Nice, the beauty

Not blogged for a while, not been in Sweden for a while. But went to Nice in France and saw the headlines happened. We didn’t expect some maniac drive a truck over people on the Bastille day at the Riviera. It was very sad, and the place he drove over people was so long I almost started to cry when passing it 3 days after… We are all on this earth together.

Except a bad truckdriver, many dead people and thinking of what would have happened if we didn’t went home earlier. The trip was super. Nice is a magic place. It got the class of rich people, the atmosphere of France with many small and great restaurants and cafées, it got mountains high enough to be called mountains, and it got a blue ocean.

Pictures from the trip:

I also got to know a happy strong guy, Raphael who took some pictures:

And having lunch in Italy with my friends:

My first time riding mountains and it takes some power climbing climbs in 24km for example, my legs got heavier and heavier and with a ”restday” (2h38min ride) I was able to ride with one of my best friends Henrik and the ”new” guy Raphael to magic places and having a great time sweating under the sun. Everything wouldn’t have been without Emil who ”arranged” the trip and got me to my favourite country. If I would be rich someday I would move to Nice.

Being me and being in Nice is extra fun as my favourite brand of cyclingclothes Café du Cycliste is from there and got a great shop and café at the Port. Did a Sundayride with people from there too, there are some strong climbers out there and the ride was hard but nice 😀 Ended the trip with an coffee and croissant at Café du Cycliste this morning:

Will live long on this trip. And will never forget how good my Specialized S-Works Tarmac Disc is for descending, how good it worked out with 1×11 on the climbs and the importance of good tires when braking hard. 😀

Älgö to Färingsö

Asked Anders if we could go a bit slower to Älgö than usual this morning, didn’t got any answer nor did he show up. Instead came 5 riders that usually does Morningspins on Djurgården and my SUMOfriend The Joker. The morningspinriders are very nice guys but regret a little that I invited them, they are really fast. Almost got dropped in the first climb, but took a good bite in my bartape and as vice guide I had to show or shout out the route at least 😉

Short turns with goal to survive made it good, ended with a PR and 2nd best overall on the route. Map and stats: Strava

Ended it all with a great breakfast at Vivels, sat there for 2h and met 4 other friends there too. Lovely place in Hammarby Sjöstad 🙂

Bad thing is that I think I drank a bit too much coffee and my stomach wasn’t good on all day, was thinking of cancelling my evening ride but thought I could make it short instead. So after working I went to Le Mond and met up 5 others riding towards Färingsö. Missed Carmen and Elvira who I looked forward to ride with and missed the easy pace. Did my best to ride easy and did okey with that pace 😉

Map and stats from that ride: Strava hmm, was a lot of PR there, strong guys taking turns today it seems 😉 Was more focused on keeping the heart rate down instead of looking at speed 😉

Cafériding to find the apples

When you are a group of cyclists that isn’t too many or too few and everyone are on the same level. Then riding in the sun can be awesome. And it was today, everyone wasn’t all at the same level but almost and same enough to have fun 😀

7 riders gathered at Cykelcafé Le Mond this morning and we left for Färingsö and the famous Äppelfabriken (applefactory) to have a nice fika. Emil had found a route and we almost followed it

Emil had written that the pace would be around 30km/h. It was much over when we came out on the nice small roads. And my Tarmac felt like flying, was really nice to push hard sometimes and see the speed over 45km/h on the flat parts. 🙂 This with Live Strava Segments on my Garmin 520 maybe had it’s role too, who wants to loose 😉

Then we had fika:

Café du Cycliste clothes and fika is a perfect combo. No matter if you eat pie or ”proper” food you still looks slim :p Or something like that.

Then we pushed on towards Stockholm. Did the classic lap around FRA and I had a plan. I maybe wouldn’t win the sprint but I would get tired so when we had rode away and turned around I went up in front and pushed all I had. Really good training for me and was really hard when I went in 48km/h with over 180 in heart rate and the road went up a bit. Had to slow down and let the others pass. But gave it all and tried to go around again and sprint. My worst spring ever! 190 in heart rate and like 49km/h when I rised and was supposed to sprint past Peter but my legs were empty and I just sat down again with a laugh about it :p

Rode past the castle which I tried to take a picture of, got a bus instead 😉

Awesome day on my awesome Tarmac. A great way to celebrate the National Day of Sweden 😀

Map and stats: Strava

Picture from the bridge on almost the hole group by Jimmie and Emil took the picture of me eating pie.

2016 Fashion

No matter if I sit on my bike or being a regular person I want to look good. I follow the fashion of Filippa K and Eton regularly and I would never go out in a onepiece or training clothes when meeting friends. Like more to have a nice shirt on than a t-shirt. So when reading papers like Metro publishing what’s hot and not from the Swedish Fashion Week I read and consider it.

With brands like Café du Cycliste, Rapha, Isadore or Pas Normal Studios it’s now possible to look stylish on a bike too. Did and order from Café du Cycliste and thought of buying their new limited Claudette jersey:

but sold out in my size so had to rethink.

The think according to Metro to get this spring is a thin classic bomber jacket, they didn’t say anything about shaved heads and being rasists so you can be cool. Café du Cycliste is in time and launched a new jersey called Francoise. bomber style:

Will be a good looking spring 🙂

If you also want to be stylish on (and off) the bike you can use this code to get 10% discount: AMBLUN10 Used when checking out on Café du Cycliste

#58 a day in the saddle under the sun

There is a Challenge on Strava to ride half of Tour de France while they race it. I’m ranked 58 after today 🙂 Enjoying it as long as it lasts as I won’t manage to complete it or keep the place.

It all started at 8. Met up with 5 nice guys close to the Globe here in Stockholm. The plan was a 200km ride on nice roads southwest of Stockholm. Like the last week to Mariefred but better and with riding home instead of a ferry.

Was doing climbs:

With Peter M in front:

Waited for a small ferry at Skanssundet:

Me today after almost 2h:

Had fun:

A new small road in the middle of nowhere, much better than last weeks ride 🙂

Emil enjoying the beautiful 8,5km gravelroad:

me again on gravel:

hard to not push when the gravelroads are that good. There is a difference with riding hard on gravel compared to asphalt. The others in line after:

The blue guys:

This was after this years first bath:

Out swimming a little before this picture, old school swimclothes. Great with Cafe du Cycliste Antoinette sometimes:

All riders was in the lake to the bibs to cool down a bit in the summer heat:

Then we had lunch and rode some more. Was a bit crispy in the end so happy with the stop at Sturehofs castle:

Back home I don’t look that brown but my body is doing all it can to mention it’s there and that it has been working for a long time with many muscles today 😉

Map and stats: Strava

Le Peloton #28 and how to spend a friday evening

I’ve got friends who can convince me easily, Christoffer is one. A customer and rider in CK Valhall’s elite team who is a nice guy that has started to ride Le Peloton sometimes. He asked me yesterday if I would ride today. My plan was to ride mtb with Jaime and Patrik but an hour of full speed and pain felt like a better preparation for sundays Lida Loop and when Kalle who owns bikecafé Le Mond asked too it was decided.

Borrowed the Roubaix S-Works Red Disc at work and put the alarm early. Rode and met up with this big group:

Me closest on the bottom fixing with my phone for the picture above 😉

Felt ok in the beginning and up to Fisksätra. Tried to be in a good position up the climb when we came back to Saltsjö-Duvnäs and to the roundabout in Ektorp. Then up to Nacka Forum I got impressed. The peloton was pushing, was floating like an engine. No thoughts of slowing down, just pushing. That feeling when it just pushes made me smile.

Good position through Sickla and then another hard part starts up to Hellas. Lost a couple of meters in the beginning but Christoffer came up and pushed me back on wheel before he continued forward, thanks 🙂 But after Hästhagen going over red I felt I just couldn’t go any harder no matter how. Got dropped!

Felt like shit and rode alone to Älta, just 34,7km/h in average Sickla-Älta instead of 41 before a second group that got dropped earlier caught me. Rode with them and caught 3-4 others before Flaten. Tried to work together to minimise losses and it was hard.

Ended with my 2nd best time on the long segment on Strava, 37,7km/h in average which I have to be happy with. A thing to notice is that after the sprint in Fisksätra it goes easy for a kilometer but still so high average. 😉

To Le Mond and got breakfast from this guy, Kalle:

Nice time in the sun chatting 🙂 Map and stats: Movescount

Me and the bike:

Then some time in the sun outside work with an espresso and one of our new neighbours AG Trading (POC, Fizik and so) 🙂

A lot to do at work and while not riding any mtb, neither did Jaime or Patrik it was talking about that half day. Patrik had talked about showing his hoods Gömmarn. Jaime and Jessica went to Hellas after work while me and Patrik did pick up my bike and went to his place to ride some new trails for me.

Found a mirror that was for preride selfies so took one 😉

And then out in the forest and hit the rocks and roots. And roots and rocks and rocks, and roots and more roots, and big roots and big rocks, and some mudholes. Then we climbed, climbed and climbed up tricky places. It was pure madness, pure technic and an awesome after work 😉 Impressive how Patrik can ride fast with so much roots and rocks all over ruining everything where you can imagine about flow. Took a ”serious” picture of us too with the track behind:

Then I rode home and felt that I wouldn’t touch a bike for the rest of the day. Hard but fun in the sun with great friends 🙂 Only the Holy Spirit can beat that 🙂

Map and stats from the evening: Movescount