The day draws nearer – Saturday, 24th March, when I fly off to Spain accompanied by my precious bike. Spent most of yesterday (Sunday) packing it into a bike box for transit to Alicante from Luton Airport. I’m already losing sleep over this as I’ve never packed a bike box before – just hope to God it survives and I can put it all back together again when I get to the hotel!

Plan is, if all goes according to said plan, that I spend a week amongst like minded bike nuts in an aparthotel in Denia climbing lots of hills in (hopefully) gloriously sunny conditions on lovely smooth tarmac. Did it last year and, despite coming a cropper, absolutely loved it.

Different slant this time around – Dr. Garry Palmer of SportsTest (www.sportstest.co.uk) will be running some seminars aimed at improving one’s overall performance on the bike. I’ve been training hard for this, following some of his advice – now to put it to a real test!

Really looking forward to meeting up with friends I made from the last time, mainly High Wycombe Cycling Club members. As far as I know, no other Team Milton Keynes (www.teammk.com) members are going this year – miserable bunch!