30 August, 2023

A big ride today for Kay to the lookout point near Bagnols-en-Foret. Back-to-back rides for us and Kay did well to complete the 40 miles and nearly 3,000ft of climbing – 64km and 900m. Great job but I have a feeling her legs are going to hurt tomorrow. connect.garmin.com/activity/11905818256

29 August, 2023

Just an easy, short and flattish ride today with Kay. Thought being tomorrow we’ll do a bigger ride out to the viewing point near Bagnols-en-Foret. Don’t think there’s an easier 20 mile ride to be ridden from Claviers than this route.

26 August, 2023

Really put the squeeze on Kay this morning on the road out from Bargemon up to Col de Saint-Arnoux. Barely had time to turn around at the top and roll back down to her before she appeared and crested the hill. Great effort by Kay,

Went our separate ways at the turn off to Claviers with Kay heading up the hill back to the villa while I carried on towards Draguignan and Figanieres. Another solid ride with a reasonable amount of climbing. Definately a good idea to start riding with a HR monitor again to gauge my efforts.

24 August, 2023

Morning coffee ride with Kay to Comps-sur-Artuby via Col du Bel Homme. And at last I’ve sorted my squeaky seat post, the only annoying noise now is the sound of my heavy breathing. For the first time in years I put on a HR monitor today and on the Col du Bel Homme climb I maxed out at 182, a good 10 beats below where I’d normally expect to be. Same for the climb back up to Claviers from Bargemon at the end of the ride.

Looking at the segments for today’s ride, a rough calculation for where I am at this moment in time, I’d say around 15% down on last sumnmer. No surprise there but finally something to aim for. connect.garmin.com/activity/11862029136

Another good workout for Kay and a well deserved coffee stop in Comps-sur-Artuby. It’s not an easy ride up to Col du Bel Homme, and the military road up to the D21 junction is heavy going. From that point on though it’s pretty much downhill all the way home although I’m sure Kay would disagree.

22 August, 2023

First ride out with Kay in France this summer and I think I made her work. I hope so because I was definately working hard on the Col de Saint-Arnoux climb out of Seillans. From the centre of the village it’s only a 5km climb but I’m pretty sure the 14 minute effort was the first threshold training I’ve done this year.

I wasn’t wearing a heart rate monitor but it’s safe to say I was at my max HR well before I reached the top of the climb. To be fair the heat and no water bottle took its toll as I certainly haven’t acclimatised to the high temperatures yet. We left well before 9am but it was already 34°C by the time we got home an hour and a half later.

As an aside, to put into perspective how little I’ve cycled this year, back in July 2021 I cycled 1,252 miles during the course of the month. After today’s ride I’ve only just exceeded that total for the entirety of this year to date.

20 August, 2023

After today it’s clear I won’t be breaking any of my personal climbing records in France this summer. Just riding my bicycle for the love of cycling will be enough. I was hoping for a longer ride today but a puncture – rather a flat from an old patch that failed – cut the ride short. There are worse places to flat than Viaduct du Rayol though. connect.garmin.com/activity/11830592881

18 August, 2023

First ride in France this summer and great to be back in Claviers again. A hilly coffee ride with David for my first outing and while my legs didn’t feel too bad on the climbs, my cardio seems to have taken quite a dip. Especially noticable by the end of the ride when the temperature had headed up to 36°C.

11 August, 2023

Post birthday afternoon ride with Aaron. Nothing too strenuous and possibly my last opportunity for a forest ride before I head off to France next week.

10 August, 2023

Aaron’s birthday today and with his new Altura kit and POC lid he almost looks the complete mountain biker. Just the Melon glasses missing and they should arrive any day now.

I have to say that Aaron’s Giant Trance 29 2 is a fantastic trail bike and a great first full suspension mountain bike. I love my hardtail Boardman Pro 29er, love the way it rides and handles, but after riding the Giant today I’m now a full sus convert.

I was considering a gravel bike for my next purchase but after rediscovering my love of singletrack riding it’s almost certainly going to be a full suspension mountain bike. connect.garmin.com/activity/11755249735

7 August, 2023

Biggest ride to date with Aaron today, in terms of time, distance and amount of climbing. Riding loops around the jumps, getting quicker and quicker, and it was only a matter of time before one of us crashed. Fortunately it wasn’t me, not happy it was Aaron, just happy it wasn’t me.

4 August, 2023

A bigger ride again today for Aaron but with less focus on climbing this time out and more about covering ground. There’s always climbing to be done in the Wyre Forest but today we took the sting out of the hills by making them long and gradual. Our descents were equally long and gradual and the result was loads of fun and our best average speed so far.

1 August, 2023

Since mid-July I’ve been doing quite a bit of mountain biking in the Wyre Forest, introducing Aaron to a lot of what it has to offer in terms of trail and singletrack riding. Today I took his riding up a notch. It was heavy on the climbing with very little in the way of flat, where if we weren’t going up then we were going down.

I even threw in a loop around Hawkbatch for good measure which is a favourite of mine and includes a couple of particularly punchy climbs. A great ride and eventually the constant climbing had the desired effect on Aaron – legs gone he wisely called time on the ride, fit to fight another day.