Discovering Rutland should be fun...

It must be something to do with the East Midlands... Spelling it CiCLE has always added a little bit of something different to the Rutland Classic.

The pro race has been saved after a winter of financial rumours. The sportive survives too and I am looking to get round the course a lot more successfully that my last outing in 2009.

I am only doing the 54 before anyone thinks some sort of heroic ride is about to happen. That is still 3000 feet of climbing so I will need my climbing legs on.

I am expecting rain and wind as it doesn't seem to have stopped raining since...

1. The hosepipe ban came into force
2. I got a new bike

...That'll be nice.

The main challenges on the day will be Launde Abbey which is only about 300 metres long but seems to take ten minutes to climb. The way we will enter the climb will be over a speed stopping cattle grid... so you start from low speed and get slower.

Neville Holt is a bit longer and slightly less steep but it has been a staple of road racing in this area since I was a lad.

In fact its all going to be a bit emotional for me as its twenty years since I first started riding and time trialling in a club format. Twenty years!!!  Lots of memories and lots of ups and downs to play over in my head as I head around my local roads.

I am going misty eyed as we speak