It is hard to adjust coming back to the humdrum life of being in work at the moment. Even now, almost a week after getting back, I am still missing the LaSanta routine of waking up, going for a swim, having some food, riding your bike for countless hours, having a swim, doing a run and then going out for dinner....part of thinks it is the perfect life, although I suppose it does not really pay the bills.
Anyway, the week all went well and I managed to get some good training in while I was there. The first day, we had a little TT of about 20k that hurt more than I was expecting. If there is one thing that you can be guaranteed of during any ride in Lanzarote, it is that there will be some hills. The TT didn't fail to disappoint, although, it has to be said that the hills on this course were tiny compared to what else you have on this island.
Over the next few days, we all settled into the LaSanta life and I had some good rides taking in most of the sites of the island. I was pretty pleased that, this year, I had opted to take my carbon bike as I think that hulking that Ribble up the hills last year was by no means a good thing - I don't care if it makes you fitter.
About half way through the week, a large bunch of the Serpies headed to Playa Blanca where we all donned our wetsuits for a bit of a sea swim. This year, I was again a demonstrator here, showing some of the beginners how to start, how to sight in the water and how to turn etc - pretty similar to the stuff that I do for Swim for Tri during the summer months anyway. It was good to have a swim in the wetsuit anyway, the last time was probably my last race last season.
During the week we also did another TT which was basically a climb lasting about 30 mins. This was pretty tough and even though I broke something on my bike on the way up, I still managed to maintain a relatively decent pace, I would like to have a go again however as I do think that I could have gone a fair bit quicker. The route up there is by no means nice, it is almost 2000ft of climbing and in a pretty relentless fashion, as can be seen from this this
On the last day of we are on the island, the Serpies hold their very own triathlon and this is pretty much the highlight of the week for people like me. Last year, I had a bit of an awful race, after coming first out of the water, I eventually finished in 4th after some bad riding and some even worse running. This year, I was keen to make some amends on that performance. I did manage to start well and eventually get first out of the water again...
Out on the bike though, one person went past me but I was determined to make sure that no one else managed to come past me this year. Thanks to having broken my front derailleur the day before, I was stuck in the big chainring (hard gear) for the whole ride, which is basically 7km of climbing and 7km of descending. The big ring worked okay though and I managed to get back into T2 still in 2nd place, albeit, I had lost a couple of minutes to the eventual winner over the course of the bike.
The run was going to be the most interesting section for me, as I wanted to see just how much I had improved. Before I went to Lanza I had taken a week off running as I had hurt my knee and I had hardly run all week while I was there, so I was not expecting too much. The run was a lot better than last year however and I eventually managed to come in 2nd place in a time that was 3 minutes quicker than last year.
So, all in all, it was a good trip...as always, I think that I should have done some more running, but that is just what always happens. At the end of the day, it is pretty hard to resist going riding on this..
When the alternative back here is...
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