Weekly Summary

Sometimes when things don't work out and plans are frustrated you just have to find a solution that works for yourself. I did this a while ago when I got myself a cheap road bike for three reasons. Firstly, I wanted to ride the Cape Argus on a road bike, secondly I plan to do all my base fitness training and interval training for the Cape Epic on it and thirdly, when I can find no-one else to go mountain biking with or the guys let me down I can always get on the road bike and just ride for a couple of hours. So that's what I did this week, I've had a week of road rides which is OK and quite a lot of fun but I would rather be on my mountain bike!

The weeks stats:
Ride time: 8:40
Kcal: 6389
Distance: 204
HR Zones: Light - 3:53, Moderate - 3:50, Hard -54

I generally try to keep my heart rate around 70% on the road bike as that's the key zone for building base fitness and also for fat burning. I tend to try and ride for about three hours at a time so often have to be up and out of the house between 6 & 6.30am. Summer is much better as you can ride from about 5ish.

So this would be an opportune moment to introduce you to my road bike. It really is nothing special, just a plain and simple thing but honest to. It's a Schwinn Fastback Sport, Schwinn's entry level road bike so it was cheap but also reasonably well spec'd for the price with no house-brand, cost-cutting parts. It comes with a carbon fork, Shimano Tiagra rear dérailleur and Shimano Sora front dérailleur and Sora brake levers & shifters. Ritchey and FSA parts are also to be found together with Alex rims, Truvatic chainset (without the girly third ring!) and a Selle Italia saddle. It even came with some SPD clipless pedals! All in all not bad for an entry level bike! As I said the idea is to do some specific stuff with it after which I'll probably give it away. If the roadie bug really bites I'll upgrade to something a bit better. Having said that, I'm already planning to participate in this year's Die Burger road race in November and the Construction Du Cap 99er early next year which are both seeding events for next year's Cape Argus.

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