{"id":360,"date":"2013-05-24T13:36:36","date_gmt":"2013-05-24T13:36:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.torquesense.com\/blog\/?p=360"},"modified":"2014-02-08T22:11:19","modified_gmt":"2014-02-08T22:11:19","slug":"something-new","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.torquesense.com\/blog\/something-new\/","title":{"rendered":"You have nothing to fear&#8230; but fear itself"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Two weeks off the bike have left me feeling fat and nervous about the next ride, so much so that I considered excusing myself \u00a0from No Excuses Thursday at the 11th hour. My nervousness springs from the fact that my shoulder is still stiff and achy from my last crash on the 9th of May; it&#8217;s one thing to fall off when you&#8217;re fit but to fall off onto an existing injury is an unpleasant thought.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"http:\/\/app.strava.com\/activities\/55913595\/embed\/b45df1313c2df2f685803845096df81560ca0130\" height=\"405\" width=\"590\" frameborder=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Anyone who has had an exercise routine embedded in their schedule will be familiar with the invisible hand that gently helps you get your kit together and then applies pressure to the middle of your back, easing you out of the door into the cold, wind and rain. The chunk of\u00a0psyche\u00a0screaming at you to put your pyjamas on and spend a warm night on the sofa with Netflix is no match for this trance inducing force. \u00a0A few\u00a0pedal\u00a0strokes in and the hands last job is to wave you off, its work is done until the next time you really can&#8217;t be arsed to drag your carcass uphill and down dale.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_361\" style=\"width: 310px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.torquesense.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/sunset.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-361\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-361\" alt=\"Sunset over Houndkirk Moor, Sheffield\" src=\"http:\/\/www.torquesense.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/sunset-300x225.jpg\" width=\"300\" height=\"225\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.torquesense.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/sunset-300x225.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.torquesense.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/sunset-1024x768.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/www.torquesense.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/sunset.jpg 1500w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-361\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Sunset over Houndkirk Moor, Sheffield<\/p><\/div>\n<p>Joining me on this evening&#8217;s jaunt were Gav and Jim, a spin up to the top of Houndkirk and then time for something new. We turned left and took and well hidden path through the heather, a gentle, muddy descent took us through a gap in a wall and along twisting single track for a 1\/2 a mile. Jim had previously taken a tumble on this trail and pulled over to give us a description of what to expect from the next section: narrow, rocky, technical will large steps and lots to trip you up.<\/p>\n<p>I took the lead and found the description was accurate, a selection of granite\u00a0obstacles\u00a0presented themselves in quick succession, from\u00a0awkward\u00a0jagged channels to deep steps and loose stones. It occurred to me that this just the sort of terrain that catches riders out, the inclination of most people with an ounce of self preservation is to take the speed off through such a gnarly section but it is often just\u00a0this approach that causes the bike to stop suddenly on hitting an obstacle rather than rolling over it,\u00a0catapulting\u00a0the rider over the handle bars.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_365\" style=\"width: 310px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-365\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-365\" title=\"A new bit\" alt=\"new-bit\" src=\"http:\/\/www.torquesense.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/new-bit-300x225.jpg\" width=\"300\" height=\"225\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.torquesense.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/new-bit-300x225.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.torquesense.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/new-bit-1024x768.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/www.torquesense.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/new-bit.jpg 1500w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><p id=\"caption-attachment-365\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">New bit of trail, marked on Strava as &#8220;Unsafe&#8221;<\/p><\/div>\n<p>As we approached the road the trail got a bit looser and presented a couple more tricky sections, I found myself muttering the mantra &#8220;look three metres ahead, look three metres ahead&#8221; as I caught myself staring down at my front wheel.<\/p>\n<p>I was just starting to tire from the relentless pounding when I reached the gate and waited for the others to catch up. Jim wasn&#8217;t far behind a we had the usual enthusiastic exchange that follows the successful descent of a granite lined channel with your bike intact and all your teeth still in your head.<\/p>\n<p>When Gav arrived we headed for the pub, tarmac all the way.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Two weeks off the bike have left me feeling fat and nervous about the next ride, so much so that I considered excusing myself \u00a0from No Excuses Thursday at the 11th hour. My nervousness springs from the fact that my shoulder is still stiff and achy from my last crash on the 9th of May; [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[33,42,45,48,104],"class_list":["post-360","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-no-excuses-thursday","tag-houndkirk-moor","tag-mountain-biking-peak-district","tag-moutain-biking-around-sheffield","tag-no-excuses-thursday-2","tag-norfolk-arms"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.torquesense.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/360","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.torquesense.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.torquesense.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.torquesense.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.torquesense.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=360"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/www.torquesense.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/360\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":363,"href":"https:\/\/www.torquesense.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/360\/revisions\/363"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.torquesense.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=360"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.torquesense.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=360"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.torquesense.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=360"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}