A Cold Wet Fathers Day Ride

Jonathan's Fathers Day Card

Bike after the 4 hour ride in the rain



Poor Bike Having a lie down in the car after the ride





Wet Sand Coated Jelly Legs







Today , was an optional training day but I decided that with Saturday being a wet morning to do my long ride on Sunday , hoping the weather would be kinder. I was wrong . Started off from the Narrows Bridge for a 4 hour ride and got a slow steady drizzle from the word go.

There wasn't too many riders about so it was a quiet ride with just the wind and rain . I did make one big mistake . I had one electrolyte tablet for my bidon and assumed with the cold weather that would last a 4 hour ride .I now know that was the dumbest idea ever. At the 2 hour mark my quads were screaming.I wasn't really pushing hard and had been consuming Gatorade , and jelly beans and Gu Chewie's. So the nutrition was pretty good. I usually have crushed salt tablets in my 2 bidons which provide my electrolyte requirements and whilst I didn't cramp the legs were hurting. It could just be the legs still recovering from the run last weekend and the first long ride in 14 days. Whatever it is , I think the salt intake needed to be higher . I was still perspiring in the rain. Had 20 jelly beans and 45 g of carbohydrate chewie's and a further 45g from the Gatorade. It was probably not quite sufficient but I did not feel lethargic or a loss of energy , just miserable for the whole ride with my spectacles just covered with rain droplets . The legs and the back of my jacket were caked in sand .It  even got into my Bento box and I was eating sand with every jelly bean I was biting into. The freeway ride is an out and back cycle path alongside the Kwinana Freeway and was just boring . Nothing was moving. I saw 4 riders on the way down and a lot more as I got back to South Perth at 10am when the recreation riders were coming out.

At least as I did my 4km run along the foreshore , it was nice and sunny but for the first 2km I could not feel my feet. Strange feeling running with no feeling from the cold.

On Friday I did my swim training in the evening again to avoid the rain .There were only 4 brave souls at training so I had a whole lane . Ross got to watch my swim stroke and he was quite complimentary about my stroke. Just have to keep my legs up and coming from a non swimming back ground my balance and positioning in the water just needs to be worked on. I hope to be back in the ocean again from next Sunday .Could not find anyone willing to swim today but given I was riding in the morning that worked out well.

Unfortunately a body surfer was taken by a shark today a Bunker Bay about 3.5 hours from Perth. The weather and overcast conditions were definitely ideal Shark weather so maybe today was not the day to return to the ocean.



Shark attack at Bunker Bay...story at Perth Now