I've given up using the cycle path through Hyde Park as I'm travelling against the general flow of traffic (bloody cyclists are a bloody menace!) so these days I use South Carriage Drive. That's fine; it takes me where I want to go (towards Hammersmith via Kensington), but it always knackers me out and I don't know why.
I get onto the road from William St/Albert gate and turn left (West). I always try to remind myself not to try and peg it too hard because I know I'm going to get knackered if I do.
Excuses:
1. It's a false flat. No, really, it is. It looks flat, but it goes distinctly uphill and at a tougher gradient than you'd think.
2. There's no shelter from the prevailing easterly tornado (okay, okay, zephyr).
3. I've just pegged it up Sloane St in a bid to outrun a cyclicidal cabbie and so am knackered anyway.
4. On South Carriage Drive there is very little traffic and no traffic lights to slow me down so I am going faster than I normally would anyway ( I like this excuse).
5. The road surface is rubbish and frequently covered in horse sh…
6. I haven't had any breakfast and have simply run out of fuel.
I do always try to pluck up some brio and look a bit manly as I wheeze past the guards outside Hyde Park Barracks, but this is usually the point where I'm feeling it worst. I'd like to be in the drops, but usually I'm sitting up trying to get some air into my lungs.
I guess it's a combination of all those things (plus I'm not as fit as I think), but it hits me harder than I think it's going to every time.
