100-Mile Challenge Begins

A grey morning turned into a lovely evening here in Lincolnshire and so it was easier to motivate myself to start my 100-mile challenge. 

This is the challenge I have set myself after being encouraged by friends and others doing similar things at the moment – basically I want to travel 100-miles by my own steam in the next 45 days (by the time I go on holiday on 28th May).

The reason for setting this challenge for myself is to motivate myself to exercise now I’ve done the Lincoln 10k and have nothing to really train for… hopefully it’ll force me to exercise regularly, outside, helping me to improve my fitness and also be a healthier person.

So this evening I got my bike out of the shed for the first time this year and probably since the summer last year, pumped up the tyres and tested the breaks, and hit the road.

I will be using Run Keeper (free) for the iPhone to track the distances I’m travelling – I am used to using that anyway when I go out running (which is too infrequent, hence this challenge) and it will track my distance, time, speed, averages etc.  I use the free version rather than the pro version because, well, because it’s free!

Today I was going to go round the “big block” which is around 7 miles, but following some advice from my other half about how my bum might feel after my first bike ride of the season (it really is a horrible saddle!), I chose to opt for a shorter route.  It turned out I did 4.5 miles exactly in something over 25 minutes, which is a good start and already makes up for tomorrow (I don’t get time for exercise on a Thursday evening).

I have created a spreadsheet to track my 100-day challenge and will share my progress on Splodz Blogz as and when over the next 45 days.  I hope to be able to share with you some great numbers as the days go by.