Entering week 24…sporting an egg-shaped bump.

Feel strong, healthy and a lot fitter than I did during a heinous first trimester of 24/7 nausea and eating all things white, plus watermelon and pineapple. With those six weeks behind me of barely being able to walk a loop around the farm at snail’s pace, I leapt back on the bike with enthusiasm to recommence my commute by bike.

I have a dream commute. 6km of sealed country road where it’s a rare occurrence to encounter a car (most people are still hosing down the milking shed at that time) and then 11km of gravel – the Hauraki Rail Trail from Owharoa Falls right to within 20m of the office in Paeroa. The perfect combo of terrain for my cross bike.

Pre-bump timings: home to Paeroa 45mins, Paeroa to home 55mins (due to elevation and end of day!)

Bump timings: home to Paeroa no change, Paeroa to home 1hr 10mins…

I lost a lot of fitness in the first trimester which meant my commute home was around 1hr 30mins just 6-8 weeks ago, but I’ve been working on getting fitter again so I reckon I’m currently peaking on the bike! Peaking during pregancy that is.

Big changes have been:

• I’ve switched to using a rack system with pannier bags as about a month ago I started to find I was getting an excruciatingly sore back on the way home with my usual laden up backpack.
• I lose my breath much quicker on the uphills and unless I take deep, long, consistent breaths I find myself almost gasping for air at times. 
• Self preservation mode has kicked in which meant one morning I waited until 8am to leave for work as I didn’t want to ride across all the icy bridges on the trail. Trouble was, at 8:30am it was still just sitting on 0 degrees and there was ice galore!

Riding singletrack on the ol’ mtb is a whole different can of worms. For next time.

Note: Why the post title? One of the main contractors that works on the trail said to me last week, “Why are you still riding when you are pregnant? Only hippies cycle into town anyway”.