Winter & Early Season

Over the winter I had a lot of ups and downs, two different knee injuries put paid to over 3 weeks worth of winter training, but by the beginning of 2013 I was starting to get to where I needed to be. I had put in ~3,000 miles of winter base training and my knee injuries were being well treated with massage and stretching sessions. A solid two week training camp in the canary islands saw me move closer to race fitness and make big gains in the build up to the season, I was losing my winter puppy fat and getting towards race weight, and I felt more powerful than ever before. Two weeks back in the UK continuing with steady miles saw me continue to build towards the season, I did a small race in Essex and felt very strong coming in 2nd place, a good start to my racing in 2013.

In mid february I was once again boarding a plane and getting ready to spend 2 weeks in Spain to fine tune my top end speed ready to hit the early season at full speed. I did a huge first week riding for 32 hours in 8 days, and in hindsight this was too much. On the 9th day I began to feel rough and couldn't finish the long ride we had planned and was struggling to breathe on the climb up the Col de Rates, I took an early loop home and that was my last ride in Spain. I couldn't ride for the next week and felt very ill, this was incredibly disappointing in the build up to my first race. On return to the UK I saw the doctor and got diagnosed with a Chest Infection, got put on antibiotics. Next week diagnosed with Tonsillitis, put on antibiotics... then had an allergic reaction to the antibiotics! It seemed like this wasn't going away and finally the doctor took some blood tests and it transpired that I had Glandular Fever the whole time. By now I hadn't trained for 3 weeks and was still feeling tired, but beginning to see improvements in my throat and the swelling was going down.

After a whole month off the bike I finally began to ease back into training, and my first race back was a complete disaster... I lasted 20 minutes and it was clear to see the fitness I had lost. Nevertheless I have been training hard for the last two weeks and my fitness is improving quickly, I can see the gains being made and I am looking to be competing at the sharp end of races by the end of April, hopefully in time for the Rutland-Melton CiCle Classic on the 21st.

I am now back on track, looking forward to hitting the races hard and showing people the gains I've made over the winter.

I am proud to be representing AW Cycles Road Team for the 2013 season, we are a small elite team looking to score highly in the national rankings and surprise a few people with some big results in national b races. I will be riding a brand new Wilier Zero 7 for the year, a fantastic race bike and by far the best bike I have ever ridden. The team are supported by High 5 nutrition, exactly what we need to fuel us for the big races this year!

I am also very happy to be personally supported by BDL Group and Houston Cox Central, these guys are supporting me through my race calendar and I am very grateful for this. I am keen to repay the support from these businesses and will be promoting them throughout the season. Check out my sponsor page for full details.

Thanks for reading and I look forward to keeping you regularly updated throughout the season!

Ciao.