02/06/18
Had my first session on my Curtis Racelite 24″ today and it is amazing. It is the only other bike that I have ridden other than my Yess that felt good straight away. As the morning progressed I got better and better. I was over manualing stuff and rode the first straight better than I ever have before jumping out of manuals that I was bonking before. I even over manualed the second jump on the second straight which I was struggling to manual cleanly last week. Now I just need to keep riding the bike so that I get totally used to it. I think I am going to try and get a second set of wheels to train on to keep the current wheels fresh for racing. I am going to sell all my other bikes to fund the new wheels.
03/06/18
Woke up and did a weigh in and it is not great news. I am back up to 102.2kgs so back to the gym it is next week. I am off to Crucial in a bit as my street bike has been built up ready to ride for the summer. I am going to add my new bikes to the 2018 bikes page soon when I have time.
Went to Patchway this morning and got some laps in on the Curtis and worked a lot on the first straight and then my friend Jamie arrived and we did some 3rd and 4th straights where I tried to catch him and go on the inside of him as I was really bad at this on Wednesday night. Think it really helped. I then went to Crucial and picked up my new Street bike which looks amazing.
04/06/18
Got up late today and did a weigh in and to my surprise I am back down to 100.30kgs so a pretty good weekend. Went to Lawrence Western to meet up with Jamie and his boys but the track was closed off and they were not there so I went back to Bath and it started to rain so I called it a day and took a rest day.
It was probably for the best as my back is hurting again.
The track does look amazing and I can’t wait for it to be finished and opened so I can ride it.
05/06/18
Didn’t feel like going to a track today as I was still feeling really tired so I decided to go to a couple of pump tracks and ride the 34R to see how it was. I didn’t really like riding brakeless too much but the bike felt great and I was getting much faster by the end of the sessions so I will stick at it.
I also found that after a while I had started planning lines in berms instead of just hitting the berms and trying to get around them (which didn’t work most of the time and meant I went flying over the back of the berms.
Here is a photo of Coleford BMX Pump track in Coleford, Somerset:
Here is a photo of Nunney Pump Track in Nunney, Somerset:
06/06/18
I got up early and went to the track at Bath with the Curtis but was feeling a bit off due to lack of sleep so I did a few 3rd straights and then left it at that and went home to sleep for a bit. In the afternoon I rode the 34R to Pilates which was fun as I had to think a lot more about controlling speed due to the lack of brakes. I got used to it much faster today but found that I rode around a lot slower than I would if the bike had a brake. I made the most of the slower pace and manualled, bunny hopped and learnt to slow down without using my foot on the back tyre. All in all it was good fun.
Pilates was great and I felt really good riding home.
07/06/18
Had to get up early to take my son to school so I decided to check out Castle Cary Pump Track and then pop over to my parents house on the way back.
I took the 34R again but once I got to the track I realised that I would definitely need brakes! I did a few laps and decided to call it a day as I kept flying over the berms and I didn’t want to get hurt.
Here is a photo of the track
I was going to pop into Bath track on the way home but it was raining so I decided to go home and get some sleep ready to work tonight.
While driving home I was analysing how my training is going and I have come to the conclusion that I need to change it up and get back in the gym more and go back to twice weekly sprint sessions as well. For the last couple of months I have been concentrating on skills like manualling and jumping which is important but I am not getting the results in my track speed or fitness that I want to get.
I am going to do the gym Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays BEFORE I go to the track. Actually I want to go back to my early morning Monday morning Patchway sessions to do full speed full laps to build fitness and then hit the gym when I get back from Patchway. Wednesday and Fridays I want to do the gym first and then track work. On Tuesdays and Thursday’s I want to do sprints before I go to the track.
I am moving back to my Parents at the weekend and there is a really good steep hill with not much traffic and a nice long run off to do sprints on. At the moment I think that I will benefit most from down hill sprints to get the leg speed and fitness back and I will then add uphill sprints and flat sprints after a month or so.
On the weeks that I am on earlies I plan to do the gym sessions before work and then fit in the sprints and track work where I have time.
Hopefully this will get me loosing weight again and also get me performing better on the track too.
I have been thinking about my bikes and I think I will keep the Dialled to use on pump tracks and for doing sprints on and then just use the 34R for riding around town on and maybe some park stuff to play when I can.
The idea is in a few months time when I have some money again to order another Curtis cruiser frame with 10mm dropouts so that I can build it up with all the parts on the Dialled to use as my training bike and then slowly build up the dialled frame as a more park/jump type bike to use around town and at skate parks. I also have the 20″ Dialled frame that I want to slowly build up as a race bike with profile hubs and cranks o maybe race next season.
08/06/18
Had a really productive training session at Bristol track with my friend Matt. We worked on the 3rd straight for about an hour then moved onto the 2nd straight and then the 1st straight.
I am loving the Curtis more an more every time I ride it which is good. I am wondering if I need to drop down a tooth to 36×16 so I am going to change the gearing on the dialled and train on it to see if I need to change the gearing on the Curtis too.
I was talking with Matt about changing up my training and we have decided that I need to wait to start lifting weights until after the season so I am going to work in cardio on Monday, Wednesdays and Friday’s instead of weights. The idea is to lose as much weight as possible before I start doing the weights in the off season. Matt also suggested that I work on flat manuals and also set goals when I am the track instead of just going to the track and playing. I have to agree about the goal setting as today was probably the most productive session I have had for a while.
09/06/18
Had a chilled gates session today playing on the Curtis. Still really loving it. Got some really good feedback for things to change to get my gates faster which seemed to work.
I am starting to think that I need to drop down a tooth on the front to go to 36×16 but I will stay on the 37×16 for now until the end of the season and then drop down to train over the winter.
10/06/18
Took the day off as it was my mum’s birthday so didn’t have time to ride properly.
11/06/18
Had another rest day as I was really tired from moving over the weekend so slept in. I was also supposed to look at a house for sale but that didn’t happen.
I have been researching weight loss methods and I think I am going to skip instead of doing the exercise bike as it is better for fat loss and you don’t have to do an hour to get any benefit. I can do 10 minutes before training as a warm up and 10 minutes after and it is the equivalent of 60 minutes on the exercise bike. It is also an all over body work out instead of being mainly legs.
I am also going to go back to doing the intermittent fasting as than was really working well.
I will start with both skipping, sprints and intermittent fasting tomorrow morning and see how it goes. I have just picked up my Dialled Cruiser, long seat post and the skipping rope from my house to take back to my parents house ready to use tomorrow.
12/06/18
Got up this morning and decided to start intermittent fasting as I wasn’t hungry anyway. Had to take my car in to get a diagnostic on the engine as it had the engine warning light on which turned out to be nothing really.
I then went to Bath track and did 3 x pump laps to warm up followed by 3 full speed first straights followed by 6 x flat out first straights then pumped the second and third straights and then did the last straight flat out again.
I then had a bit of a play jumping the tabletop on the second straight. I then called it a day as I was feeling a bit dizzy due to lack of food and it being half past two with no food!
13/06/18
Woke up and had breakfast as I had Pilates at 12:30 today and I can’t do it properly without food for some reason. I then got up and helped fix a roof at home and then had to go to pilates. Feeling really tired after so I am going to have a day off the bike again and get back to it tomorrow.
14/06/18
Didn’t ride again today as I woke up at midday and had to go to Cruicial to pick up some knee and shin pads and also some new daps so didn’t have time to ride.
15/06/18
Got up at 10 am this morning and went to Bromham pump track which was fun. I managed to lock my keys in the boot when I was leaving so had to break the back windows to get the keys back. Not the best end to a session and it has cost me £70 so far for parts to fix!! so an expensive ride. The new trainers were nice to ride in and the pads were really comfortable too.
16/06/18
Got up and too my son for a rest at his new school and then went to the track and set up for gates. I did a few gates and was feeling pretty quick but was feeling a bit slow compared to how I usually am. Probably as I didn’t warm up first and I had to go before I was really warmed up.
Had to rush and pick my Son up again before the end of the gates session so all in all a bit crap.
I definitely need to start doing sprints again and also start the skipping that I was planning to start last week and never got around to.
17/06/18
Not riding today as it is father’s Day and been out with the family today.
I have just bought my Yess back off of my friend who I sold it to so I am picking it up in a bit and will build it up tonight ready to ride tomorrow. I can’t wait to ride it again as I have missed it a lot.
I will now have the best of both Worlds. The steel Curtis and the Aluminium Yess so I can pick and choose which bike I want to ride although I think I will be racing the Curtis most of the time and using the Yess for training and pump tracks but we will see.
18/06/18
Got the parts off of the dialled swapped over to the Yess frame and the bits off of the Yess frame onto the dialled frame last night.
I have just done 200 skips this morning which was enough so I am going to have to build up slowly to doing the 10 minutes skipping. I think for now I going to aim for doing 1000 skips per day for now and then build up from there.
This week I am going to do 200 skips a day and then next week I am going to up to 250 next week and then add 50 a week until I get to the 1000 a day.
I did try and use the exercise bike this morning too but it is slipping everyone I peddled so I am going to try and fix it tonight and if not I will have to bin it and get another one.
I am now going to take the Yess to Crucial to get it set up correctly and then when it is finished I will drop the dialled off before I put it up for sale.
Once I have sold my surpless bikes I will buy a new exercise bike or most likely some rollers and use one of my other bikes on them.
After Crucial I went to Bath track and did 2 x pump laps to warm up and then 25 x first straights. I did them in sets of 5 and concentrated on pumping into the take off of the jump and trying to jump out of the manual’s too.
After the 5 sets of 5 I went home to eat as I am doing the intermittent fasting again. I called in to Nunney Pump track on the way home and did a few laps before I went home and had breakfast.
19/06/18
Woke up at 9am and did my 200 skips and then got ready and went to Patchway and met a friend. Had a chilled session and tried to get the first straight sorted. I managed to manual both the first and second in the same attempt today which is better than I have done before. I also umped the jump into the third burm which I haven’t done before so all in all a good day.
20/06/18
Woke up this morning and my calf muscles were really aching so I have decided to take the day off as a rest day. I had a dodgy stomach last night too so probably better not to take it easy today.
I am going to sort my car out as it is disgusting at the moment and is full of glass from where I broke the window to get the keys last week. I also need to put the new ridea ceramic bottom bracket on the Curtis that I bought on Monday ready to race at the weekend.
21/06/18
Had to take my Dad’s car to the garage this morning so no riding today. I did however get around to swapping out my bottom bracket on my Curtis so it now has the Ridea Ceramic Bottom bracket on it. It is now really smooth can’t wait to ride the bike at the weekend.
I also got the call to say that my Yess is all ready to go so I am going to pick it up in the Morning and drop off the Dialled to get built up for my Son.
22/06/18
Had another rest day ready for the regional starting tomorrow. Getting a bit itchy to ride but better to be too rested than tired.
23/06/18
Got up early and fixed my car then jumped in my Dad’s car and did regional practice at Decoy. Had a good practice and got a lot done but not feeling very confident for the racing tomorrow even though there are not many quick riders riding so it should be OK to get into the A final.
24/06/18
Rode really badly but got a 3rd, 2nd and 4th (with a crash) so made the semi’s. got the hard semi and finished 5th so was in the B final which I was upset about but to be honest the way I rode I didn’t deserve to be in the A final anyway.
Had a better ride in the B final got out of the gate well, peddled the whole way to the first jump for the first time today and rode the rest of the track well to win the final so not a bad finish to a weak riding day.
25/06/18
Had a rest day today again as I had to visit my Son’s school after work so no time for riding. Not feeling too bad considering the hard weekend racing I had on a long track. I did wake up with a sore ankle this morning so I will have to keep an eye on it over the week to make sure I rest and ice it as have another regional this weekend.
26/06/18
Didn’t go to Bideford as planned as it took too long to get through Bristol to pick up the Yess so I went to Patchway instead. Had a really good 3 hours of riding. I started off with 5 pump laps and then worked on the first straight for the rest of the time. By the end of the 3 hours I had managed to do 3 good laps where I managed to carry speed over the second jump and manual it clean so slowly getting better. It still doesn’t feel smooth but at least I am carrying speed through the straight now not slowing down.
30/06/18
Got up early and cleaned the bike and then loaded the car and drove to Bideford for regional practice. It was really hot but the track was riding really well. I wide holding back loads and dabbing my brake before the jumps which is really weird as I never used to do that last year!!! By the end of the session i was getting better but still not up to pace from last year.
The bike was riding really well though:
