So that’s the break over with. 52 days after Elsie was born and 54 days since my bike crash, I’ve finally got back up and running and started the ‘training’ as opposed to the ‘keeping ticking over’. I’m really glad I forced myself to do the Waugh’s Well fell race earlier this evening.

A shade under four miles and climbing approx 1300 feet, it’s a classic Lancashire short fell race. I did it a few years ago and know the hill of Whittle Pike (climbed twice) really well - our house pretty much looks onto it so it’s a real landmark to me.

The time, and position were neither here nor there. I’m not sure what I was expecting, but what I got was one heck of a workout and a reminder that competition is the best form of training. A couple of years ago I’d have been pushing a top ten in a race like this on a good day, but I was content to push myself as hard as I can this evening in the knowledge that I’m back to training rather than keeping fit.

Another gobsmacker for the statisticians out there… average heart rate of 178bpm for the race (look at that graph… redlining!) and a max of 186. At 38, that’s pretty good and I think the max-est max I can recall since getting the trusty Garmin 305. View the course here in Google Earth. Mainly and out-and-back up-and-down race with a loop in the middle.

I beat my previous best by 40 odd seconds - I did the race four years ago and came 22nd. Not sure what position I was this year but it was about the same. Room, and time for improvement… the upward slope has started, touch wood.

The relocation of my brother Phil to his new job in Lancaster - and soon that of his family, as soon as they find a place to live - is starting to have an impact on me in a great way. It’s just so great to be able to meet up and do things pretty informally. His life and home in Devon were so great and visits were brill, but it’s such a big deal to get in the car, pack all your stuff, and ‘organise’ a trip.

A couple of weeks ago, just after Phil started, he popped down for the evening, after work - a meal, a few pints, all simple stuff, but stuff that’s been missing for so long.

Last night, I met Phil with an old friend and long-term colleague Richard Bardgett, thus reforming - in a small way - a set of cycling buddies I used to pop out for occasional cheeky evening rides with in… well… about 1993 ! The lanes round Longridge were a great choice for some lovely mellow chatting (we saw about ten cars all evening) and just to be able to get out and enjoy a nice bike ride without ‘training’ was so good for the soul. (My only non training rides in recent memory have involved a trailer-bike being attached to the back!)

We’ll have to do it again some time. Maybe let’s not leave it so long till the next one.

With the new addition to family Haygarth being such a big thing in the June calendar (or the May one, as things turned out), I decided to give the local Rossendale Triathlon a miss this year. Instead, I continued and indeed developed my 2008 habit of becoming a sports spectator, and went along with the camera to get a few snaps of mates Carl and Cathy Nelson doing a team effort in the local sprint triathlon.

They did very well and everyone seemed to enjoy the event. Lily and I especially enjoyed the trip out on the trailer bike - she covered 13 miles and has perfected the art of seeming to be pedalling all the time (or at least, every time I look round!). Funniest bit of the day for me personally was when we were making out way round part of the course and came up behind one of the less committed entrants - Lily’s pedalling suddenly kicked hard from behind as she scented the quarry, and we had to overtake the poor bloke. Quite what he thought when he saw the five year old’s determination as she rode past, I don’t know, but I suspect he felt like jacking in there and then. It made Lily’s day though… little minx.

Rossendale Triathlon 2008 results here
Some photos here

The Fred Whitton Challenge is billed as a 112 mile sportive ride for charity around the English Lake District, taking in six of the major passes en route… starts and finishes at Coniston, and includes the climbs of Kirkstone Pass, Honister Pass, Newlands Pass, Whinlatter Pass, Cold Fell, Irton Pike, and finishes with the brutal Hardknott and Wrynose Passes.

I’ve ridden the Fred Whitton Challenge in the Lake District for the last three years now, and seem to have got by on not much specialist training, but today’s event was the closest I came to coming unstuck! Although I’m not too gifted as a climber and don’t immerse myself in the world of long training rides, I’ve managed to get by on some type of fitness or other in the past. This year’s preparation was taking it to extremes, with my longest ride this calendar year being 2 hrs 15 minutes (the ride is generally over 6 hours). I also had a three week chest infection which culminated in a course of Penicillin starting on Wednesday. We’re not talking ‘training camps’ here.

But cometh the hour, cometh the Loafer, and I managed to somehow avoid death on the hottest extended bike ride I’ve ever done.

Avid readers will remember that I cleverly decided to ride as a domestique last year (a team helper), hammering the pace hard for the first 50 miles, and cunningly giving myself an excuse to do the rest of the ride at a relative trundle. Well this year I had a helper - a super-domestique in the shape of last year’s record breaking rider Lewis Craven, who’d been equally slovenly in his training in recent months, and was quite happy to work like a horse with me on the front of the 50 strong group until the first ‘killer’ climb at 45 miles; Honister Pass.

Whether the pace or the lack of training was the undoing of Lewis and I is up for debate, but come undone we did, big time, later on.

On the descent of Newlands Pass, Lewis punctured, and we agreed that I should push on at a leisurely pace to the top of Whinlatter Pass, where I’d wait for him if he hadn’t caught me. And wait I did, for ten minutes, until one very dead looking record-holder emerged up the climb. Lewis had blown and we were half way round. Bugger.

We took things really easy along the western side of the course, and decided at the second and final food stop (Gosforth) that it was time for a good rest and a gossip, so we ate and chatted to a few helpers and set off back ten minutes later.

The approach to Hard Knott pass, easily the hardest part of the route, is purgatory. Especially when you haven’t done the training. But up we rode, where most decided to walk in the heat, and were starting to approach home and dry. It was 28°. The heat was a contributing factor in Lewis’s second puncture on the hairy descent of Hard Knott pass (the hot rims from braking melted the rim tape and a spoke poked into the tube!). I mended it for him this time. He was in a worse state than me.

We pressed over the final climb of Wrynose pass and rolled home rather flaked out and a bit sunburnt in a pretty unremarkable time of over seven hours.

Oh well. We still winged it I think, considering the lack of training. And we were mini heroes in helping keep the pace so high early on that Wheelbase team mate Rob Jebb manage (along with national hill climb champion James Dobbin) to break Lewis and Stuart Reid’s record for the event. Bitter-sweet stuff for Lewis, but that’s cycling. He was modest and full of humility throughout though - a very respectable man!

View the 2008 Fred Whitton in Google Earth

FULL CLICK HERE for full Fred Whitton Results 2008

Photos here (or slideshow if you’d prefer).

My Stats from the Garmin 305 (didn’t pause it at any time).

• 109.4 miles
• Max speed: 51.9mph
• Total Calories: 9367
• Avg Heart Rate: 151bpm
• Max Heart Rate: 179bpm
• Total ascent and descent: 14061 feet

I had a cracking day out on Saturday with Elvis. Katie dropped us off at Ribblehead to watch the Three Peaks race which I wasn’t competing in again this year, and the build-up to the leaders of the 740 racers coming through led to an electric atmosphere. When the first few leaders had come through, we ran on to the Hill Inn, then followed the course up to the summit of Ingleborough (Google Earth track here).

My main reason for being there was to give moral and fuel support to Rob Jebb who cycles with me in Team Wheelbase. Rob had won the race for the last three years, but this year’s ‘international’ status of the race (the World Long Distance Mountain Running Challenge for 2008) meant a larger field, more prize money, and more nervy runners! In the end, after a super-fast start to the 24 mile race, Rob finished fourth.

When I helped him on Ingleborough, with a long descent to the finish, I offered him encouragement, knowing that on a long race like that, there was potential to close the time gap:

Dave: “Still lots of time to catch them yet Rob. How are you feeling?”
Rob: “Fucked.”

I ran down to Ingleton after that, dropping my camera twice on the way, but I somehow got away with it. Elvis didn’t like standing about watching runners much, although he did take the opportunity to beg sarnies from spectators whenever the chance arose.

Full results here: http://siera.sportident.co.uk/threepeaks/results.php?course=Long

Photos here