Muddy Marvellous

For the last few months I have predominantly been riding my road bike (with the exception of a few jaunts down the coast path on the cross bike).  However, in my quest to keep up my mileage, I have completely over-used the easy-ish local roads so have inevitably become bored of riding. I needed to get my mojo back.

So last Wednesday, as the weather was fair, we decided that we should venture out on our Mountain Bikes and ride the local singletrack. It was great fun.

The sun was out, however after the last few months rain, the ground was muddy - in fact, some tracks resembled lakes. The muddiest parts were a tad hair-raising as I'd kinda forgotten how to ride a MTB and the greasy and deep mud was doing its best to take me out and scare me senseless. Comically, on one occasion a deep rut managed to catapult me into a hedgerow, where I got wedged on thorns whilst my bike continued without me. Just as amusingly, some puddles were so deep that whilst riding through them you suddenly found that at the lowest part of the pedal stroke, your foot was actually submerged! Thank heavens for winter boots!

It was great fun, quite an adventure and also an eyeopener.  Although, I was "technically" a bit rubbish, this ride showed how much I had improved; particularly my level of fitness -although I found it quite tiring (I'd forgotten how much of a workout your top half gets compared to road riding) I had the stamina to ride easily for ten miles.

Riding a mountain bike also showed improvements in my riding position as numerous tweaks were necessary. My seat was too low, my bars too high.  (I guess after all the riding on drop bars my back is more flexible). The only negative tweak was that I had to loosen my pedals as I was having to dab a lot to save myself flying into the gorse and brambles.
Really looking forward to my next MTB adventure. I just hope we get some dry weather soon as it would be nice to ride some drier tracks.