>Hillingdon

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Thursday is my Hillingdon day. There’s a closed-circuit for cycling there, and people turn up on Thursday evenings for group training. Through the year these sessions have helped me improve both fitness, technique and confidence on the bike. I do train on the road as well, but I’m uneasy with traffic. The only other alternative is the static trainer – good for measuring progress, but deadly dull and hard on the bits.

The challenge now is to keep a base-level of training going through the Autumn and Winter (I know it’s August, but outside my window it looks like October). For the last three years I’ve got fitter and lost weight every Summer and then piled the lard back on by Spring. The advantage of Hillingdon is that there are other people – cycling has stopped being a solitary activity. I’m also training as a coach – working with a group on Fridays. I hope that these incentives carry me through to the better weather next year (hah!).

On the writing front … [tumbleweed blows across the stage]

Anyway, Hillingdon followed by the series-enders of House. A good day.