I really needed to get out on my bike this week, in preparation for the Sigma Sports South Down Spring Sportive on Saturday, but the weather forecast looked horrible and work was manic.

It got to mid-afternoon today and I spotted a break in work and decided to go for it. It was raining intermittently but I’m not a fair-weather cyclist so cracked on.

The route up to Whitchurch was along the normal way up Marchamley Hill, with the wind in my face most of the way. I planned to ride past Dearnford Lake and as it turned out it was 5pm by the time I went past and I suspect they have closed already anyway.

I headed down through the gorgeous Brown Moss Nature Reserve and onwards via Ighfield and Calverhall. At the latter, I decided to turn left and go to Market Drayton via my alternative route as it’s a lovely road and scenic.

In Market Drayton, I could not resist popping into the Joules brewery tap for a quick pint before carrying on to home.

After the last two trips out where my legs felt tired, they were on fire today and absolutely fine the whole way around. I held it back a bit as I did not want to ruin the weekend sportive (paranoid like that, probably totally unnecessarily) I realised I must have had a bit of a bug along with conjunctivitis and now it has cleared my cycling is back to normal.

Route: click here