The Suffer fest 90K

I called Philippe late on Saturday . It was originally his idea for us to do a mid life crises Half Ironman, on reflection I'm surprised I'm actually still speaking to him. I asked if he fancied a duo bike ride on Sunday. The weather was looking to be good and he was more than up for it. At this point I'm getting my excuse in early in that he has been cycling about 20 years longer than my rather youthfully exhuberant 3-4 months experience. We'd do a straight 90K by going to Namur and back. A distance that Philippe himself said he'd think twice about doing in his car, just to get to Namur.

Out down N5 then N93 and back the same way, so our sense of direction isn't too strained. We left about 11 and at the 5K mark I knew it was going to be a very long day for me. I was struggling to keep the same pace from the off. We ticked off the first 20K in 40:30 which shows me that sub 40mins for the 20k is actually physically possible if not mentally at the moment.

I was OK when draughting him but I couldn't the whole way and I lost his wheel at every rough spot on the tarmac. Then struggled to get it back. This pattern would continue and he would continually add 5-10M to the gap at every rough part of road or on any hills and I was needing to bust a gut to keep the distance between us to a minimum. I was better on the smooth tarmac sections but I was dependent on the traffic lights being red or Phillipe having a regular picnic stop to make sure we got home the same day as each other.

A few learning points from today though which is surely the point of the whole madness. Firstly my saddle was too low and I did adjust it and it felt better on my legs if not my nether regions. I might actually put the saddle up a little more. I might also look to see if I can raise the bars a bit too. Secondly my cleats are not straight on my shoes and so I'm rubbing the crank leg with the back of my shoe on every revolution of the crank. Therefore I need to adjust them to keep my feet straighter in the pedals. Thirdly and most surprisingly I got very little speed benefit of getting out of the saddle and could see I wasn't making much more progress on Philippe or the frequent gap despite punishing the thighs , the only real time it made a difference was on one hill where I needed to get out the saddle to make sure I didn't need to drop out of the big chainset.

I definately got pulled along by trying to keep up with a faster cyclist and the time for me was pretty amazing at 3:14(bike computer) for the 90K. I can say with a very high degree of certainty that I would not have got that time on my own as I'd have went slower on some(many) sections. I can safely put that down to my low pain tolerance when I'm out on my own or in fact at anytime.

Anyway a top session and its much better fun and more rewarding than doing it on my own. So 'Chapeau et Merci' Philippe.