Getting Prepared

The Bike

So I have a trusty cycle touring bike called a Kona Sutra (yes I probably made the final decision based entirely on the double entendre). Now this is the kind of bike that people braver than I cycle around the world on. They are super reliable, sturdy, and simple. If I have an incident involving a rhinoceros and am in need of repairs, this bike can be welded back together in the back streets of a village using a welding rod, thick gloves, and a truck battery. They are capable of carrying heaps of gear which is great for world travelling. This may well be the first bike I have ever had that was actually the right size and just felt good to ride. So I am quite the fan.

BUT….

this bike is designed for bitumen and gravel roads, it is not designed for mountain bike terrain. Now from what I have read, Uganda’s roads are pretty horrible and many people choose to use a cycle touring bike, which really is a mountain bike with a couple of spots to carry gear. So, while I am sure that I can do this trip with my trusty Kona, I am not entirely sure how happy it is going to make me if I am navigating potholes bigger than my garden shed. But I have another option.

Turns out my son is quite the adventurer and has undertaken far more adventurous adventuring than his father, and just happens to be offloading his bike packing touring bike. His bike is a…. and has all sorts of lovely compact bags to keep a very small amount of stuff. This bike would well and truly handle the terrain and he is happy for me to purchase it from him. I can hear you thinking, well just do that then, it sounds far better than your crappy old Kona with the dodgy name, but there is a catch. His bike is fractionally too small for him, which is why the seat post looks like the neck of a deformed giraffe. It seems to work for him, but he is young and yet to suffer the repercussions of poor decision-making in his knees, back, and arms (he is also far too busy still making those poor decisions). So, I am going to need to take it for a solid test run, get out my trusty tape measure, and see if I can adjust it to match my bike. If all goes well, I will be undertaking this ride in comfort and style looking like a proper (perhaps even youngish) bike packer. I understand that bike packers are the much cooler version of a cycle tourist, so it is worth a shot.

Training

This may (or may not) come as a surprise, but I am not a massive fan of exercise. Really it is quite an inconvenience! there are soooo many other things I would prefer to be doing. The only problem is that when I don’t exercise, I don’t sleep. And, when I don’t exercise every Mars bar I eat shows up on the scales. So in order to be able to eat as much as I feel like and to be able to sleep, I now exercise. I am busy and have a tendency to do things the hard quick way at the best of times, and exercise is no different. A couple of quick horrible hours in the gym are much easier to do than an hour every day walking. So, at the moment I am reasonably fit, but as others have said, you can never be too fit.

So, I have a plan.

Stage 1.

I have been lucky enough to be allocated a brilliant exercise science student who will train me for 6 weeks (Thanks Matt!!). This is part of undertaking his degree, but I am sure that this is just Matt’s way of getting revenge on him for the torture I put him through in his first year when I taught him in my subject. Oh, how the power dynamic has changed. He currently has me doing 2 hours per week of strength training across my legs, core and upper body and in theory he has me doing interval/sprint training twice a week when he is not there (I may be reasonably fit, but I am not particularly strong and some areas of my flexibility are really shit!!) I say in theory because he caught me out on Thursday and asked how it was going. I had to fess up like an undisciplined first-year student and tell him I hadn’t done it. I then sheepishly scheduled in the next sprint training session so that I didn’t get caught out again.

For those of you uninitiated in the ways of exercise-related suffering, interval or sprint training (TBH I cant remember what it is called and actually don’t care that much, it is pretty horrible) is where you pedal as fast as you possibly can for 30 seconds, then slow down until you catch your breath, then do it all again, six times. This sounds like nothing but I can assure you it is horrible (either that or I am just being a sook, which is also highly probable). Anyway, Matt assures me that this is the best way to improve my fitness and that I really should suck it up and do what I am told (but not in those words, he is nowhere near as blunt and horrible as I am). So, from here on in, I promise to get my sprint training done Matt….

Stage 2.

When training for a big ride, one of the most important things you have to be ready for is to spend hours and hours and hours pedaling at a pace that will allow you to spend hours and hours cycling. So on about the 13th of November (10 weeks before I leave), I will start doing some longer-loaded rides. I will be honest, it is much easier to ride all day when you are not doing laps of Bendigo and are actually on your adventure, but I do need to get myself ready. I will likely do rides of around 60+ km once a week. I will need to do a bunch of riding off-road, because let’s face it, Uganda’s roads are not renowned for their smoothness and I am not known to have any off-road cycling skills….

And that should pretty much do it. When I don’t feel like training, I just ask myself how much I would like to suffer when I am away, that tends to help. Being fit, makes a big difference to how miserable I will be at the end of a shitty dusty 14 hour day cycling up a mountain.

Stage 3.

One of the amazing things about the body is how it adjusts to how much exercise you do. Ordinarily, I really don’t need to eat that much. I sit at a desk or on a couch for more than 10 hours a day…. (yes, slack I know). But on these trips, I am going to be moving for probably ten hours a day and this requires more energy, which means more food. For about 2 weeks prior to leaving, I will increase my riding so that I am going for a longish ride (40km +) five days per week. What this tends to do is send a clear message that I need to eat more and I am able to increase my food intake before I hit the true adventure in Uganda. Being able to eat more, means I have more energy. It takes a bit of the pain out of the first few days. I will be the first to admit that this may entirely be bullshit, I really have no idea, but it seems to work for me and gives me a good excuse to eat more, so I am sticking with my dodgy science….

There you have it. A few months of suffering in preparation for the next big adventure.

What to take

Not very much, now remind yourself Brad, don’t take much, please please please, don’t make the mistake of taking too much….

Need

• 1.25l water bottle

• 3l water bladder

• 1 bike shirt

• 1 off-bike shirt

• 1 pair of pants

• 1 pair of shorts

• 2 bike shorts (those ridiculous horrible kinds with the shoulder straps and lots of padding for my arse, because I don’t have enough of my own)

• socks and jock (not very many)

• bike shoes

• knife (for cutting food or defending myself from rogue hippos)

• Mobile phone (for shooting video and reassuring Paula that my run-in with a lion really wasn’t as bad as the media made out)

• spare parts for the bike

• very small tent for emergencies and keeping bedbugs out of my sleeping bag when staying in dodgy locations

• sleeping mat

• light sleeping bag

• 1 light rain jacket

• 1 light jumper

• first aid kit (just with enough stuff to stop various liquids from leaking in ways that they should not be)

• power bank

• I am sure there are other things, but I cant think of them right now

Want

• DO NOT PUT ANYTHING ON THIS LIST!!!