Alida

Sad news. RIP Brett.

Ran my first 21km the week before the 94.7. Died a thousand deaths. Cycled the 94.7 the following week - tired but still able to form a sentence afterwards. For me personally, running is much harder and I find I need more recovery time than with cycling. On a bike I can go out and beat myself up every day but with running I need at least a day off between runs if the intensity is high.

I suffer from ITB and have given up on physio, anti-inflammatories and Power Balance. I run with a knee guard and recently took to finishing my runs barefoot - when I run barefoot there is no pain in my knee whatsoever so I reckon there's something with me and my running shoes that doesn't make for a happy ITB. Tested a pair of Vibrams and still no knee pain so that's the way I'm headed = ordered a pair of the Speeds yesterday and waiting for them to arrive any ... minute ... now.

COMPLETELY forgot about this. PowerBalance band is in the post and on its way to you for dissection. Should get there in 5 working days (allegedly).

I don't think those of us saying "they are only cheating themselves" are really able to understand why they do it. Personally at the beginning of the year I could hang on to (well mostly hang on to) the racing ladies bunch and on Sunday I got spat out the back of D bunch before Marlboro off-ramp and could only manage to hang on to a bunch on a flat or downhill. All uphills were done in my lightest gear (with a compact crank :lol:) Worst 94.7 time I've ever had. But such is life. The guys that are cheating don't have that "such is life" thinking. Because somewhere somehow it matters that they finished 1093 out how many odd thousand riders there were.

The Momentum water points. I was wearing Momentum kit and everyone at the Momentum water points went absolutely bananas when I rode past. Eventually I stopped caring about a time and would slow down and wave and laugh along just to say thank you for the support. When I stopped at the water point on Heartbreak Hill someone ran up to me to fill my water bottles. Was like being a celebrity :clap:

I've ridden in both open and licensed ladies bunches. Best times and easiest rides were done in the open groups I started with. Most satisfying were the times I finished with the bunch in licensed ladies because I had to work my butt off to stick with them.

Done. I'll pop by the post office sometime this week. You will be posting pics right?

You can have mine.

OK here are my findings. Last year at the 94.7 expo I had the test done on me and being duly impressed that I could not be pulled over while wearing heels, I bought a powerbalance band and wore it all the time. I can't say that my cycling performance improved noticeably but it didn't get worse. I started running around the end of April beginning of May this year and at the end of July picked up an ITB injury due to an imbalance between my left and right core muscles (physio's words not mine). As part of the physio I had to do all sorts of strengthening exercises and you guessed it, balance exercises. Turns out my balance was pretty shocking. I could not balance on my right leg whatsoever. When I started having to balance on a bosu the physio initially had to hold on to me so I didn't just fall off the thing. All this while I had my powerbalance band on. Took it off - no difference. Put it back on - no difference. So I have tried the thing (and donated my R475 to "skoolgeld") and it seriously didn't help my balance. I have no scientific evidence to say yay or nay but personally I don't think it works and any improvement a person feels is due to the placebo effect.

They probably wouldn't but I would. My frame's never been on an IDT.

The warranty I got with my frame said that it expires as soon as I put my frame on an IDT.

I'm in D. Decided to enter open instead of licensed - pleasantly surprised with my seeding. Haven't been on a bike in a couple of months - hoping my running legs will hold out

The pro ladies have always been friendly to me in the racing bunch. Don't know too many of them socially but those that I do know haven't come across as snobbish.

Anyone cycling out on the Boschkop road ... please cycle in a group so that you're more visible or ideally with a following vehicle. I've had a couple of close calls out there and yesterday one of the ladies that cycles with us in the club was hit from behind. She's OK. Her new bike is trashed. The police got the guy (he was drunk and drove off after he hit her) - not sure what the outcome will be but the most important thing is that she's only got a few scrapes.