Road and trail, where do I stand?

There are about 3 or 4 topics I want to write about. However they are longer posts and deserve more reading and editing.

Currently I am sat in a plush hotel suite about to turn 30. I have started writing in a diary and have also begun a physical bike log.

Both of these new editions I will talk about in another blog post however for now the point is, as I sip my second glass of Veuve Clicquot Ponsardin champagne, I need to get something off my chest.

I love cycling.

There phew I feel better.

However I do not care what form of cycling I am doing.

Lately as you know I have purchased and been riding a little BMX. So much fun, so much pain to fall off.

I also have been hitting the trails hard.

I have given up on Strava.

All of this should point to my total movement away from roads and to the dirt. I love being out in woods, thrashing about on trails and exploring the landscape.

Except.

I never feel 100% comfortable.

I love it, but in the way you love someone who is bad for you. The way you love someone who you know, deep down, is going to hurt you.

Today I did a blast on the road bike. I planned it last night, I worked out the route and I was only out for 42 minutes.

It was literally a short ride.

However it just felt like home.

I talk a lot about the feel of things with my bike mates. We talk about how roadies tend to feel more serious and anal about things. How mountain bikers seem to be more chilled out.

Yet I feel I straddle both camps. I love the chilled out carefree nature of a mountain bike ride. However I just don't feel I really one hundred percent belong there.

Yet I am not a weight weeny, time trialing, uber serious, power output roadie.

Although I think I could be if I let myself go for it.

I think the truth of what I am might be in the middle somewhere. I think my light carbon road bike may have been a bike that maybe I should not have gotten.

I think I should have purchased a tourer with paniers and I should be built for comfort.

The journey is more important maybe?

Or perhaps I should get a cyclocross bike and go for the halfway house?

Most likely I maybe should stop worrying.

I shouldn't care about what I am or where I best fit.

Maybe I should continue to just enjoy being on my bike. To keep getting fitter, stronger and better.

Oh and to keep finding new routes to enjoy/endure.

Missing the trails.

As I sit in a coffee shop having a healthy brunch before heading home to finish marking coursework I can't help but be jealous of Geoff.

He is off to Swinley forest this morning for a blast around the awesome trails there.

I am stuck ordering parts and waiting on delivery before attempting to fix my stricken bike.

I thought road biking would fix the need to be on two wheels. I thought that throwing myself back into the world of skinny tyres and Lycra would satisfy me.

I was wrong.

As I sit in jeans, converse and lumberjack shirt with my non-ironic beard and thick rimmed glasses (had both before hipsters) I feel every inch a frustrated XCer.

Which I guess is because I am. So much so that I was tempted to switch the wheels of the hardtail onto the spare road bike I have in the garden and have an old school blast around my local wood just to satisfy my needs.

Actually that doesn't sound too bad an idea...

In all seriousness though I do need to get this coursework marked today - attempts at being a professional teacher.

Maybe tomorrow though?

My Raleigh Scorpio

This is my ride a early 90s Raleigh Scorpio 12 speed. Love this bike but sometimes could do with a couple of extra gears!

Emmelle vintage road bike

Bought this bike on Gumtree. Replaced a brake cable and removed the rusted mud guards. It still needs the back wheel truing but is almost ready to go. Am tempted to rewrap the handlebars too though.