Jan 2010 update

Happy New Year everybody

Another year starts and it will be a vintage one for cycling. Wherever I look at the moment there is good news. Bike sales are up, people still seem to be reading magazines and books, thanks for that by the way, and cycling in Britain just grows and grows.

This will be a big year for British racing with Team Sky going for all the top races in the world, and a lot of other British racers dotted around the bestteams. Racing in this country will be better than ever as well. The Tour Series televised races were great in 2009, I expect the Premier Calendar races to be better in 2010 too.

I’m already on my travels, having just done my first photo-shoot and story of the new year. That was with the British Cervelo rider Dan Lloyd, who was having his time trial position analysed in the wind tunnel by a company called Drag 2 Zero, which is run by Simon Smart, a former aerodynamicist in Formula 1 who uses the Brawn GP F1 wind tunnel to work with cyclists of all levels. The story of what we did and some interesting facts about cycling aerodynamics will appear in the Pro Performance section of an upcoming issue of Cycle Sport magazine.

Next is a load of home based writing and working on book proposals, then I have assignments in Portugal, Italy, Belgium and Spain crammed into the second two weeks of January, plus a few jobs here in GB, weather permitting.

In between I’ll be riding as much as possible, and running when time or travel doesn’t allow the bike. It’s a poor second best to cycling, although my running partner Jack makes it more fun. Till next time, keep riding.