Week ten - Tuesday

Cycling 1.5 hrs 

Ride at a steady pace. Try not to get out of breath. Keep the pedals turning at 90 – 95rpm. Review and rearrange your training route to increase distance. 

Luckily I have already rethought my favourite route to increase the distance so I set out on the road bike to ride for an extra 30 mins. 

On a positive note I now feel happy on the bike. I like the position and am happier getting up out of the saddle. 

Unfortunately that’s pretty much where the positives end. I do not seem to be able to get the hang of the gears at all. I feel like I am permanently in the wrong gear which is incredibly hard work as it makes it feel like I am cycling through treacle. I had trouble getting up my first hill as I actually couldn’t get the bike moving and wasn’t going fast enough to maintain momentum when I go to it. I found I lost speed easily and struggled to get it back up. That said when I tackled a particularly tricky hill when I got the bike moving I found it a lot easier than I had done on the hybrid. 

I don’t know quite why I am finding the gears such a challenge. I know how to move them and know that I should just change them until I find one I’m happy in but for some reason I have a real mental block on them. On my hybrid the levers show which way to press them for higher or lower and the dial indicates the number gear you are in. The absence of this on the road bike seems to be causing me a real issue which is very silly.

The problem with this is that I feel that I have gone back about 6 weeks in my training programme and I don’t have time for that. I feel despondent and like I won’t be ready in time now because of the new bike. Realistically this is of course, unlikely to be the case. Hopefully, with practice, the gear issue will click in my head and I will improve. Last night I didn’t quite manage 1.5 hours of cycling as I was so grumpy but I did do 1hour 17mins so I wasn’t far off. I also did it in 13mph average which is not that far off what I want to be averaging by August so all is not lost. 

I guess all I can do is keep practicing and try harder.