The bike is ready... now my turn

Following on from what I said last time about bike maintenance my bike went in to Alpine Bikes on Thursday to have some work done. The headset in my bike had been wobbling slightly for a time and so I thought it would be best to get it checked out or even replaced. Anyway, got the headset replaced, the rear wheel trued and the gears set up properly. Last Sunday I replaced all the gear and brake cables. I made the mistake of removing the front deraillieur unit to clean it. Trying to set it up again was such a nightmare. Trying to judge the right height on the seat tube and then how to line it up so that the shifting mechanism doesn't rub on the chain or anything else. Anyway, they are all working again so I think we are good to go.

The next thing to do is get me ready. We cycled from Glasgow to Balloch last Saturday. Okay, we took the train back but I ended up doing just over 29 miles... not a bad start. Next weekend I think we are going to Aberfoyle and then at some point we are going to be cycling through to Edinburgh. What this is all leading up to is that we want to have done at least one 70 mile trip before we go. The longest journey by bike I have done before was around 40 miles on Skye (lots of hills on Skye) so this will be quite a task. Yeah I know that Lance Armstrong, etc, regularly do twice that but then again he's not 16 stone and as unfit as I am, ha!!! Mind you, I was playing football on Thursday night, in the middle of a thunderstorm, and I felt great. I wasn't huffing and puffing and even had energy left at the end of the game which is good. We all know that as you get older it becomes more and more difficult to keep fit. You either don't have the time or you feel tired, which is kind of ironic as the more exercise you get the more energy you seem to have. Having Sweden sitting there like a carrot being dangled in front of me is a good impetus to go and get fitter. It's good to have goals. Not having a goal is like being on a journey with no destination. Our destination is Gothenburg but there is still a long way to go before then.