To hot to breathe, to hot to ride...

Had a trio of ridiculously hot days this week. 43, 43 and 44 degrees. Ouch, it was hot. Put up a tarpaulin over the back courtyard to reduce the heat from the sun coming in throught the windows. Kept the aircon going whenever the power was on (OK, we only had a couple of hours of power outage due to the heat) and used a fan to go to bed. Despite this the terrace house we live in heated up and remains hot- hotter than outside now. Thankfully the week ahead is looking pretty pleasant. The lack of rain- driest January since 193osomething- has meant that some of our garden is looking the worse for wear. I think the gardenias are on the way out and some of the box is heading there too.

My riding km were under 100km for the whole week. Despite it all I feel pretty OK, having got my swiss-ball work going again. Feeling reasonably strong when I do get out, and really enjoyed the riding I did do this week. Maybe that is the rest...

Last week was spent in Bright doing my last minute training camp for the Alpine Classic, which was on Sunday in great conditions. I started the week with only one hill of more than 1km under my belt for the past 6 months, and suffered up Tawonga early in the week. Thankfully, muscle memory is a wonderful thing and I improved rapidly. Climbing Buffalo with Rod and co was better and I was feeling strong for the rides to Harrietville. I even spent about 5km at 10% above anaerobic threshold. Not too bad for someone in base training, I reckon. The Alpine itself was my usual affair of doing one of the shorter events, though I tried to minimise my time at the stops and do a good time. 140km in 5.12, with 5.01 ride time was good and I think got me 4th in the section. Climbed Buffalo in 1.06.30, which I think is a PB for me. The other climbs were pretty good, but not personal bests. Climbing Tawonga from Mt Beuaty without doing Falls Creek was rather pleasant though. All in all a great week's cycling, getting in about 480km.

Hopefully I can get a few more km in this week, and start to build things up again. Aiming for the Vic Masters in late March and then the Nationals in the first week of April. Launceston sounds like a good place to be for a ride and bit of a holiday.