Good Times

Tracy in Grosmont

Weve had a lovely long weekend!

Friday saw us tootling about, I had to pop into All Terrain Cycles in Saltaire to see if they could do anything about my Giant saddle bag. In my opinion, it is a very poor design and had literally shaken my toolkit to pieces after only a few hundred miles. They were good enough to swap it for a Topeak one (or at least, they sold me one for the return of the Giant bag and a trade price discount for the new bag)

We then popped over to Heptonstall and spent an enjoyable afternoon in one of our favourite places.

Saturday saw us take the Brompton and road bike over to Grosmont near Whitby. Tracy did a brilliant job going up several 25% and even 33% climbs and a three hour 13 mile ride stats dont really do justice to how hard the trip was, especially on a Brommie. As a reward, we went to Trenchers in Whitby for very expensive fish and chips.

Today, we went back to Hebden Bridge and Heptonstall. Again, just pottering around, looking for good cake!

Really nice weekend, one life, live it!

York and Selby

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Been chewing wasps!

This ride was great fun, we travelled through Wakefield, Stanley, Garforth, Tadcaster and then to York.

There isnt really an easy way of avoiding the A64, you have to travel along the cycle path (separated from the main road), facing the traffic, then cross the A64 - its really busy and you have to use a narrow path between the central crash barriers, simply ridiculous!

Just after we crossed, a wasp flew into my mouth, which was luckily only slightly open. It stung the inside of my lip, not very painful but it swelled up quite dramatically.

Onward to York for a quick bacon sarnie (my first real meat for weeks), and a coffee. Aching a bit when we set off again along the A19 but we soon settled into a steady pace. We went through Naburn, Cawood, Wistow and then into Selby.
Continuing along the A19, through Brayton and Burn then a bit of a wobble! I think we should have taken a turning at Roall, but we messed about a bit swapping sides of the M62. Knottingley, Ponte, and Sharlston before diverting through Walton and back to Ossett via Horbury.
85 miles and surprisingly 3181 feet of climbing.

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Shipley and Hebden Bridge

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The route to Shipley from Ossett is very straightforward, but the roads are quite busy. I was taking my bike for its first service at All Terrain Cycles http://www.allterraincycles.co.uk/ and they did the service as I waited. They had to re-tension the rear wheel and tweak the gear indexing, very good friendly service.

Take the A650, then the A6146, A6144 to Wilsden. Onward to Hawarth then a mountain of a climb right up to the top of the Moor. The hard climb is worth it because the view at the top is amazing and the ride down to Hebden Bridge is wonderful. Unfortunately, I had a puncture on the way back, and my tool kit had disintegrated in the saddle bag! It was easily mended and made a great ride.
(4387 feet of climbing altogether)

Cragg Vale, Scammondon

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A stunning bike ride right up to the tops!
To avoid a very hard ride up Tuel Lane in Sowerby, take the next right turn (Gratrix Lane) just after the Navigation Pub in Sowerby. Follow the map along some very nice lanes and eventually emerge onto the A646.

In Mytholmroyd, take the next left turn after going over the river, following the signs for Cragg Vale. Its a five mile route ascending all the way up to Blackstone Edge reservoir, nothing too taxing, just very long!

Descend to Ripponden, then take a sharp right turn along the A672, eventually going under the M62. This is a steep road!

Downwards to Denshaw and up again to the top of Saddleworth Moor. I took the downhill route to Brighouse which was a real reward after a hard ride.
(6217 feet of climbing altogether)

Basics

Over the years Ive gathered quite a lot of information about nutrition, some of it backed by science, some common sense and a bit of it just my own hunches. Here are the basic rules:

1. Count and log everything! Log all your food using services such as www.sparkpeople.com and log all your exercise using services such as www.runkeeper.com. This lets you analyse your performance in more detail and you will almost certainly find that your weight loss or gain equates to a calorific differential of 3500 calories per pound of weight. This means that if your Daily Calorific Requirement is 2000 calories and you eat 2000 calories along with 1750 calories of exercise then you will lose half a pound. Over the course of a few months I have found this to be almost exactly true.
2. Drink lots of water. Your body needs water for almost every process that it has to do. Your digestive system, brain, muscles, in fact everything not only need water but can be seriously in-affective without enough. Most people believe that they are hungry when in fact they are just thirsty. Drinking eight pints of water a day can help to control your diet and makes your digestive function work more efficiently. Your muscles need water to help repair damage done by exercise and flush out lactic acid etc.
3. Eat six times a day. Yes, that right, six! The key is to eat little and often but not to fall into the habit of snacking or continually grazing. Have a good breakfast, fruit two hours later, a slightly larger meal at 12, then three more small meals ending well before 8pm.
4. Only eat Ancient foods. If a food substance wasnt available 10,000 years ago, then your body will probably not be able to deal with it properly. Eat little red meat, plenty of fish, pulses, nuts, berries and vegetables. The only sugar that you should eat without fibre should be honey which has extraordinary properties. (see https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBnniua6-oM)

Lip up fatty!

Wakefield Hospice 10K

I've always been quite active and enjoy lots of different kinds of physical activity but my fitness levels have varied quite a bit. When I sold my milk round to train to be a teacher, I found that my fitness level dropped right down - well, it would as I wasn't doing any exercise at all! When I tried to do something about this, I found it really hard. I couldn't run 100 metres and it took me a few weeks to be able to run a mile.
I have always enjoyed running and I managed to get myself up to a good level of fitness, but after a spell of illness I just couldn't get back into training. My school had entered a team into the Wakefield Hospice 10k and I started the race with no training at all. I managed to run all the way and did it in 68 minutes but when the photo came back I was shocked!
That was enough for me to take action, this blog is the record of the system I use and of the results I obtain.