Easy As Trawling The Bight.
by:Beautiful Bonz & Awesome Angharad (or should that be awful?)
part: 342!

The rest of that week flew by, or it seemed; probably, because I was so busy marking or teaching. I also went out with my field group to see how my meeces were doing? They were still fast asleep, so they weren't doing much at all.

Friday came and I cooked a nice dinner for the arrival of my lord and master, but Simon came instead. He tucked into the pork spare ribs I'd cooked and seemed to enjoy them, so did Tom. Neither opened a bottle of wine, although they did have a bottle of beer each - Bass, which I'm told is a good one. I don't drink it so I wouldn't know.

I asked Simon if he wanted to try the ride the next morning and he rather impetuously said he would. I smiled but was secretly pleased. I cleared up the dishes from dinner and shoved them in the machine, Tom made some coffee, which I declined- it would keep me awake, well he did make industrial strength fluid! I made my own tea, and we sat nibbling cheese and biscuits and talking.

When we went to bed, I knew what Simon wanted when he helped me up the stairs by caressing my bum. I wasn't entirely averse to his suggestion or should that be suggestiveness? So after the nightly ablutions, we cuddled and chatted and kissed and...you don't really need to know all the fine details, save to say that we both fell asleep feeling satisfied and exhausted.

At seven the next morning I woke and took myself off to the shower, I was a little tender in a personal place, but considered I would probably cope with a forty mile ride. I would after all be wearing a decent pair of cycling shorts with a reasonable chamois in them.

I roused Simon, no I said roused - I woke him up, not the other- that would have sent him to sleep again! He showered whilst I went down and shoved some coffee on and boiled the kettle. he came down and we had a nice quiet breakfast, until Tom appeared and turned on the radio to listen to John Humphrys barbecuing some politician or other.

I went and dressed, sports bra, cycling shorts - ah, but which ones, I opted for the yellow, Saunier Duval ones. Then my vest and finally the yellow shirt. Okay, so David Millar doesn't ride for them any more, and I look about as much like him as Kylie Minogue would, only she's even shorter than I am and Australian.

I sat down and pulled on my socks, would you believe proper, kosher cycling socks, and then my slippers. I didn't want to walk about in cleated shoes. Simon came up and dressed in his cycling stuff, he looked quite athletic, cutting a fine figure, as they say. Why didn't I notice when he was naked last night? I suppose I had other things on my mind, well one thing anyway - enough of that, there might be children watching!

I popped on a bit of makeup, not sure why, but I did. I also rubbed in a bit of moisturiser to protect my skin against the wind. After tying back my hair in a pony tail, I collected my bum bag and shoved in all the necessary things I was likely to need, lippy, money, hankies, mobile phone, energy bars and the kitchen sink. I'd tucked my arm and leg warmers into my back pockets, but decided I needed to wear them. Simon had put on his bib-tights, I suspected he'd be too warm but that was his problem.

We quickly checked over the bikes, they were fine and after donning our jackets, gloves and helmets and some eye-wear, trundled off, waving to Tom as we went.

We used the ride to the sports club as a warm up, really only riding at about ten or twelve miles an hour, taking it very easy. We arrived at about nine fifteen and were greeted by Geoff, who was pleased to see Simon come as a guest rider. He introduced me to Tony, who was leading the ride. They showed us the route they were going to use. Simon simply nodded, he knew the roads reasonably well, I felt a little anxious. The roads would be reasonably quiet but they were quite a rambling way to reach Petersfield, so we'd be doing more than forty miles.

"How far are we actually riding?" I asked Tony.

" 'bout fifty somethin', why, you okay with that?"

Rather than be labelled a wimpish female, I nodded, "Yeah, fine." It wasn't what I was thinking. "Are you going to be okay with that sort of distance?" I asked Simon.

"Yes, of course I am, why?" he responded and I felt rather small.

"Just checking, I don't know how fast these guys are going to ride."

"I'm sure we'll be okay, so stop worrying." He seemed confident enough, maybe I was being a bit neurotic, it wasn't as if we were doing a hundred miles or more, and I used to regularly ride forty, so why was I worrying?

I had bought Simon a saddle bag for his new bike, a Specialized one to match his bike. I'd also put together a puncture repair kit and one of those multi-tools, so at least he should be self sufficient. We were both carrying mini-pumps, so all forseeable disaters were accounted for.

There were fourteen of us riding, three of us were girls, the two others Tina and Jackie were social-work students and rode together every week.

Simon's bike had attracted a bit of attention, "Not taking your best bike out on a club ride are you?" "Nice bit o'kit." "What a pretty bike," were all comments he received happily, the latter one from Tina. I was on my Scott as befits a Saunier Duval Scott, team outfit.

We set off and despite the traffic, went at quite a pace, rarely dropping under fifteen miles an hour except when up against traffic congestion or red lights. Once out of the city, I thought I'd stay with the girls and have a comfortable ride - duh! Wrong!

Tina and Jackie, weren't the fastest riders in the group, but they were nowhere near the slowest either. The pace was upped to a steady twenty and I was okay with it until we started climbing: they dropped a sprocket and kept up the speed, I dropped two gears and slowed down. Even Simon was ahead of me, this was embarrassing!

I made up the distance on a downhill and used the momentum to ease up the next rise, then over the downs, despite my climbing training the week or so before, I was struggling. How quickly fitness can be lost.
I lost count of everything except keeping up the cadence and just pedalling along with everyone else.

I took a drink, an energy one, and it helped a bit. Well about an hour and a half later we got to Petersfield and stopped at a cafe, one that bore the CTC -Cyclists Touring Club 'approved' sign, so I knew we'd be welcome. Sadly not everywhere wants the custom of sweaty cyclists. This place did. We stopped for a drink and a cake, then we were off again, back to Portsmouth.

Refreshed they upped the pace and I began to worry that I wouldn't be able to keep up. Simon seemed to be doing okay, so why was I so anxious? I didn't know, maybe it brought back memories of my previous attempts to ride in a club, when I was told rather snottily, 'to join the girl's team'. I did, but not in the way they meant.

Eventually, I began to relax and let my body do the riding. We were doing twenty five and I was coping. The front of the group pushed us a bit harder, touching thirty at times on the flatter sections and I stayed with them. The two women, had dropped back and so had Simon, when we coasted into the car park of the sports centre, the slower group were nowhere to be seen.

"You ride well, Cathy, have you thought about racing?" asked Geoff.

"Yes, I've thought about it, but that's all."

"I really would think about it, I think you'd enjoy it."

"Dunno, at the moment too many commitments to get the miles in."

"Well, think about it some more, we'll get you a licence and then pop you in some easy starters."

"Yeah, maybe; I'll see." I worried a little as there was no sign of Simon. "Where are the girls?" I asked Tony.

"Oh they often run out of steam, I've tried to tell them about pacing themselves to leave something for the end, in case they need to sprint, but they never do. Looks like your bloke has done the same."

"It does, doesn't it. We have a five mile ride to home yet, so I hope his legs haven't gone."

Tony looked at me and sniggered. I knew what he was thinking, posh bike and kit, can't ride for toffee! Which probably summed Simon up, and me to some extent.

The stragglers finally arrived over ten minutes after the rest of us. "I was beginning to think you'd got lost," I said to Simon.

"No, Tina had a flat tyre, so we had to stop and pump it up," he replied.

"Oh, okay, ready for home?"

"Yeah, when you are." He got back on his bike and after we waved to everyone, we set off for home.

Tom took us out for dinner, when I could persuade Simon to wake up and shower! Otherwise it was a nice day out.