Changing things up: a new challenge!

After running several races and since having a colleague who loves biking, I got inspired to start biking again. In highschool and part of college I used to bike a lot and really enjoyed doing it. However, for the last couple (ok, more than a couple) of years I have been slacking on it, scared of the eternal wind in this country. The times I did go I asked way too much of myself so it always turned out to be an exhausting experience. Not so much fun.

I thought about it and decided that I would have to start on an easy level and then work towards a set goal to keep me motivated. So, about a month ago I picked a race and started my training. At first it wasn’t much of a training because I still had races to run and because it was just to freaking cold.

Ok. Let’s get to the goal first:

On Saturday 19th of June I will bike 115 hilly k’s in the Jan Janssen Classic. Jan Janssen was the first Dutch winner of the Tour de France. Technically, the J.J. Classic is not a race because there are no time measurements and you can can start within a certain time period and that’s it. I would really have liked to do the 150k, but next to the bigger distance, it would also mean a significant increase in the amount of hills. And after a few trainings I can confirm that I don’t have enough time to train for distance AND a lot of hills (I saw the route, and it is mean). So I decided for the 115k which is also more flat.

Don’t be scared that is just my kick-ass look, hoping to scare the hills away.

Onto the training so far (you can also check my excercise log):

- 20k somewhere end of april
- 35k on hilly roads, half May and in the same week:
- 56k got lost and I don’t do the 10% max increase-rule. I felt it though
- 64k on hilly roads.

For the remaining time my plan is to bike each weekend and alter building up distance with the same 35k route I biked before. Last weekend I didn’t bike, unfortunately. But I still have a couple of weeks to train left.

So, wish me luck I am definitely going to need it. But most of all I am looking forward to biking more because I feel so happy every time I am on that bike…well, most of the time haha.