Mountain Biking

This post is a bit of a retrospective one as with the Deva triathlon taking the forefront of the blog recently I didn't have time to write this one up. Here's an insight into how I like to cause my own downfall with regards to training. Usually if there isn't an injury/illness preventing me from training I find some way to hurt myself just before an event. Here's activities 1 and 2 in nonsensical training prior to an event...

The start of this post might have sounded like it was going to be a moan about things going wrong, but actually I wanted to talk about something I really enjoyed doing, mountain biking. I went to Delamere forest with Casey, a friend from uni, the Thursday before last. He works in a local bike shop and he lent me one of the shops test bikes (thanks to the Bike Factory). This was probably one of the reasons I enjoyed myself so much. I think the bike was worth about £2500 and it was the smoothest bike I've ever ridden. Everything changed when it was supposed to and it was half the weight of my mountain bike (one I got in primary school that currently doesn't have a chain). If I was lucky enough to have £2500 lying round to spend on a mountain bike, I would have gone for it. But it was this realisation that I didn't have that money that gave me a twitchy bum at the thought of coming off and damaging the bike.

We struggled to walk down

In the end I didn't have to worry about the bike, it was fine. It was my body that I should've worried about. Once we'd navigated our way out of a bog, we found some tracks for me to fall off on. I didn't hurt myself badly but did manage to receive an uncountable amount of nettle stings and bruises. There was a few worrying bits where I seemed to be going sideways and I only came off a couple of times (never badly). In the most painful incident I got thrown forwards when I tried to get on my bike halfway down a steep hill (pictured) then brake making the bike almost go arse over tit only to fall back down as I fell off and smash me in the calf. After a while I got the hang of it and it was really fun. I started to get braver and the whole thing was really enjoyable.

If anyone is considering mountain biking, try it. I can't believe I hadn't tried it before and I'll definitely go again whenever I can. The whole thing is a buzz and the adrenaline from flying down trails stops the pain of any bruises. Only thing is, it's probably not the best idea a few days before a race (I blame Casey, when I said “fancy a bike ride” I hadn't expected an expedition through a forest). It's probably an even worse idea to engage in nonsensical activity number two, playing football the next day and receiving even more bruises (again mostly Casey's fault). All in all the battering I took probably undid some of the hard work I'd put in in training but it was worth it to find a new hobby. I'm definitely gonna have to go mountain biking again.