exposure to reward those who take their eye of the ball with a broken something and a fabulous babbling brook at the bottom for those with no pads left to crash into. Bottle, reacquired. All the damage to confidence of Llandegla a distant memory. Reminder of why I do this received and understood.
The walkers were all surprisingly chirpy too. We went from Rivington Barn, past Yarrow (easiest hill ever thanks to the surface, my bike seems to eat those little rocks for breakfast), down across a damn, around the corner along another lane, off onto another bridleway than runs under the new trails at Healey Nab. Looked at Healey Nab. Decided not to ruin confidence building day with Healey Nab. On down the other side, across another damn, up the hill of doom (I pushed some of it, I don't care what you think of me), past the bloke in the United Utilities van looking at me like I was a loon, through the herd of cows, down the permissive bridleway (what does the permissive mean?), give the brakes a work out, along the stream to the right, pop out somewhere I can't remember, somehow end up going back down the lovely easy ascent past Yarrow which has now turned into a gorgeous descent, endless wriggles through little rocks where the rain has eroded the sandy path, through a gate, past the walkers who can see my grin from 5 miles away and return it (I think they must have been temporarily bike removed people, because they really did give me the biggest grin), off the brakes, in to the land of 'I know what I'm doing, I do, I do!', popping back out onto the tarmac and down into Rivington village back along past the Go Ape.
Arrive at the Barn to bemused glances from the bikers with engines. Don't care any more, don't care about being mud splattered, don't care that I'm fat and eating flapjack, don't care that my hair is a mess, don't care that my bike is no longer white but brown.
Hi, my name is Louise. I'm 18.5 stone. Or leastways I was 6 months ago. I ride my bike. I like exploring. 6 months ago, my blood pressure was right on the edge of high. 6 months ago, I couldn't ride up even the smallest of hills without needing to stop for a breather at the top. 6 months ago, I was not the person I am now. I'm probably still 18.5 stone, but you know what? I.just.don't.care.
Catch me if you can :O)
The rules can be found over at Phill Connells Blog (the link is to the description of the June 100 but the rules remain the same, only the distance has increased). Commuter miles don't count which is what has stopped me entering before - I'll be riding 30 miles this week meaning legs left to do leisure miles will probably be zero - so it all has to come from weekend riding and I'm just not fit enough yet to rack those kinds of miles up in a normal month.
So, because Every Trail threw a fit every time I tried to insert a camera picture, my only proof of the miles I've done today is a pic from the odometer of my new Strada which I used for the first time today. It strikes me as quite fitting that I opened it on Saturday evening, thus meaning all miles on that odometer until the end of the month contribute to the challenge. It seems.....appropriate.
Yep, it says 10.2 miles. Not 6 months ago, there is no way on earth I could have done what I did today. I got to 5 miles and was still talking about going around again. The only reason we didn't go around again was a pressure headache due to impending clouds and possibly storm which can be rather beautifully illustrated in the shot below.
The 17% climb which preceded this view did nothing for my head either. However, the descent down the other side, once I'd brave the herd of cows (yes, I know) was a wonderful reward. Steepest I've ridden down, slightly loose and shaley, nice exposure to reward those who take their eye of the ball with a broken something and a fabulous babbling brook at the bottom for those with no pads left to crash into. Bottle, reacquired. All the damage to confidence of Llandegla a distant memory. Reminder of why I do this received and understood.
The walkers were all surprisingly chirpy too. We went from Rivington Barn, past Yarrow (easiest hill ever thanks to the surface, my bike seems to eat those little rocks for breakfast), down across a damn, around the corner along another lane, off onto another bridleway than runs under the new trails at Healey Nab. Looked at Healey Nab. Decided not to ruin confidence building day with Healey Nab. On down the other side, across another damn, up the hill of doom (I pushed some of it, I don't care what you think of me), past the bloke in the United Utilities van looking at me like I was a loon, through the herd of cows, down the permissive bridleway (what does the permissive mean?), give the brakes a work out, along the stream to the right, pop out somewhere I can't remember, somehow end up going back down the lovely easy ascent past Yarrow which has now turned into a gorgeous descent, endless wriggles through little rocks where the rain has eroded the sandy path, through a gate, past the walkers who can see my grin from 5 miles away and return it (I think they must have been temporarily bike removed people, because they really did give me the biggest grin), off the brakes, in to the land of 'I know what I'm doing, I do, I do!', popping back out onto the tarmac and down into Rivington village back along past the Go Ape.
Arrive at the Barn to bemused glances from the bikers with engines. Don't care any more, don't care about being mud splattered, don't care that I'm fat and eating flapjack, don't care that my hair is a mess, don't care that my bike is no longer white but brown.
Hi, my name is Louise. I'm 18.5 stone. Or leastways I was 6 months ago. I ride my bike. I like exploring. 6 months ago, my blood pressure was right on the edge of high. 6 months ago, I couldn't ride up even the smallest of hills without needing to stop for a breather at the top. 6 months ago, I was not the person I am now. I'm probably still 18.5 stone, but you know what? I.just.don't.care.
Catch me if you can :O)
Sunday, August 01, 2010
It aint all sweetness & light
I'm not a boy. I'm a girl. Possibly a tomboy thought past your teens that terminology seems inappropriate and I'd never dream of using it to describe anyone else for fear of insulting.
I'm a girl who likes getting muddy and going fast. Probably too fast. I also like challenges. I don't like competitions. I'm quite aggressive on a bike, in the right environment - if I am happy with the track I'll push as hard as I possibly can and be quite relentless about pedalling everywhere I can and pumping every last little bit of speed I can out of the track with my pathetically limited skills.
I'm still a girl.
I wear nail varnish. I even wear make up occasionally. I collect MAC pigments because they're beautiful and I moisturise every morning. I try and colour co-ordinate, I read Grazia as well as Singletrack and occasionally New Scientist too. I understand a higher percentage of the New Scientist than I do of Singletrack when they start talking about rebounds and frame geometry but I try all the same.
I get upset sometimes. Irrationally upset, but upset all the same. I try very hard not to get upset when I'm riding but it happens sometimes, mostly when I am thrown into a situation I know I simply can't deal with. Somehow I feel as if because I am a girl and fat to boot, I must never be seen to back down, never walk unless everyone else in the (male) group is, that somehow it will be noted and clocked and commented on if I girl who is fat is anything less than absolutely stellar and completely ballsy.
Well I'm not. Not stellar, not ballsy. Today I am being a complete baby, but yesterday it was even worse. I quit at something for only the second time in the last 3 years. I've endured MRI's with needles (I'm screamingly claustrophobic with a pretty bad needle phobia) and lights which left me looking sunburnt. I've walked out the house in clothing I would have rather have burnt not so long ago in the interests of being appropriately dressed for 'sport'. I've hauled my ass up climbs sticking to my rule of no damn walking. I've ridden over truck loads of dumped loose stone and stayed on, I've not touched my brakes for 10 minutes on descents, I've jumped my bike, I've ridden alone and managed to stop constantly looking over my shoulder.
Yesterday I quit because I couldn't take it and I am upset about it, damn it, and frustrated and angry at myself for making bad judgement upon bad judgement leaving me in the situation in the first place which I should have known better than to land myself in.
It wouldn't have perhaps been so bad if the same thing but differently hadn't happened at Dalby (who, incidentally, have resolutely ignored my rather irritated email to them explaining that the A5 sign which was their brief nod to people with mobility problems who had the audacity to want to watch a British World Cup event was woefully inadequate). I didn't quit then even though I cried. Yesterday was just insane.
And of course now I'm thinking, what happens if I get one of the 20 random symptoms completely out of the blue on my canal ride. What happens? What happens if I can't carry on and I have to make the judgement call? Even if it's the right one, can I cope with the explanations, the nagging suspicion that no one will actually understand how bad it has to have got for me to quit these days, that I am not the person I once was who quit at the first sign of trouble, that pain that makes me cry and numb dead legs aren't enough to make me quit but that if I can't think, if I can't string a sentence together, it's just not safe - that physical failure is easy to continue through but it's the mental vagueness which I simply cannot conquer through sheer will and determination because if anything happens I simply wont be able to think fast enough to deal with it......I can't explain brain fog to anyone. I've tried and I've tried and it's impossible. It's something akin to being stoned, I think, when you desperately desperately do not want to be, haven't chosen to be, and really absolutely need to not be in the next 5 minutes or something very very bad will happen.
I can work through it, of course I can, simply reorganising the easy stuff to coincide with the time of day it usually hits, but yesterday wasn't at the usual time and it was so out of the blue and I don't know what triggered it, have lost absolutely lost track of what happened yesterday, don't understand how it all got out of hand so quickly, how I didn't see it coming.
The rational part of me knows that it was a lethal combination of a stressful and tiring week at work, accidentally drinking 7 cans of Red Bull thanks to bottles of the stuff not cans, too much heat, my broken thermostat meaning I was in a t-shirt on Friday while everyone else was in windcheaters, a 2am bed time, the hilliest festival arena I've ever had the displeasure to meet, and a terribly nights sleep in the Premier Inn we stayed in.
I'm a girl. I'm not always rational.
There's a ride around Rivington tomorrow with my name on it. I've no idea if it's inside my skill level or miles outside of it. I don't actually care, as long as the fog fairy doesn't come and visit, because she's the only one who can mess my plans up. The physical stuff is a walk in the park, but that fairy needs shooting. And I don't have the gun.
I'm a girl who likes getting muddy and going fast. Probably too fast. I also like challenges. I don't like competitions. I'm quite aggressive on a bike, in the right environment - if I am happy with the track I'll push as hard as I possibly can and be quite relentless about pedalling everywhere I can and pumping every last little bit of speed I can out of the track with my pathetically limited skills.
I'm still a girl.
I wear nail varnish. I even wear make up occasionally. I collect MAC pigments because they're beautiful and I moisturise every morning. I try and colour co-ordinate, I read Grazia as well as Singletrack and occasionally New Scientist too. I understand a higher percentage of the New Scientist than I do of Singletrack when they start talking about rebounds and frame geometry but I try all the same.
I get upset sometimes. Irrationally upset, but upset all the same. I try very hard not to get upset when I'm riding but it happens sometimes, mostly when I am thrown into a situation I know I simply can't deal with. Somehow I feel as if because I am a girl and fat to boot, I must never be seen to back down, never walk unless everyone else in the (male) group is, that somehow it will be noted and clocked and commented on if I girl who is fat is anything less than absolutely stellar and completely ballsy.
Well I'm not. Not stellar, not ballsy. Today I am being a complete baby, but yesterday it was even worse. I quit at something for only the second time in the last 3 years. I've endured MRI's with needles (I'm screamingly claustrophobic with a pretty bad needle phobia) and lights which left me looking sunburnt. I've walked out the house in clothing I would have rather have burnt not so long ago in the interests of being appropriately dressed for 'sport'. I've hauled my ass up climbs sticking to my rule of no damn walking. I've ridden over truck loads of dumped loose stone and stayed on, I've not touched my brakes for 10 minutes on descents, I've jumped my bike, I've ridden alone and managed to stop constantly looking over my shoulder.
Yesterday I quit because I couldn't take it and I am upset about it, damn it, and frustrated and angry at myself for making bad judgement upon bad judgement leaving me in the situation in the first place which I should have known better than to land myself in.
It wouldn't have perhaps been so bad if the same thing but differently hadn't happened at Dalby (who, incidentally, have resolutely ignored my rather irritated email to them explaining that the A5 sign which was their brief nod to people with mobility problems who had the audacity to want to watch a British World Cup event was woefully inadequate). I didn't quit then even though I cried. Yesterday was just insane.
And of course now I'm thinking, what happens if I get one of the 20 random symptoms completely out of the blue on my canal ride. What happens? What happens if I can't carry on and I have to make the judgement call? Even if it's the right one, can I cope with the explanations, the nagging suspicion that no one will actually understand how bad it has to have got for me to quit these days, that I am not the person I once was who quit at the first sign of trouble, that pain that makes me cry and numb dead legs aren't enough to make me quit but that if I can't think, if I can't string a sentence together, it's just not safe - that physical failure is easy to continue through but it's the mental vagueness which I simply cannot conquer through sheer will and determination because if anything happens I simply wont be able to think fast enough to deal with it......I can't explain brain fog to anyone. I've tried and I've tried and it's impossible. It's something akin to being stoned, I think, when you desperately desperately do not want to be, haven't chosen to be, and really absolutely need to not be in the next 5 minutes or something very very bad will happen.
I can work through it, of course I can, simply reorganising the easy stuff to coincide with the time of day it usually hits, but yesterday wasn't at the usual time and it was so out of the blue and I don't know what triggered it, have lost absolutely lost track of what happened yesterday, don't understand how it all got out of hand so quickly, how I didn't see it coming.
The rational part of me knows that it was a lethal combination of a stressful and tiring week at work, accidentally drinking 7 cans of Red Bull thanks to bottles of the stuff not cans, too much heat, my broken thermostat meaning I was in a t-shirt on Friday while everyone else was in windcheaters, a 2am bed time, the hilliest festival arena I've ever had the displeasure to meet, and a terribly nights sleep in the Premier Inn we stayed in.
I'm a girl. I'm not always rational.
There's a ride around Rivington tomorrow with my name on it. I've no idea if it's inside my skill level or miles outside of it. I don't actually care, as long as the fog fairy doesn't come and visit, because she's the only one who can mess my plans up. The physical stuff is a walk in the park, but that fairy needs shooting. And I don't have the gun.
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