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2003-07-01 16:56:40 Source: Web

We made it! Yup, we got to Roskilde - and even back again ;-) Lotta's recovery has been improving and she decided that she would be able to handle a day at Roskilde, so we drove down on Saturday (My longest drive yet at around 250km) and stayed at a very nice hotel in the countryside in Denmark. Then on Sunday we drove the last stretch to Roskilde and after buying a one-day pass each we were in. It didn't take too long to meet up with Hotel Bastardos camp. They had been having a great festival and were pleased to see us. Sunday apparently was the day with the worst weather at the festival this year, but even so, we only had a few showers. Not bad!

During the day we manged to see "Moder Jords Massive" (Mother Earth's Massive - a Swedish world music collective), The Sounds, Massive Attack and Björk - who closed the festival with a bizarre set which would have been brilliant in a more intimate setting, but which didn't really work from where we were standing.

After that we spent as little time as possible in the chaos that now seems unstoppable on the last night. Pretty much everyone from Bastardos had made plans to leave that night, which was a relief. If you are heading to Roskilde yourself I highly recommend heading off after the last band.

With our two passengers (one of whom was my co-driver) on tow, we headed off from Roskilde at about 01:20 and were back in Gothenburg by 06:30. Not too shabby! I think that next time, we'll probably find a nearby camping site to move our tents to on Sunday afternoon and head there after the final band. Then we can drive home in comfort after a night's rest on the Monday.

After a day's recovery from the long night's driving I'm feeling pretty good and we're getting things in order for our trip to the summer house. I'm definitely looking forward to kicking back for a while and focussing on relaxing and training!

2003-06-26 09:23:24 Source: Web

So the holidays begin here! Yup - I should have started my holiday last Friday (and I actually did have it planned that way), but events have conspired to kick Lotta and I repeatedly in the nuts (so to speak). We should also be at Roskilde by now, but instead we're at home and our plans have been changed for us.

The main problem has been that Lotta has come down with Salmonella poisoning and has been pretty sick for the last week or so. So she's had the toughest time of it and even had to spend a night in hospital. Of course, there was no way we could go to a festival with her in that condition, so we've sold our tickets and changed our plans.

I decided to go back to work and help out for another 3 days, which has actually been a "Good Thing(tm)", as I managed to get some very useful work done to help out my colleague who is manning the decks in my absence. The upside of working a few extra days is that I've stretched out my holiday so I can spend some more time up at the summer house and be there over the weekend where there's the possibility of taking part in a triathlon, a river swim and/or a mountainbike race. This is "werry good" (to quote the average Swedish pronunciation).

On top of that. we're hoping that Lotta's recovery will continue as it has for the last couple of days, in which case we're hoping to drive down for the last day of Roskilde when we can get a day pass and meet our friends (and see Massive Attack and Björk).

So while the last week or so has been really tough and we've missed out on a lot of our plans, it has not been 100% bad (for me at least, Lotta would probably disagree).

So now I am back on holiday again and looking forward to a couple of weeks where I can both train and relax. Today I'm planning to pick up some replacement parts for my bikes to get them in order for the coming weeks. Then I'll either try and finish the ride I had to break off the other week (see my last post), or perhaps head out for a run.

Last weekend was the Gothenburg Triathlon! I served as a race marshal for the swimming leg. It was huge amounts of fun and the whole event was very successful. We had good sunny weather, but it wasn't overbearingly hot either. We didn't have to save anyone from drowning ;-) but there were a few people who needed to rest on the boat and one guy who had to climb in to the boat to remove his wetsuit which was way too tight.

Other than that, the most eventful part for me was after the race when we were collecting the buoys that marked the course. One of the sinkers (car wheel hubs!) had fastened on something and we couldn't pull it loose. In the ned we could see that it was a couple of metres from the surface and caught on an old sunken line which was securely fastened to the bottom. I ended up having to dive in and free the buoy, so at least I managed to get my first outdoor swim of the year over and done with :-D

I'm definitely planning on completing a 70km mountainbike race in a couple of weeks. That seems like great fun. I'm also hoping that some work I've been doing on altering my running style may allow me to try my first triathlon soon, but if not, there's always "The Vansbro Swim", which is one of the 4 Swedish classic races. That's a 3km river swim. Unfortunately it clashes with the cycle race I really want to do, but there's a 1km short race 2 days earlier and I may well be up for that if not the triathlon (which is the same day - go figure). Apart from that I have a schedule of possible races lined up during July and August, so there should hopefully be plenty to report.

2003-06-16 21:59:13 Source: Web

Lots of news I guess! It's been a while (as usual).

The weekend before last I had my ol' man over for a visit. Despite Ryanair causing him to miss his flight by not posting any boarding details in the lounge (and then refusing him and 7 other people the chance to board the flight while they stood and watched their baggage being unloadad - true!), he did manage to get over a few hours later. We had a great time, although the weather was a little up and down, so we didn't *actually* get to do the things I had potentially planned in advance. But that didn't matter at all as we had a couple of nice days out anyway.

Since then it's been head-down at work, trying to get the decks cleared before Lotta and I head of for the year's Roskilde Festival - as usual we'll be there with the Hotel Bastardos gang. We bought a tent the other day at a bargain basement price, but after trying it out in the living room(!) we decided it's not right for us. So we went and looked at some more tents this evening and hav now found the one we want - but they were sold out at the store we visited. Lotta's gonna pick it up tomorrow and return the original tent (you've gotta love Sweden's liberal returns policies).

It's starting to get a little exciting now, after not travelling to Roskilde last year, I'm looking forward to this years. We're taking the car (which should be fun as well, a chance to get some distance driving experience) which gives us the chance to leave late Sunday night and avoid all the unpleasantness that's really put me off the last few times I was there.

Apart from that, I was out cycling at the weekend and after cycling 20km, my handlebars suddenly swung out of position! One of the bolts in the stem, holding my handlebars in place had stripped the thread in the socket it was screwed into. Not good! Especially as I suddenly realised i had left my mobile at home and only had around £3.50 on me! Walking 20km in cycle shoes didn't seem like a pleasant option either.

After ascertaining that there was no cycle in shop in the nearest town, I took apart the stem and found that although most of the thread had stripped out, there was a few millimetres left which I could screw the bolt into. I then fairly gently tighetent te second bolt to avoid stripping the first oe again and managed to fix the handlebars tightly enough to be able to carefully cycle home. Not so much fun! And now I'm gonna be doubly careful to make sure I always have a mobile and a debit card with me when I cycle longer distances :-D

Well, that's the news for now I'm lookin forward to the upcoming holiday and will keep y'all posted!

2003-06-06 17:27:04 Source: Web

Guess who I had lunch with today?

Yup - that's right. The king of Sweden! Well, kinda! Today was the launching of the Ostindiafararen Götheborg - a replica of a classic old sailing ship that sank in the Gothenburg harbour on 12th Sept 1745! The event today, which also marked Swedens National Day was the launch of the ship, which has been under construction for 7 years.

As my company have handled the ticket bookings for the event, we had the chance to spend the day, out in the sun, watching the pomp and ceremony. As a surprise, our boss had arranged that we would also have tickets to the royal luncheon, attended by the king and many dignitaries, so while I didn't *quite* have lunch with the king, I was in the same room (and he walked past about a metre away from me - probably the closest I will ever be to him!). So you could say that today has been a jammy junket extraordinaire!

Thanks to wonderful weather and some great rganisation, the event appears to have been a massive success and we certainly enjoyed ourselves more than a normal day in the office :-D The ship itself is quite amazing and will be sailing to China in a re-enactment of a classic trading voyage later next year. If she stops by anywhere near you I would recommend going along and taking a look. My dad is visiting Sweden from Sunday and I'm hoping we can get the chance to go and take a look onboard (I believe the ship is available to visitors for the weekend).

2003-06-03 12:52:35 Source: Web

Just heard from Lotta (who's in Stockholm just now) that she passed her final exam which qualifies her as a certified interpreter. Wooho! Quite a big deal actually - amongst other things it means a substantial increase in her hourly rate. She's now one of only 27 certified English interpreters in Sweden.

Way to go Lotta! :-D

2003-05-29 14:36:22 Source: Web

w0000h! The race today went really well. I'm extremely pleased with my performance. I made it round the 110km in 4:07 - which was well under my goal of 4:30. My cycle computer reckons that I had an average speed of 29.14 kph.

After about 30km, I joined a group who were travelling at a really comfortable speed and then kept with them to the end. I felt really fresh at the finish and could certainly have pushed harder for a better time, but my goal was to have a fun race and enjoy myself - and I most certainly did that!

A big thanks as well to Lotta and her folks who were there and cheered me on at several points on the course - and gave me a lift home ;-)

Well, now I need to find some more races at around the same distance that I can do this summer. Then next year perhaps Vättern Runt, which is a 300km "classic" race around Sweden's biggest lake. I guess it has to be done ;-) For now, I think a cold beer in front of the TV and perhaps a gentle cycle ride this evening just to work the kinks out of my legs. A couple of times round the park should do it ;-)

2003-05-27 20:29:05 Source: Web

Well, race day draws nearer! I picked up my start number today and cleaned and oiled my bike. Thursday morning, 09:16 Swedish time I'll be starting. Hopefully I should be at the finish around 13:45 or thereabouts. After a good run at the weekend (50km ride with the first 30km at an average speed of > 30kph) I'm hoping I can ride the 110km in under 4.5 hours. I guess I should probably keep my mouth shut reall, but I like a challenge!

The plan is to sleep well this evening as I'm guessing I'l be pretty nervous tomorrow evening. But my main goal is just to enjoy the race, have fun and get some experience of actually racing. Hopefully I can fit in a race or two more during the summer.

Keep your fingers crossed for me on Thursday morning and I'll try and post the results as soon as I can.

2003-05-20 21:55:58 Source: Web

More cycling news! I rode 70km on the new bike at the weekend. It was a chance to get out and check out part of the course I'll be riding next week, plus a chance to get more confortable with the positioning on the bike. I felt that I definitely could have cycled the extra 40km that is the full race distance and it's given me a great confidence boost. Tomorrow I'm probably going to try out some group tempo training for the fisr time (getting used to the mechanics of cycling in a pack, drafting and of course getting used to a completely different tempo!).

The knee is *still* no better. A quick run yesterday ended up with me having to break off after around 13 minutes. Hardly enough time to break a sweat :-( My Physio has recommended I try and track down an orthopaedic doctor - no easy task in Sweden I'm afraid. There was an article that made the front page of the paper here just last week about a guy who broke his shoulder and now has to wait until 2007 before he can see an orthopaedic specialist. I'll either have to go private, or possibly see if I can track down one on the UK - it might well be worthwhile. The point of seeing an orthopaedic doctor is to get x-rays and see if there's a visible cause for the pain. The physio basically doesn't know ahere the problem lies and the exercises I've been doing don't seem to have helped.

Depressing, but with my focus on cycling and swimming at the moment Im not letting it get me down to much.

2003-05-11 16:23:00 Source: Web

What a great Sunday! This has been exactly how a Sunday should be ;-)

This morning I cycled 40km in the wonderful spring sunshine. It wasn't exactly warm (around 15C), but was basically perfect cycling weather - light breeze and sun. Wonderful! The ride itself wasn't perfect, I spent a little too much time finding my way on the way there (I cycled back in 3/4 the time it took to go out), but it was an OK run anyway.

I've decided to enter a cycle race that's on the 29th May (it's a bank holiday here). The race is 110km, so if I get in 50-100km / week up till then I should be in OK form. It will be my first race and a good chance to see how everything works.

The good news is that I've found another bike than the one mentioned in my last post, which is a better size for me. Although it is slightly more expensive, it's also very new (only 3-4 months old) and in pretty much perfect condition. In fact I saw it being raced today by the guy I'm buying it from! He was in a local cycle race that consisted of 20 laps of the nearby park (3.7km/lap). Lotta and I went down and spent the afternoon watching the action and cheering him on. While he didn't win, he placed well in the main group. The winners were all from Team Bianchi and the first three home almost lapped the entire field! Pretty cool stuff (and kind of sobering for someone just about to embark on their first race). I'm picking the bike up tomorrow evening, so it was cool to watch it being ridden as it should be!

Of course the knee is no better, so I doubt whether I'll be fit for the triathlon competitions I was hoping to do this year, but I've got an appointment on Monday with an osteopath who works frequently with triathletes, so I'm hoping he may also be able to shed some light on things. For the time being though I'm concentrating on the swimming and cycling and hoping I can do a few cycle competitions this summer even if I can't run triathlons.

2003-05-01 16:52:23 Source: Web

I've checked out the bike I mentioned in my last post and it looks pretty good! The only slight problem is that it's about the largest frame I could possibly get away with - I would have to have the saddle as low as it will go - which is OK, but means there's no leeway for adjustments.

Anyway, I've let the guy who's selling know that I'm interested. He's not going to sell it until the new bike he's ordered turns up, so I'm going to continue looking in the meantime, but within a couple of weeks I should have a nice racer!