It’s been a while since I have written a blog – sorry about that. I will fill you in on what’s been going on.

After I got back from St Anthonys I got ill ☹ which for all you athletes out there you know how frustrating that is. When you can’t train, it’s such a pain in the arse – but it didn’t last too long. Thankfully I was back into training within a week.

I have been living up at Michelle and Stuart’s house this week doing some real hard core balls in the wheelie bin sessions. I love holding onto Stuart and Michelle’s wheels on the bike sessions and then trying to stop Stuart from getting too far in front of me on the run. This week Mick McWilliams, an Irish Elite Triathlete, joined us so it was great to have someone else pushing me on the bike. He is a ex-Olympic swimmer so it is also great company in the pool. I know Stuart loved having someone to push him in the hard swim sets.

I finished off my hard training week doing by doing a bike race at Hillingdon. It was a 50km bike race. Michelle has been pushing the pace as usual on the bike and I knew she was getting stronger and stronger. When she was going through and off with Stuart – I was holding on for dear life!!! Of course I love it and I know I have got the best job in the world and I am so lucky to be able to do it.

So the bike race . . .

Lucky me had Dad and Carrie come down with me today and when I got there It wasn’t long before I saw Michelle and Sarah Murphy. It had been a while since I had seen Sarah and it was great to see her. She is a true legend and I have got to mention her bag!

You can tell she has been going to triathlon event for a while with Michelle. Stuart asked for a Tool -out one popped from her band. Michelle asked for safety pins – out popped some from her bag. A TRUE LEGEND!!

So myself and Michelle warmed up on the turbos and then got on with the 50k race. It was about a mile loop which meant there were about 31 laps.

Off we went – the pace was up and down and was very interesting to say the least. It defintely tested my bike handling skills. I was using this as a good burn up so I tried going off the front a few times and was having fun but also trying to stay out of trouble.

There were a few crashing during the race and the race had to get put on hold and started again. As we were getting to the end of the race with 8 laps to go the pace moved up. To be honest I wish it had happened earlier. With 2 laps to go Stuart told me to just have a go and hopefully Michelle wouldn’t be too far away from me. As I went Michelle was blocked in, I had a bash and got caught coming in with 1 lap to go. It ended with near enough 30 odd women having a bash for the sprint – I was staying well out of that!!

So I had fun at my first crit race today.