quote: L7, Electric Ballroom Camden, 16/06/24 (they actually said 21 rather than 18, but I've modified it to make it fit better).

2024 ended as it started, with a Zwift route completion habit, but in the middle things went somewhat wrong…

I started Zwifting in Summer 2023, while recovering from the injury which wrecked Six days in the Dome. 'Getting a Tron bike and completing every single Zwift route' was then the crutch which got me through the aftermath of my Dad's death in Autumn 2023. Thanks to slightly more cycling than was probably sensible, I got the Tron bike by the end of January, and by mid-February I'd done every route apart from the longest one, the PRL Full in London. It was a while before London was available at a weekend when I had sufficient time and energy. I gave up 5 hours into my first attempt, when I realised I was going to be finishing late and knackered before a busy week. I finally managed it (taking 8 hours and 13 episodes of Killing Eve) 10 days before my first race of the year, the Pennine Bridleway Trail Challenge. I'd entered the Pennine Bridleway as a fun multi-day warm-up for the Viadal six-day in August. Overall it was fun. However, my middle-aged (female) body threw me some fairly big curveballs: the heaviest period I've ever had, long-sightedness making navigating at night in a storm hard, and difficulty staying warm (when moving slowly due to the navigation issues…).

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Happy at the finish of the Pennine Bridleway, and with my new bike (and a Green sprint leader jersey)

Things went badly wrong in late June. I'd been working hard for months, because of trying to catch up on things I'd got behind on in the Autumn, a major new responsibility, and multiple big deadlines which involved a lot of herding other people. And in the midst of a busy couple of weeks (which included a trip to London to see L7 play all of the Bricks are Heavy) I got covid and my body (and head) waved a little white flag.

I was planning to still give the Viadal six-day a go, but (fortunately in retrospect) my flight to Copenhagen got cancelled in mid-air. I instead spent an enjoyable week at home doing not a lot. When I tried to get back to exercise in September things were still very not right though. On a ten mile walk in the Peak District my heart rate hit 170 going not particularly fast uphill, and I was exhausted (with elevated resting heart rate and depressed heart rate variability) for a week afterwards. I also had 2 heavy periods within the space of 10 days, so I started taking multi-vitamins and iron and booked an appointment with a private menopause specialist (something I'd been humming and hawing about doing for a while). As well as prescribing HRT, she nudged me into booking a GP appointment. I initially struggled to convince the GP that there was anything wrong with me ("I'd be happy with a resting heart rate in the 50s"). But "I can usually do 60 miles a day for mulitple days, so being exhausted after 10 miles is not normal" did the job, and she ordered a battery of blood tests, an ECG and lined up various other referals (including a long Covid clinic) if necessary. The blood tests came back fine, apart from low vitamin D levels, even though I'd been taking multi-vitamins for 4 or 5 weeks.

During the Autumn I took things as easily as possible: yoga, weights, no cycling and running, only short and slow walks, eating better, sleeping more, and not overdoing things at work either. And slowly I'm beginning to feel like myself again. I took 2 weeks off work over Christmas/New Year and have started Zwifting again. Initially my Garmin told me off for over-doing it, but my heart rate is coming down and my speed and watts are going up, so thing are going (cautiously) in the right direction. The boundary between 'absolutely no after effects' and 'wrecked the day after' is at a much lower level, and much narrower, than 'old normal', but I'm no longer getting wiped out for a week by 10 miles of walking.

The priority for 2025 is not breaking myself again (mantra "It's not 1992 and you're not 18 any more"). If things go well I'd like to have another go at doing the Viadal six-day, but I won't commit to that until I've got a bit more training under my belt (the big uncertainty is what my body can handle once I'm back to work and commuting). My short term goal is completing the rest of the new Zwift routes, and I'm hoping to get an entry for the LDWA 100. I know from 2022 that (provided I start slowly) I can comfortably complete a LDWA 100 with very little training/fitness. And 'completing 10 LDWA 100s before I turn 60' is a new, suitably sensible, middle-aged goal (especially since I already have 4 'in the bag').