Paul Petch

April 2009 updates

Holidays

What a week it has been here in Christchurch! Over the Easter weekend Amy and I hit the Little River Rail Trail, with some fantastic Craigieburn tramping the following day (so nice!). I then met up with Spencer on the Sunday for a spin in the hills….which was an expensive but memorable day. After the long weekend I took a few more days holiday and it worked out at 10 super lazy days… with near perfect sun kissed Autumn weather! Add some jogging, copious amounts of single speeding at Bottlelake and more bike fixes/ re-vamps and “tinkerings” than you can shake a stick at….. it has been a very nice break indeed! Today found me up early and back into the commute on the GT Peace… this time with some panniers that made it a total joy compared to a heavy and sweaty backpack. As mad as it sounds, it’s good to be back at work to get some rest! Out of all the seasons, Autumn has to be my favourite time of the year in New Zealand.

I’ve been super keen on the blogging front over that past few weeks too with at least a post (or two) a day and I’ve also managed to “recruit” a handful of eager bloggers to contribute after some rambling and general spamming across the interwebs. You may have already read the fantastic posts by Zane who is a bit of a legend around these parts with some serious skills and stories of woe that would make your fathers buckle under the sheer “gnar gnar gnar” of it all ;) Hopefully we shall see a few contributions from the North island too in the form of momentus and whafe….. who are already very active and respected MTBR contributors. My good friend Spencer is also “teetering” close to rolling out some goodness for us to enjoy… and there is an idle rumor that he has a new singlespeed… and loves it ;) Last but not least we have Lordoneone from “Old Blighty”and of course Jing from “Stralia’” eager to spread some international passion for two wheels. Thank you to you all!

Google adverts and co.

It had to happen sooner or later and as you can see I’ve decided to add some Google Adsense distractions to the blog, as well as some “pay as you go options” by various means. The aim is to try and cover my hosting costs that seem to be increasing as the months tick over. I’ve tried to make the adverts stand out enough, but not to much….. if that’s possible and I apologise to any of you who are sensitive to such crimes against the interwebs :D Anyway, if you are interested in some small banner advertising, please visit here for details or email me for specific visitor data before you buy :) What I do ask though is that as a follower of MTBNZ, can you please support me and simply visit one of the links …. like the one to the side >>> for example :D

Nutrition & weight loss

I’ve continued to see Rebbecca from MINT, and I’m still chugging along nicely thanks to her advice and encouragement! I’m weighing in at about 72.8KG now compared to 78ish from 6 months back…. so I’m really happy with that! Weight is not everything though, with my overall muscle mass on the increase while my fat % continues to lower and more importantly I’ve got more energy and “get up and go” than ever before. So how exactly has this come about in such a short space of time? Put simply I’m eating more protein, hardly any sugar outside of exercising, low GI foods and I eat smallish meals every 3 hrs. I’ll be blogging more about my thoughts and experiences of the new diet as well as pre- during- and post ride nutrition in the coming weeks, so please keep an eye out for that!

Run Forest run!

I love riding my bike, but I also like other sports to help me ride my bike better :D One upon a time I used to like a jog or two so I’ve decided to do some cross training in preparation for the SBS half marathon in May which is coming along just fine. After just 4 weeks I’m running upto 24KM a week with at least one of those runs being 12+ KM. My trusty dog May helps me with the park runs too… which makes her a happy mutt :D Who knows where my running will go over the coming months, but I would really like to look at some adventure endurance “stuff” or maybe a duathlon come next summer….nice. Either way, it is a great alternative to riding when time is not on my side after work and fingers crossed that it all goes well in May :)

Summer rests its weary head…

It’s that funny time of the year with Winter on the way. We all know that when the weather turns to custard and it dips below freezing that is always tougher to keep the fitness levels up, so what are my plans to try and keep active? Well, the single speeds (GT & Cove) are both ready to go and my riding buddies all have a single speed as part of their collection now too….. which is just fab as you can’t beat some good winter night riding with mates!! As for my daily 20km commute to work, I plan to be out there rain or shine again this season, so that will help. I’ll also be looking at some serious snow time too which will be very cool indeed! Oh… and there is the running :D I’ve even considered a road bike to help with the winter blues when the trails are closed, but more on that “possibility” later :) Ultimately, things will slow down though as Winter kicks in, but personally I see it as a great opportunity to get outside and experience stuff with some different scenery and more challenges!!!

So Summer 2009 has waved me goodbye once more but I’ll leave you with some photos “a celebration of friends, New Zealand, Mountain Biking and the Summer of 2009. Good times!”

Cheers and happy safe trails where ever you are :)

Summer Mountain Biking in New Zealand 2009 from Paul Petch on Vimeo.

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Related posts:

1. November updates
2. First post in some time – some updates
3. Some quick updates
4. My favourite posts of 2009
5. Some updates

This entry was posted on Monday, April 20th, 2009 at 2:56 pm and is filed under Ramblings and tagged with bottlelake, lordonone, MTBNZ contributors, night riding, single speed, spencer, weather, zane. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.