Etape Caledonia

Despite forecasts to the contrary, the worst of the weather stayed away for Sunday, and so we lined up in Pitlochry for the start of the Etape Caledonia in good spirits.

Got straight out of the saddle at the start and was soon up to speed and making good progress up the early climbs. The profile doesn't look too demanding with 130km and 1,300m climbing, but there's a few tough climbs and essentially a 50km TT around Loch Rannoch. I picked up a partner within 25km and we had great fun ripping up the road and jumping from group to group.

Barry eventually dropped me on the main climb of the day up the Schiehallion, but I still climbed well, setting a time of 7:52 for the KOM segment which was the 277th quickest time of the day. More importantly, it was 30 seconds quicker than Chris Boardman's time. I'm sure he's crying himself to sleep with his Olympic gold medal, and dabbing away the tears of disappointment with his TdF yellow jersey.

After that there was the great descent back into the valley, then more hard pedalling with very little help (I turned around at one point to find I was pulling a train of 5-6 riders, with none of them willing to take a turn!)

With 35km to go, I knew a sub 4 hour time was possible, so I really attacked the last series of climbs. I was pretty much on the limit on these and I was very thankful to finally start the descent back into Pitlochry as my climbing legs were shot.

So it was hard to see that the final 400m was a climb into the town. I gritted my teeth and got out the saddle to empty the tank, and had nothing left as I crossed the line for a time of 3hr 56min.

That gave me an average speed of 33.2km/h and 499th place (out of 5,000+ riders). Very happy with that performance, and now my focus is on climbing with my trip to Provence in 2 weeks time.

The long drive home to London was put in perspective when we spotted an Omega Pharma Quickstep truck on the M1. Pitlochry to London may be a slog, but it's the equivalent of nipping round the corner in comparison to driving from Dublin to Italy in the middle of the Giro d'Italia