Failing to prepare …

Now that’s what I call a sandcastle. Short on refinement and detail – but admirable in terms of quantity.

The misery of the wind and the puncture on Monday rather put out of my mind the fact that I’d had no top gear – but lots of grinding and jumping half gears to make up for it. To get over the trauma, I took the bike in to the local LBS and went down to Bournemouth in the sun.

Suddenly, after a winter that has gone into late April, the weather has decided to skip spring and go straight into summer. Apparently it got into the 80s℉ (late 20s℃). A national newspaper I saw the following day had a picture of a very attractive young lady sunbathing on Bournemouth beach. I’d not seen her when I went for a short walk on the promenade – clearly I’d been at the wrong part of the bay.

With the sportive on Sunday I’d decided to take it easy this week – but it did occur to me that I should give the bike a short spin to see if I could remember what it feels like to expose legs and arms to the elements, and to make sure the gear adjustments had worked.

As it turns out, that was a good idea as everything was working nicely, other than the fact that I still couldn’t get into top. I’ve  never fully understood why gears that work properly on a stand don’t always do the same on the road but it brought to mind the old ‘failure to prepare means preparing to fail’ adage.

A minor adjustment on the appropriate rear derailleur limit screw has sorted the gears.  If only my abject lack of adequate training could be remedied as easily.

Another thing I’ve struggled to understand (among many) is how, on a little spin to test the bike before a bigger ride, my legs always feel like jelly and something starts to hurt.  This time it was a niggle in my left knee but I’m going to treat it with the respect it deserves – and ignore it completely.

Tomorrow I am leading the club’s blue ride – probably not a great idea the day before the sportive. I was going to complain to the idiot who compiled the rota – but I’ve remembered that was me. Still, it’s only a bit over a pretty flat 22 miles (36km) and will be taken at a leisurely pace so it might not be a terrible idea – but I’ll not tempt fate and so won’t be taking my sportive bike.