Lessons Learnt

In one sense, the main purpose of this blog is complete - in that I've documented my training and completion of the Etape du Tour. It was only really ever meant as a diary for myself - but it's been great to have the support and encouragement of friends and fellow first-time Etapists who have found the blog.

Over the last few days though, it's occurred to me that the main reason I've read other people's blogs about the Etape is to get ideas for things that might prove useful for my own preparation. Therefore I thought that it might be useful for me to go through the key elements of my preparation - analysing what worked well and what worked not so well.

I wouldn't presume to offer advice - clearly we're all different and all have different abilities and training needs. However, I thought it would be useful to go back and work out what was useful to me as a complete road-riding beginner, in case it might prove useful to anyone starting from a similar position.

I'll be posting these thoughts as I get the time over the next few days.