Finally

I finally, finally got back out on the road today. Oh sweet rejoice, back on the bike, outside, for 100km or so of sun kissed wonder. It was everything I was hoping for.

As I mentioned yesterday, I moved my ride to today to chase some fine weather and I have to say, doing so worked a treat. The weather this morning (and all of today) has been gorgeous. A bit chilly, but clear and bright, with almost no wind. I make no exaggeration when I say it was basically perfect riding weather.

This morning a few of us from Break Your Limits met up and headed up to the Perth hills. As I have said before, I don't head up into the Perth hills that often, and sometimes I really don't feel like it, but today was not one of those times. For some reason a nice roll around the hills was exactly what I was after. It was quite lovely. There is something special about the hills on a clear autumn or winter morning. The brisk air, the mist hanging in the valleys, everything looking green and lush. Pretty.

The riding was good too. A ride into the hills can be a funny affair, often the power output isn't that high and neither is the average speed. It can be a ride broken up by periods of intense slow effort as you head up hill and then fast, easy spinning on the other side. Definitely a ride where normalised power is perhaps a better indication of effort. That was certainly the case for me today, with my average power low, but my normalised power about where I would expect it to be. A bit hard to say, but it felt like the recent work on the Kickr might have paid some rewards too. The ride up Welshpool Road hill defintely felt easier than it has, even though my power up the hill was about normal. Just felt like I could tap away for as long as I needed. Very nice.

Even the bike handling wasn't as bad as I had feared. Riding up in the hills is a sure way to force you to relax on a bike and it did that for me a little today. I was still descending the big hills like a wet blanket, but on the smaller rollers I was able to get myself to relax and just roll with it. It will take time to feel completely comfortable on the bike again, but today was a solid start.

It was a good long ride in the end, perhaps not the most intense session, but some nice miles. It is the freshest I have felt after a 100+km in a while. Felt like I definitely could have kept riding if the program had called for it. Oh yeah, and the arm coped fine. No real soreness at all.

Can't wait to do it again.