And the votes are in…
Everyone, apart from flu-ridden Matt, has now done their ‘after’ time trial to conclude the third fitness article. You’ll have to read the magazine to find out if we were quicker or slower, but one thing that it brought into focus was how changeable a simple two-mile off-road route can be. Even a well established track can become slow and draggy in the wet, or way quicker after a winter dry-spell. We had some riders quicker and some slower, but side to side comparisons will be difficult I reckon. This was due to us picking a route that had some singletrack, some descending and then one big long climb. Too many variables I reckon, but it was argued that a simple road climb would favour the lighter riders initially, but on its second running would only show who had lost lots of weight and penalise the couple of skinny riders who wanted to get heavier… Swings and roundabouts.
Needless to say, none of us ever want to do the loop again because you want to limit that amount of pain in your life… 
Last couple of days of the magazine now (yes, I’m doing my usual working on a Sunday trick) Should be another interesting issue though. See you on the other side…