Photo: A canoe would have been a little easier on some sections of today’s ride.

It’s been a strange week.

Monday and Tuesday I spent 10 hours a day in a class with four Italians, two Thai, a Romanian, a Pole and three Brits. We were all learning how to be Teaching English as a Foreign Language teachers. We had to prepare Lesson Plans. One of mine was to find an imaginative way of teaching the Past Continuous tense. I didn’t even know it existed, let alone how to teach it. I really enjoyed it and hopefully my “students” did as well. I drew upon all my professional experience and got some fantastic feedback. “Are you sure you have never been a teacher” said the real teacher. Very happy with that.

Wednesday was online. I started a Kent University online course called ‘The Science of Endurance Training and Performance’. Fascinating stuff and very useful for my training for PBP and the Club Ride Grand Tour.

Today was very parallel universe. I rode ICC’s The Great Escape course solo. 205km in sub 10 hours including stops for brunch and afternoon tea and an unbelievable number of floods. The longest of which was over a 150m of flooded road, or river as we call it.  It’s never happened before but my Garmin virtually never showed me on the course but, bizarrely, showed me riding about 200 – 300m parallel to the course all the way round. Perhaps in an alternative universe some cyclist was riding through fields but wondering why it kept showing them as on the road. Who knows.

Now I need a days rest. Except we’re going to see friends in Warwickshire tomorrow, then a Self Build Show on Saturday, then a Club ride on Sunday.

I’ll rest on Monday.