Training

This week was my first full week of pre-Epic training in which I'm riding an average of 12 hours. I've broken it up into two MTB rides and two road rides. I'm on my mountain bike on Tuesday evenings with Paul for a 3+ hour night ride (the first 1½ hours are part of the Helderberg Cycle World ride) and then again on Thursday morning's with Petie from HCW. The Tuesday ride is 'low & slow' normally from Paradys Kloof, into Eden for a play on singletrack and then onto Jonkershoek and back. Thursday's are a more high intensity affair and a serious amount of fun! My two road rides are on Monday and Saturday mornings and will be getting earlier and earlier as summer starts to kick in. The main aim of the road rides is to build base fitness. Nearer the time of the Epic we'll start to do some interval training. The riding is a lot of fun at the moment and I'm really enjoying myself.

Above is my rear tyre from the Karoo To Coast. As you can see it's in a pretty bad way and there is no way it was going to be repaired.

Yesterday I helped out at De Hoop primary school where Helderberg Cycle Safe were doing the practical side of their training programme. We had to walk the children through a course marked out on the playing fields, then ride around it with them and once they were confident ride with them on the road. The morning was a lot of fun and it was great to be able to give something back to the sport. I'll be helping again on Tuesday at another primary school. Watch Petie talk about Helderberg Cycle Safe here.

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