Tag Archives: triathlon

Chalk & Cheese at the Radar Ride (Andrew)

You can buy a synthetic gel that tastes like a banana. You can buy a bar made of nuts and grains that tastes like a chocolate cake. You can’t buy a banana that tastes like a chocolate cake, but, with advances in sports nutrition, it won’t be long before you can. Because sports gel and bars are all about disguising what you’re actually eating.

Who wants a gel that’s a Bakewell tart or a bar that’s pretending to be a strawberry cheesecake? Manufacturers should be honest and describe things accurately. I’d much rather choose between “Chalk”, “Superglue” and “Smell Like Boak”. At least then I’d know what I was buying.

That’s why I loved the Rader Ride 2016. Instead of the usual selection of gels and bars it had read food at its feed stations. It had everything: cheese rolls, ham rolls, cheese and ham rolls. You name it (as long it involved cheese and/or ham), it had it. It had also home baking with flapjacks and banana bread and great treat like Jaffa cakes and jelly beans. And, for those that wanted a banana that tasted like a banana it had a banana.

This buffet was my downfall.

At the end of the Radar Ride, you cycle a service road to a radar station above Wanlockhead. It’s 2.5 miles of pure climbing culminating in a stunning view of Dumfries and the Borders. But, at the bottom, they had a food stop – and I couldn’t resist it. I just had to have another cheese roll. I stopped. Iain stopped. We shared a roll and then, with the road immediately ramping up, I was in the wrong gear. I had to push off a number of times to get enough speed to turn the wheel and change my gear but It was too late. Iain was already 100m up the road. He might as well have been at the top of the hill. I couldn’t catch up.

But I’d had cheese, so I was happy.

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Caledonian Etape (Iain)

B+B Owner – what time do you want breakfast? 5am?

Me – Its ok. I don’t like a cooked breakfast. If you leave out cereal and milk then I’ll have that.

B+B Owner Are you sure? How about tea and coffee?

Me – No thanks! You don’t need to get up. Cereal will be great.

B+B Owner – As long as its not an issue….

Me – Thanks! Ill be happy with the cereal. Enjoy your lie in!

When I got home I rated the B+B on tripadvisor. “1 star – No cooked breakfast!!”

If that review was true (the story is but the review isn’t) then you’d think the B+B was terrible. The review is a snapshot but its not the full story.

Similarly a picture at a race is a snapshot that doesn’t give the full story.

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We both look fit and happy. It doesn’t show that we both had a heavy cold.

We’ve been doing this race since 2011. My first attempt at it was on a hybrid bike and it took nearly 7 hours to cover 81 miles. Since then we’ve been back every year. Our times have got better but there has been one constant – Andrew always beats me.

This year I thought I’d win. I didn’t. He dropped me at mile 20. I tried to catch up but when I pushed hard my chest would seize up and I’d have to cough.

I accepted it wasn’t going to be my day. The rest of the race was spent at a steady non coughing pace. I finished with a personal best so I can’t complain….too much.

The next day I felt rough so I worked at home. I felt much better for doing so.

When I got back to the office on Tuesday nobody believed I felt rough. My boss said: “But you and your brother look fine in the picture!”

Holiday Flu’s (Andrew)

I’m on holiday this week. A week at home to catch up with some DIY, some writing for work and, what I thought would be a chance to catch up with my swimming after a poor month of getting to the pool.

The swimming started fine. I went to Tollcross on Tuesday and swam 2k and could have swam more. “I’ll do 2.5k” on Thursday I told myself. In the meantime, I started each day with an hour on the turbo to get my legs spinning before the Etape Caledonia on Sunday.

And then Wednesday happened. A sore throat. The beginnings of a head cold and, today, Thursday, I’m not at the pool. Or on the bike. I’m looking out the window at an almost blue sky and wishing that I was out on the bike. Instead, I have a head cold.

It’s frustrating to be off work and to have the time to enjoy swimming, running and cycling without trying to fit them around the rest of the day. But I know there’s nothing I can do. It’s a head cold. Possibly chronic. Definitely terminal. At least for today.

I’ll be better tomorrow. And this is a good reminder that training is not just about what you planned. It’s what happens when you’re planning.

Last year I was ill for a week six weeks before Iron Man UK. I should have been going on my final long rides and runs. Instead I had to take it easy. There’s no point pushing it, it’ll only make things worse.

So, instead, I ripped apart a plastic shed and carried old paint pots back and forth from the house to the car to the skip. But I didn’t run. Or cycle. Or swim. So, that’s okay then.

JK Rowling’s Driveway (Andrew)

Iain and I met JK Rowling two years ago. It was at a drinks reception at the Kings Theatre in Edinburgh and, because badgering her for Emma Watson’s phone number is not cool, we asked her what she thought about the Etape Caledonia bike race closing the road in front of her house in Aberfeldy.

Because talking about bikes is cool.

Really.

However, it turned out Iain didn’t want to talk about roads, or whether she was the mystery figure who threw tacks in front of the riders (she wasn’t, we asked and she denied it) he actually wanted to ask if she knew what happened in her driveway during the race.

“There’s no loos,” he begun.

JK’s not sure where this going…

“And by the time you’ve cycled for four hours you really need to go to the toilet.”

I knew where this was going. But there was no stopping Iain.

“And all the driveway’s make ideal places to stop…”

JK Rowling now knows where this going too…

“… all the bikes pull over, and, you know…”

She does.

I do. I have to change subject: “Have you got Emma Watson’s phone number?” I ask.

She doesn’t.

Funny that.