'tis the season to be merry (but not too merry)

So, two months in to the return to something like "serious" cycling what have I learnt. Well firstly, that old habits die hard. For you amusement and as a reminder to myself for what I suspect are going to be periods of intensive suffering here are the highlights.

1. Drinking 8 pints of beer, a few glasses of red ink and having Chicken Tikka Womble (or whatever it was supposed to be) the night before a two hour early morning "tempo" session is a catastrophic idea.

2. No matter how hard I try I still get drawn to Cycling Weekly and usually end up wasting hours of my life wondering if I can really justify a new set of ultra light-weight tat.

But what happened to the old Parker's adverts and all that detail? Damn the Internet. Those adverts were the best bit.

3. Like a Jack Russell attacking the postie, when I see a set of "30 signs" I have a nervous twitch that propels me up to high speed and then produces a spectacular "bonk" about twenty seconds later.

Where's the postie? Grrrr....grrr.....

4. The percentage chance of getting all members of a club to turn up for training runs in similar (if not identical) kit is 0.0000000000001%.

5. There's always someone faster, better, more graceful on the bike in any bunch ride.

6. There's still nothing like the taste of Nutella on toast and a mug of tea after a ride.

7. The roads of Bedforshire are poorly surfaced and the drag down the A600 from Stondon is something I still hate with a passion.

8. Mike Webb is the funniest cyclist in Britain although he probably doesn't realise it (still).

9. Christmas is a time to get some sneaky miles in so that you can feel a bit smug and get one over your prospective competitors.

10. Turbo trainers are no substitue for any of the above.

Err... that's all for now folks.

Have a great Christmas!

With friends like these, who needs turbos?

Winter has finally arrived and it's safe to say that the balmy November weather is distance memory now. The longs are "out" and the mornings and nights are miserable and dark. All the more reason to pop in to the shed/ garage/ back bedroom and put on some inspirational music and blast away on the Turbo trainer.Except that the Turbo trainer is cycling's equivalent to "the rack", or the sublimely bad "pear of anguish". Well maybe not quite that bad.

The advantage of the turbo though, is that you can control the variables which ordinarily you cannot; you can also watch the telly while you do it; and you can get off and have a cup of tea within minutes of finishing.

The flip side is that all of these things are massively distracting or make it easy to simply pack up. I attempted a gallant 30 minute interval session on Tuesday but the chain on the bike I was on developed an unusual kink (it's an oldish chain and I think it wanted to let me know that it was off to "Time Team" to be analysed and recorded as some form artifcact ancien). Either that, or it was just shagged because I'd managed to make it slip off the "big ring" and get wedged in the derailleur, thereby bending it. Clot.

Anyway, my motivation for this folly was partly to avoid all manner of pre-Christmas tedium and also because of: SomeoneIknowisontheTurbosothereforeIneedtodomoretimeonitthanhimbecausethat'swhat's goingtomatterinthenewseason Syndrome.

Having been described as a racing "Nemesis" I have now taken it upon myself to ensure I beat my goader by the narrowest of margins, e.g. by one-tenth of a second (like at Sharpenhoe 2003), just to cause the highest degree of annoyance  - in the nicest possible sense.

Everyone needs a yin to their yang. I suggest you find a designated Nemesis too, competition is good for the market and all that.

The feeling of losing by 1/10th of a second...

Cheers Steve, this is going to be an interesting season.

Calorie counting

Having managed to get a few rides in on consecutive days of consecutive weekends, I decided to tempt fate and see how much lard has dropped off.

Happily I am now under the 12st mark but our scales aren't exactly the most accurate device. I recorded weights of 7st 4 and 3st 2 but decided on 11st 12 as being the most accurate/ least inaccurate. Anyway, sitting on the bike for more than a couple of hours usually means I need some food so as not to "bonk" - I spectacularly blew up in my first year of cycling on "100 in 8" reliability ride. My late father in law had to shovel Walkers crisps in to me and I can still recall licking the salt off the inside of the three packets I'd necked. Currently, I use a Science in Sport electrolyte drink on every ride, but sometimes a "little bit of what you fancy" helps not only get some carbs back in the tank, but also gives a little mental "pick me up".

If you are on a budget (and are not a strict veggie or vegan) you can look at jelly as a cheap source of energy. A 100g wedge will put 296Kcal back in to the tum; an equivalently sized PowerBar will produce 363Kcal but will cost £1.35 - a quid more than the jelly. Horses for courses though - as it's a bit of a chore to dice up cubes of jelly and clingfilm them so that you can scoff them on the move. Unwrapping jelly with gloves on, while riding at 15-20mph over the pot-holed and icy roads of Arctic Bedfordshire is akin to peeling a tangerine in your pocket on the dodgems.

Somewhere in the "compromise" zone are these little beauties - the School Bar. In nice 20g bars, these are made from real fruit and would churn out 335Kcal if put over the bunsen burner. I now seem to be the "dealer" for school bars and having lured on one of the chain-gang in to my suger-free, fruit based cyclo-den-of-iniquity I may be on to a lucrative sideline. Illicit fruit dealing is not on the Statute Book yet I don't think.

Given it's Christmas time I suspect that Jelly Babies will be under many cyclo-Christmas Trees. And we all remember who used to love Jelly Babies don't we and he can't be wrong.

Training ride

1,100 calories, 2.5 hours around the hills of Chalton, Harlington and the like, 40+ miles.... tea please. And it's humid...

London fatality

Sadly the death toll for 2011 for cyclists in London increases yet again. Many condolences to the family and friends of the young lady involved.

Tragic.