Contacted the Novice riders today to see how they got on. Mick is fine but does not want to sit on a saddle for another week. Sebastion does a physical job and went into work monday morning but after 2 hours he had to go home. Gary had booked monday off work but had to go in today. He is my Son-in-Laws boss and Apparantly he was sitting on a cushion at his desk and got others to bring him coffee.

I also met one of my customers on the ride and although we did not ride together- we were about the same position on the road. He is a mountain biker and rides our local hills so must be fit. Talking to him today and he said he should have done the 39 miler. That 10 mile loop up to Mayfield was a killer. For the first time ever on the road he used his 22/34 gearing on every hill on that section. My own thoughts were that I was on the wrong bike. Took Boreas and it had a compact 50/34 and a 12/25 cassette. Don't think I could have gone much faster but having to stay with Gary and go slow on those steep sections made the ride a bit more difficult than it should have been. The TCR with a triple at 30/27 would have been easier.

And at the start of the ride I weighed 152lbs. I drank plenty and did not dehydrate but at the end of the ride I had lost 4lbs. Drank a couple of cold ones and a lot of water and weight went up to 151 by bedtime. Monday morning I had gone back to 147 and it has stayed off.