Training in the Hay Paddock

The training is almost about to come to an end with our departure next week. The challenge with strong spring winds has continued and I have had some tough training sessions. We are now back at Lake Clearwater after a few days in Ashburton when I completed four pushrim trainings. Canterbury is now under an orange wind warning and it was pouring with rain up here last night. It is now blowing very hard and from weather observations from other parts of the district it is also blow hard in Ashburton.

Terry Pushing Hard in the Hay Paddock

Another thing that has been making training hard has been lifestyle farmers out mowing their roadsides. Numerous times I have struck these ride-mower warriors cutting the spring growth to keep their patch tidy. Unfortunately these mowers toss the grass out on the road and hence Terry has to negotiate a road that has been turned into hay paddock. This situation has been repeated numerous times the last couple of weeks, I can almost guarantee that I won't come across this in New York. 

The training that I have completed recently included a longer session of 2 hours 26 minutes that covered over 34 kilometres. I was fortunate with this session having mainly reasonably benign winds as I headed north on my usual route. The wind did hit though, like a door smacking me in the face. Fortunately roadside hedges helped to reduce the ferocity of the wind. When I turned around the trip home was pretty quick with 10 consecutive kms exceeding 15.5 km/hr. A tail wind definitely helps to lift your speed.