Relaxing Long Weekend? Not quite.

We had a long weekend down under with the Queen's birthday on Monday. And so as you would do after a long and busy week at work, I slept in and relaxed most of the weekend.

Not quite.

With a friend of mine, Pierre, we decided during the week to go to the Blue Mountains for a mountain bike ride.  I love this beautiful place, close to Sydney (~1hr drive) which has plenty of mountain bike tracks. While I have been there several times to do the famous Oaks trail, Pierre organised the ride which included both the Andersons trail (30kms) and the Oaks trail (30kms).

Pierre tracked it with his app, you can see the itinerary here.

So Saturday, I woke up at 6am (as you do) and went to pick him up before heading off to the blue mountains to do some mountain biking. 

The weather was perfect, sunny with no clouds, but chilly with temperatures close to 0 degree celsius. We got to Glenbrook around 7.45am after one hour drive, parked close to the Visitors centre (strategic location due to the proximity of its toilets) and rode to Glenbrook station to take the train to Wentworth Falls.

It's always great to see so many people waking up early in the morning, coming with their families, mates and jamming the train with their mountain bikes.

Bikes in the train

We got off at Wentworth Falls, and Pierre took the lead as we had to ride a little prior to getting on the actual Andersons Trail. There was some construction work on the way and following Pierre onto the road, I got really scared when we found ourselves in the middle of the freeway with literally no lane for bicycles! Pierre then crossed both lanes to get out on a bicycle/pedestrian path. After a big fright, we then rode to the start of the trail and had a great time.

The Andersons trail is really a great track, with an adrenaline charged rush down a steep downhill. The downhill ends up in an icy cold creek that you, sadly, have to cross and get your feet wet!

After this, is a dreadful 3km steep uphill! I did not have much fun there with my old bike.

We then got onto the famous Oaks trail, that I love and we had a blast.

I discovered half way through the track that there was steam in front of the lens of my GoPro (checking back home -  the videos are just no good). Thankfully, for the best part of the Oaks trail after that (the fast section, single trail and technical bit at the end) there was no steam. I will have some great shots/videos to share after the editing is done.

Amazing time, great company and great weather! Will definitely go back there with Pierre and do some more shots too!

After relaxing for a few hours at home (and yes I did do a few stretches), having a massive (and not so healthy) pizza for dinner, I then decided at 10pm on Saturday to enter a 14kms race on Sunday at 6.45am. 

My girlfriend was not so impressed with me as:

• she was going to be woken up another day at 6am

• we had to go to a friend's 30th surprise birthday party at 12pm sharp. 

The 14 kms running race was taking place around the Iron Cove and the Leichhardt Park, a flat, fast and scenic race. I will update the post once the photos are published so you get an idea.

Race itinerary - Copyright Sri Chinmoy

The race was really enjoyable with great views of the cove, people rowing and the city in the background. The organisation was great and so was the weather. 

After riding 60kms the day before, not having really prepared physically, mentally and nutritionally, I was actually happily surprised with my time. I completed the race in just over 1 hour. 61 minutes and 48 seconds to be precise (which equates to 4m40s per km). The results are available here.

And for those wondering, yes, we did make it on time to our friend's 30th surprise birthday party and I did make it up to my girlfriend (bringing her delicious French pastries for breakfast).

And finally, on Monday morning, both my girlfriend and I had a well deserved sleep in (and did I mention that I also slept 14 hrs? ;)