Green Laning

Armed with an Ordinance Survey map I headed out to the green lanes today to get a bit of saddle-time.

I explored some of the green lanes north of Silverstone. Not great. A lot of them were across pastures with many gates to open and shut. There were a few gnarley patches because of deep mud and slush. But on the whole - pretty tame.

So far, the greenlanes I used to ride around Guildford are far better. There are more further north of the ones I was on today - hope to explore them soon and find them a bit more challenging... and with less gates.

Spent only 2 hours on the bike. I forgot to fuel-up before leaving and was lucky to run out of juice only a mile or so from home. Doh! A bit of  a push. Man, I am sooo unfit! I'm cream-crackered now.

Green Lane Concussion

Made use of the fantastic sunny weather we've been having and got out on the road bike and for some green-laning. My first ride on the four-fiddy in a while. The lanes were the driest I've ever seen them and most of them were hard, dried mud. This made them fast!

Of course... when you ride fast it's fun... but when you crash... you crash big. On the way back I crashed while hooning along through a deep-cut track (cut about 10 feet lower than the fields it goes through). It's normally muddy ruts with foot-deep slush sections. On Sunday it was like cement with 4" to 8" deep square ruts.

I was just not paying as much attention as I should have been - I hit the embankment and smacked my head. "THWACK!" was all I heard. My ears rang, I hit my head hard. It was beyond seeing stars... I was pretty dazed. I've done my neck in too. Shoulder and thigh all bruised. I've had a major headache sincethen and have been feeling exhausted and a bit ill at times. Think I got a bit of concussion. Not good.

I'm very unfit and only managed 1 loop + 2 laps (normally do 1 loop and 6 laps). Erzberg is only 5 weeks away! Just need to rest for the next few days... Sunday is my first road race of the season: Ducati Desmo at Silverstone on the Wee Monster.

Crack! Crunch! Tinkle! Slosh!

Knobblies shatter the iced puddles on a crisp clear day.

Started training again out on the green lanes yesterday.

The frozen ground made 'the course' fast. Slewed another 37 seconds off my previous best.