Training Log Archive: ToddO

Honister and Newlands. Nice dry roads meant for slightly less worry descents than usual!
"Early" start (had to let breakfast settle) so I'd be home to watch an afternoon of athletics on the BBC.
Nice conditions apart from a solid headwind as I went up Borrowdale, down Newlands and into Keswick from Braithwaite.
Good fun for a short spell down Newlands, just outside Stair, due to having a motorbike to give me confidence around the corners. Usually I'm ready to hit the brakes suddenly for when cars come around a corner.

Honister climb.
It occurred to me that this would be the first time I'd come up here since my BG. When I got there though, there wasn't enough energy left to remember that!
Felt like an achievement to stay in the saddle around the first corner. The steep sections after this felt longer than I remembered though. Very hard work. The quads were screaming and the lungs weren't very happy either.
Then the "nice" bit after the cattle-grid was hard as well... maybe a lingering BG effect. Oh well.
Chest felt tight on this flatter section. Asthma maybe?
Strava tells me I got my fastest split to the cattle-grid but I was then about a minute slower n the second half than I've been before.
Could taste blood when I was on the descent towards Buttermere. Good work-out!

Up Newlands.
Hadn't pansied along Buttermere so it was and honest ride up here, not "segment hunting". Felt steeper than remembered!
Strong at the end, helped by a minor bit of road-rage caused by a car shooting past me before coming to a complete stop when it met a descending car up ahead. I think the adrenaline from resolving not to stop, regardless of whether I had to thread through the gap between the cars (yep, these drivers were that bad), spurred me on to a good last section.

Parked in Braithwaite and went up the driveway to the start field of the Coledale Horseshoe race. Took the path that gradually climbed whilst mainly skirting around the W side of Barrow before crossing Barrow Gill (the T-shirt came off here) and going up the nose to the top of Stile End. Trundled up and over Barrow to finish with a longer descent than remembered.
Very little sign of L) med knee pain. I had chosen the route to limit potential twists though.
Felt pretty strong and a bit smug on the way up Stile End. Two weeks after a BG and the main problem is a little bit of peripheral neuropathy. I'll take that. Oh, and the sunburn on my quads has almost gone...

Just over to the end of the rail trail. Feet feeling odd due to the pins & needles.

Being mindful of my L) knee I decided not to do any twists or muddy patches so just went out and back to the arch-sided bridge.
R) distal quads/med upper knee joint a little sore.

To Braithwaite to meet Neild then around the lake via Thornthwaite.
8:18
49:12