Flatlining

Still waiting for the book to arrive which will transform my training methods and drag me screaming into the 21st Century.

Brian claims that his method will make me faster, whilst allowing me to train less , and more slowly. I'm not sure that I could actually train more slowly without going backwards; and training less would simply involve staying in bed all day, but I'm willing to suspend disbelief.

So, in the interests of science, I dug my heart-rate monitor out of my running-gear drawer and strapped it on. Brian, who's a similar age to me, says his programme restricted him to less than 130 bpm on all rides.

This can't be right. I hit 150 putting my shoes on and barely dropped below it until I was sitting in the cafe afterwards. When I even approached a hill, a series of beeping alarms went off. I half expected a lugubrious Danish masseur to appear and say "Bjarne, look what you're doing to yourself, we are your friends, we can help".

(The previous line will only make sense if you've seen Overcoming -- which I recommend you do. It's very entertaining, especially now we know what Bjarne and Ivan were really up to).

Clearly this hi-tech training lark is more complicated than it seems. No wonder Chris Boardman always looked worried.

More from the Catford Hill Climb tomorrow.