Welcome to my new little project! I’ve never written a blog before or even kept a diary, apart from a few mostly angry scribblings when I was about 16, so this is all quite new to me. Where on earth to start?? I’m hoping that this will give me a chance to keep in touch and keep people updated on what’s going on in my year cycling and my move out to Belgium to try out European racing and the big unknown…
After the big freeze over Christmas and some panic in the Creswick household about whether we would have any food on the table for Christmas dinner or whether any of the family would actually be able to make it to the table, it seemed the New Year was off to a good start with three full days of relatively ice and snow free roads. Time for some rides! It was amazing to finally get back in the saddle in the great outdoors for a ride out into Surrey on New Years day and then to Windsor on the Saturday via Hillingdon to watch my boyfriend Stew race. I know it never ever gets warm at Minet Park, even in July, but when you anticipate the cold and wear every single item of clothing you own, being a spectator is pretty good fun.
Evidence that all good things come do to an end was loud and clear when the even bigger freeze was back with a vengeance. Cycling in a foot of snow? No thanks. This has really got me thinking about people in the more unlucky parts of the Northern Hemisphere, how do cyclists in Canada stay sane on the turbo day after day? There must be secrets to surviving winter banished to the indoors that I don’t know about.
Fortunately my boyfriend has an incredible stash of cycling DVDs that are somehow just the ticket for making me imagine in some small way that I’m out on the road and keeping me motivated on the turbo. I have absolutely no idea where this collection comes from or where the new titles appear from, but even so, they’re pretty useful. Saturday was the turn of ‘Hell on Wheels’ which followed the T-Mobile team around the 2003 tour de France. That Stew gets into these films perhaps more than most was very clear when halfway through, the DVD shows footage of the team car and a couple of riders tearing down the Tourmalet. Wheels are screeching, riders are holding on to the road by the skin of their teeth when suddenly, thinking he too was about to take the hairpin, Stew goes flying off his rollers! He’d turned the front wheel ‘into the bend’ and for a spilt second both of us thought he has fallen off the edge of the mountain – very amusing!
Over the weekend, I also went to a talk by Vin Denson organised by Redhill CC. It was the highlight of my weekend. I have recently read his book, 'The Full Cycle' and it was great to hear him talk about his experiences as a pro rider and he came across as such a nice man who really wanted to inspire young riders. I know I’m not a young rider but he definitely inspired me!
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Full-Cycle-Vincent-Denson/dp/1874739528
