Tour de France 2008 Photos

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Windsor Triathlon, 15 June

I've just got home after a ride in the pouring rain. Had planned to do some hills around Hampstead Heath but thought better of it on the slippery, tight roads around there. What better time then to update my blog.

Last weekend was the Nokia Windsor Triathlon and the Responders had a good turn out: Phil Richards, Nick Secker, Dave Bennett, Ray Logan and myself. The weather couldn't have been more perfect. Water temperature at 17.5 degrees C, air temps just under 20 degrees C.

I had been suffering with a cold for the past 3 weeks and wasn't really sure how well I'd recovered. But we all have our excuses don't we? Now to the results and photos.

Windsor Triathlon Results,
15 June 2008

	SWIM (1,500m)	BIKE (42km)	RUN (10km)	TOTAL
Ray	32m 0s	1hr 14m 45s	55m 3s	2hr 41m 48s
Nick S	32m 58s	1hr 19m 54s	47m 47s	2hr 40m 40s
Phil	38m 16s	1hr 15m 53s	47m 11s	2hr 41m 21s
Dave	35m 49s	1hr 16m 40s	52m 51s	2hr 45m 21s
Nick C	33m 57s	1hr 13m 50s	45m 31s	2hr 33m 18s

Full results are here.

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Tour of Wessex - Saturday 24 May

I'd been targeting the Tour of Wessex (Somerset) for a couple of months now and most of my training has been focused on cycling. This has left my running and swimming fitness to drop away a little bit. So I was expecting to do well and the target was to feel strong through to the finish.

Having completed the 153km circuit in just under 6 hours (5:54:46) I was pretty pleased with how I felt and finished. That's an average speed of about 26kph, including 3 food/water stops totaling about 17 minutes. Excluding those stops the average speed was just over 27kph.

Along the way the route was blessed with a pretty bumpy profile - about 2000m in climbing - including Alfred's Tower, which was a Cat. 1 climb steep enough to cause most people to slip and slide on the wet surface on the way up. All that climbing should prepare me for the climbs on the Etape Tour.

Took on plenty of fluids (about 6 bottles - 4 energy, 2 water) and food (2 bars, 1 gel, 1 white roll, 2 bananas) but still found the last 20kms a stretch. Still this is an improvement from the last sportive I did when I bonked at about 90kms.

Weather on the day stayed fine with some cloud cover, but I still managed to burn my arms and exposed parts of my legs. Now I've got a lovely pro-cyclist t-shirt tan! The only element that we all had to contend with was the wind. A lot of the course was very exposed, especially the narrow lanes, lined by canals and fields, around Glastonbury - giving it a Tour of Flanders/Paris Roubaix feel. In that section I was working well with a group of 10 or so guys.

By far my favorite part of the course was the ascent and descent through Cheddar Gorge. Pretty spectacular! I only wish there was no tourist traffic around the bottom of the descent, which interrupted our free run down. Never the less, it felt like a mini-climb and descent in the alps.

Results should be posted in the week and photos will be up on Wednesday.

London Phoenix Easter Sportive - 24 March

Decided to do this ride at the last minute. All Easter the weather had been atrocious - rain, winds, grey skies, temps rarely over 5 degrees. But then for Easter Monday (24 March) the forecast was for sunny spells and max of 9 degrees. I just had to get out on the bike. But I should have stayed in bed...

The inaugural London Phoenix Easter Classic Reliability Ride is a 112 km (70 mile), or shorter 55 km ride through the Essex country side, departing from Fairlop. As I arrived at the start, the snow had already begun to fall.

We set off at 10:00am into heavy skies and driving snow. Conditions only barely improved throughout the ride. Settled into a good pace with the lead pack of about 10 riders for about 90 kms before being dropped. Slogged home over the remaining 22 kms. Overall the route was quite nice with a few little climbs along the way, but nothing too drastic or steep. Overall I climbed only 800 m according to my heart rate monitor.

Total time for the ride: 4 hours 15 minutes, including stops. Average speed of 28.6 km/h. Overall I was quite pleased, but need to develop my endurance to enable me to stay with the faster guys through to the finish.

Kit for Etape

I've sorted my kit for the race. Decided on the slightly garish all-white Liquigas UCI ProTour jersey and shorts; as worn by Danilo di Luca in 2005 (i think). Wore them for the first time on the weekend, and in the wet conditions they've gained a little bit of character. I can't see them staying white for too long, so will keep them for the major rides I think.

Geez I hope I'm on form for the Etape, otherwise I'll be easy to spot when I'm spat out the back of a group.

Transport sorted...

Well, Rob has come to the rescue. After all the problems we've had getting our bikes on planes, Rob has offered to drive our bikes in his Dad's van. I'll be co-pilot for the trip with about 6 bikes in the back. Should be fun.

Bikes on Planes

Well the saga continues trying to get my bike on the flight to Pau. I'm told the plane can only take a bike bag with combined dimensions of 250cm (height + length + width). My bag is within the regulations, but I've been calling almost every day for over a week and they can't yet confirm that my bike will get on the flight. Don't know what to do if they can't take it on the flight. I suppose I could always drive for 2 days to get there. ;-)