Weekly Review February 22nd – 28th 2021

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Each week I try to review and reflect on my previous week on the bike. This allows me to see how my fitness and ability is progressing on a wider timescale than day to day. For previous weekly reviews please click here. 

This week’s rides were as follows:

The week started well. It didn’t end so well. We’re at two punctures now. I have to say that I thought bad luck might come in threes. One to go…

Starting with the good:

I jumped into a Sweet Spot Training session for the first ride of the week. It’s been a good long while since I’ve done SST, and the reasoning behind that was largely because the last time I did an SST session I was working significantly harder than the workout should have been. This was due to a mistake I’d made whereby Zwift was registering 20w less than I was generating. As such, that session nearly killed me.

And that put me off doing SST.

Anyway, at a new FTP figure, I didn’t find that session too bad. I don’t think I’d have enjoyed doing it back to back (so Tuesday and Wednesday), and that is why I decided to do something a little different on Wednesday.

So for Wednesday I did Workout 7 (of 8) of the Zwift Academy 2020 series. This has been on my todo list for ages – pretty much since I got ill and couldn’t finish the set workouts back in late October / early November last year. I’m pleased to have got this one ticked off, and have to say, it wasn’t easy by any means. Some of the ZA2020 workouts weren’t so bad. That one was a test, no doubt about it.

After Tuesday and Wednesday being full on workouts, I rewarded myself with a nice easy one on Thursday. Just spin out the legs, all good.

Normally I wouldn’t ride on a Friday if I’d already done my three weekly rides. However, I managed to finish work early, and the weather was lovely, so why the heck not, right?

Well, one reason was that I would have to use my old tyres – because my new ones hadn’t arrived. So I risked it, and took it fairly easy on Friday, but still got in a solid hour. And whilst I was out, my new tyres arrived. Happy days.

All good. I did my best in fitting them myself on Friday afternoon. Then I realised that I’d put the rear on the wrong way. Amazing. So, sore thumbs or not, I took the tyre off, swapped the direction, promptly popped the inner tube, replaced said inner tube, then put the tyre back on.

Ready and raring for a Saturday ride, right? Right.

Off I went on Saturday. Got 1.6km from my house. Hit some traffic lights and *BOOM*. The inner tube burst spectacularly, destroying the tyre wall in the process. It sounded like a gun going off. Bad times.

On the plus side, at least I didn’t crash. And on the double plus side, a very friendly fellow cyclist helped me out getting a replacement tyre shipped to my door overnight – so no 10 day wait for a new one. And on the triple plus side, I’ve booked in a full bike service + tyre replacement (and check of the front one) for tomorrow night.

So whilst it sucks that I’m off the road today / yesterday, I can still Zwift (at least), and the problems are in hand. Hopefully the bike mechanic can give me a crash course in not destroying tyres in the future.

I’m disappointed with how the week ended. I could have got an indoor session in on Sunday, but I drowned my sorrows on Saturday night and, as I don’t drink very much anymore, ended up in bed most of Sunday morning and early afternoon with a banging hang over.

When I did get up I couldn’t be bothered going on the bike. Bit of a self pity session, woe is me, sulking and the like. Disappointed to have missed out on a lovely sunny day, and again today to be honest. Definitely an outdoor friendly day today – even as I sit here typing this after work. Zwift is my other option.

All in all, I’ve had better weeks. Hopefully with a bit of bicycle love, I will be back on the road after tomorrow night with two shiny new wheels and a spring in my step. I mean, we can but hope.

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