Plans on hold

It's been a properly mixed bag (for that read 'unplanned') month's worth of training, mainly centred around enjoying the Sunday club runs with KPRC and a few rides with Simon. Over the course of a couple of family holidays I started some running again and was really enjoying it, even dipping under 20 minutes at a parkrun. But then the old body gave way, with my hamstrings and glutes protesting  to the point where I had to stop.

However, instead of bitching and moaning about it I actually did something proactive, so I headed down to the gym and got myself seen by an instructor who's given me a strength and core routine to do. It is truly staggering how weak my core and upper body is. During one particularly stressful core exercise my arms were trembling like a skyscraper in an earthquake. 'Ooh, you are weak.' said Tom, my instructor, as various gym bunnies looked on in bemusement. That said, it's been fun doing something different and it seems to be working. I'm going to try some gentle runs again later this week but I'll make sure I keep the gym sessions going, along with a short pool session.

So, that's good. Now the not so good. It looks like that PBP will not happen next year. I spent a few days looking at the qualifiers I was going to do (200 and 300km Kingston Wheelers events, 400 would be LWL again, then Windsor-Chester-Windsor as my 600). But then I checked the dates of PBP and realised that the last day is GCSE results day and with Wheezy Junior taking his GCSEs in 2019, it's not something I can or want to miss. Theoretically, if I left with the 80 hour vedettes group, and everything went well and I had a stellar ride, then I could get back to London by Thursday morning, but that's all a big if and I would constantly be clock-watching, which would just sap the fun from the event. I am gutted, but I've enjoyed the audax this year so I intend to complete my Super Randonne series this season and do all the qualifiers next year anyway. Even if I can't do PBP I can still do a shed load of audax.

It does rather leave me with what else to focus on next year, but for the time being, a bit of bike, a bit run and a bit of swim is fine.