Time Trial - 12 miles - 33:28 - Average 21.5 mph

I did my first time trial in England tonight, I've only ever time trialed in the US before. It was about 5 miles from work to Newton so I was warmed up when I arrived. I arrived a bit late but was very welcomed by a very friendly bunch from Team Cambridge.

The 12 mile ride was a windy one with a couple of hills. We set off a minute apart and I didn't catch the bloke in front of me - in didn't see him. Someone steamed past me on a fancy bike at 6 miles. I tried to keep him in my sights and deluded myself with the idea of fighting back. It picked up my pace at least!

After crossing the finish line I was pleased to notice an tea and coffee station had been set up. 25p was a good price for a very welcome cuppa!

One of the club members directed me to the cycle path that heads to Addenbrookes. I'd seen it from the train but had never had the opportunity to use it before. It was a nice ride home but all told I think I've cycled 30 miles today - thankfully not all of it at 21mph!

Business Successes

I think the best thing about working for myself is having happy customers. Both Chris (from Chris's Bikes) and Steve the plumber (from Johnson Heating and Plumbing) were starting to notice the slowing economy in their businesses. Now they both have new websites that are easy to find with Google they are noticing the different. Chris has already sold about 20 bikes to people who found him on the web and Steve says that already 90% of his new calls are from the website - many more than are coming from Yellow Pages.

It is great to see that a simple, findable website makes such a different. It is all very well looking at the website statistics but what really matters is sales - and this side of it seems to be working exceptionally well, which I'm really pleased about!

A bit knackered...

I feel a bit knackered at the moment. The Dr burned something on my disgusting left foot this week which has remained sore enough to have left me limping all week. I messed up my left knee in circuit training and I seem to wake up every morning with a bad back. So, a bit knackered.

I've managed to continue to cycle 5 miles back and forth to work and did a great evening of running training with the Cambridge Triathlon club. We did a speed session of 6 x 3 minutes at race pace. My pace was radically different from the early sets to the later ones: 6:38 min/mile; 6:49; 6:31; 6:10; 6:11; 6:01 (smelled the barn on the last one). I've never run on a track before and really enjoyed it. I very nearly got 2 complete circuits in within the 3 minutes but do need to step it up a bit to really get there. I went for a swim later but the soreness on my foot didn't left me do it well.

Friday was really fun though. The Cambridge Triathletes have borrowed a local pond to practice open water swimming. I donned my wetsuit and joined about 25 swimmers in circling the pond (which is about 1300m around). It's quite a different experience swimming in the open water. One of the more noticeable aspects is how hard it is to swim in a straight line. Clearly, in a race, swimming straight is a big advantage so learning to spot as you swim is very helpful. It is quite strange to see ducks sitting on the bank as you swim past them - I felt quite aquatic! What a nice start to the weekend.