After jogging a 10K on Thursday night and feeling pretty full of the cold when I was working on Friday I decided to take it easy on Friday night – just a night in with the girls, some great chat and a couple of glasses of vino =)

Saturday kicked off to a tremendous workout – I help clean the church once a month so I was dusting, cleaning loos, hoovering the hall and washing the windows.  It was absolutely roasting so I was looking forward to a trip to the beach with the dogs and some friends on Saturday afternoon.  We headed to Irvine and the dogs and I managed a 3 mile walk along the waters edge to keep cool but it was a bit hot for a jog (29 degrees C).  After a lovely dinner at The Blair we headed home!   By Saturday night, after two days rest I knew I needed another valiant effort in the saddle to get me back on schedule with the training.   How timely…. an incoming message from my brother asking if I want to do his “Largs cycle route” with him!     YES! was my answer but sadly he and my sister in law were already planning a hillwalk for Sunday and since that’s not on my list of charitable activities I decided I’d be better focusing on increasing my mileage for the Pedal for Scotland and build up the much needed stamina…   I texted my sporting activities friend, Claire and she agreed that she’d cycle to Loch Lomond with me.  Result!

The alarm went off at 0630 and it was much cooler outside when I took the dogs out.. however, 0630 is a bit keen to start a days cycle and I wasn’t sure if Claire would be up yet so I headed back to bed til 0930 and to my disappointment Claire responded to my “just up are you up for this cycle” with a “To be honest not really =(” !

I was in a state of flux for 20 mins but continued to get ready… “If Claire’s not coming is there any point heading to Loch Lomond?  Should I start cycling from home and do a 50 – 60 mile route round past Greenock and back up via Irvine?”

“oh to heck with it I’ll call her and see if I can persuade her – 60 miles is a lonely long way!”  Thankfully my persuasive guilt inducing tactics worked and within 5 minutes she’d agreed to come.   So in a rush, I gathered my things, got my bike out the shed and filled 3 drinks containers (one hydration pack and two water bottles since its been so hot the last few days I don’t want to risk heat stroke!).

I hopped on the bike, clipped in and headed off down the hill out of Neilston to Barrhead…  Thankfully the legs weren’t too sore and the rest had done the trick.  Through Barrhead I was fighting with myself – “should I go over the hill on Kennishead road and go direct to Queens Park or do the flatter but longer route past Silverburn…?? decisions decisions!”   I’m a bit hard on myself a lot and plumped for the short hard climb route.  My PB on that section was 2:02 so today I was 18 seconds off form (owed to the Cold virus I think).  I took a wee detour off the main roads through Queens Park and arrived at Claire’s and to my proud amazement she’d managed to change her tyre all by herself and was in the midst of getting ready.

We headed up towards Glasgow (not too far) before she realised she hadn’t started her Strava App and we paused for false start number 1!  Meanwhile I realised I’d forgotten to put on my heart rate monitor – Doh!  Uch well, we carried on up to Glasgow city centre and went looking for a pair of replacement sunglasses for the ones I lost at T in the Park!   Every pound shop in Glasgow has sold out of sunglasses!

We made our way off the shopping streets and down to the Clyde side and then came across the new Hydro Arena near the SECC:

Just beyond that there were trucks, fire engines, fancy cars and go karts lined up for some sort of attraction.   We pedaled out along the cycle path  past the Crown Plaza hotel, past the Air ambulance helicopter pad and out on to the quiet and wide road that goes past the new Riverside Museum.

HONK! Zoom! A mental angry driver in a car overtook Claire and I who were riding side by side for a bit of banter.  We nearly had accidents in our pants because of the fright we got.  Thankfully the lights up ahead were at red so I had a chance to catch up and give my opinion –

me: “excuse me sir but I don’t think that blasting your horn at us was a good idea – we both jumped out our skin and we could have crashed”

angry man: ” you have no right to be riding on the roads never mind side by side”

me: “em i think you will find if you check the highway code that its allowed”

angry man.:  [lights went to green, wheelspin away]

Well that gave me and Claire something to debate as we passed the next big junction and headed out to the cycle path which used to be a train line going parallel to Dumbarton Road.

And just as we agreed… its written in the highway code

https://www.gov.uk/rules-for-cyclists-59-to-82/overview-59-to-71

66

You should

• never ride more than two abreast, and ride in single file on narrow or busy roads and when riding round bends

Thanks again to Traithete Dave for his advice about staying in our middle gear and spinning out the legs… Claire agreed to set the pace at the front and before long we were zooming along the elevated path towards Clydebank.   Warning : You have to keep an eye out for tree roots and also for broken glass on this part of the cycle – mainly green (I’m guessing buckfast) and some clear (wild guess Voddie).

Onwards we went alongside Doo huts (pigeon fanciers build tall sheds as 5 start accommodation for their racing pigeons!) then we turned up past the big bike at Clydebank (recent picture  with me on top) and stopped at the shopping centre to check out another pound shop for sunglasses – same story. =(   sad me for loosing them!

We left Clydebank along the canal and I captured a couple of photos on the move to let you see what its like:

It was here that I took some photos of swans and signets last Tuesday while my car was in for an MOT:

So Claire was on a roll…   cycling purely in middle gear seems to work a treat to keep the legs spinning and not exhaust ourselves too much!  We stopped at Bowling for a quick snack, a refill of our hydration packs (as its much easier to drink out the pipe and mouthpiece than try to negotiate a bottle and lid whilst on the move) but then some people we’d recently overtaken came past and we packed up and jumped back on our bikes and headed off after them to resume our lead!  (This despite Claire and I always confirming to each other “its not a race or a fashion show!).

We passed the SSPCA centre at Milton and I was tempted to stop off and see what I could rescue this week but Claire put pay to that by continuing at a steady pace! (More animals might be a bit much – I already have two 14 year old cats, Tigger and Roo) and the two dogs you have already been introduced to!

We were soon passing through Dumbarton and my old flat in Crosslet road! Through the town centre, up over the bridge and onwards to Renton… the path goes along the river here and its really lovely scenery =).    We couldn’t believe how quickly we’d cycled when we reached Balloch, popped along to the wee shop for a sandwich and stopped at the very slow public toilet (it does a full cleaning cycle after every use and confuses people trying to go in when you shouldn’t.

We said our goodbyes, by this point I’d only achieved 33 miles and I knew I’d have to do a lot more whereas Claire was very happy with her 23.6 mile effort (I was over the moon that she’d joined me so I wasn’t too lonely).  Claire headed off to catch the train back to Glasgow and I sped down to the cycle track to see if I could race her home!

PAH!  headwind!  Who’d have known that it was an easterly wind causing me a bit of thigh burn on the way home.  I retraced our steps and stopped off at Clydebank for a quick melted dark chocolate kitkat before continuing back along the route to Glasgow city centre.

I was happy to see the squiggly bridge welcoming me back:

My legs were suitably tired and I was in no doubt that the best solution would be to catch the train for the last section of the journey and felt no guilt when purchasing my ticket after completing the 54.3 mile day trip.     With less than a week til Claire, Winnie, Candy and I start the Great Glen Way its just donned on me that I will need to do jogging on top of walking while I’m away and cycling won’t get a look in… or will it?  to be decided.. watch this space! =)