All entries for Thursday 02 July 2009

Testing out the Nokia N97

Thanks to the good people at WOM World I’ve got myself a Nokia N97 to play with for a couple of weeks. I’ve been looking forward to this for months, actually. I’ve always been a Nokia fan and on paper this looks like a really good device. It does all the stuff I want a smartphone to do and it looks good. I’ve seen some mixed reviews of the N97, some from people I usually agree with, which is a shame. I really want to like this phone. We’ll see.

I’ve actually had it for a couple of days now, just getting used to it before testing out various things in detail. The first thing to do, though, is to upgrade the firmware from the version 10.0.012 supplied with the device to the current version 11.0.021. Hopefully this will address some of the little niggles I have with the device already. Anyway, testing will start in earnest this weekend.

Steve Rumsby : 02 Jul 2009 14:08 |  Tags: N97 Nokia |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Cycling progress so far in 2009

In previous years I’ve done a monthly “cycling summary” post both to document my progress towards cycling further and faster, and to provide some incentive to keep going. Making your targets public stops you changing your mind, and having to blog about not making them is an encouragement to try a bit harder! I’ve not done that this year, and probably partly as a result I’ve not done anywhere near so well.

I did have a “big ride” in mind this year, specifically a London to Paris ride later this month. That’s 300 miles in four days. None of those days on its own was going to be a major challenge for me, but stringing 4 of them together back-to-back was. I was anticipating quite a lot of training which would keep my mileage up, and I didn’t want to set specific targets in case they got in the way of that training. Then, for various reasons, the London to Paris idea fell through, leaving me with no targets to keep me going.

January wasn’t toooooo bad a month, February was quite snowy so I lost a lot of miles, and after that I just haven’t had the motivation. I’ve even stopped recording the details of each individual ride. I’ve still got proper monthly totals, but no longer am I recording individual journeys. Not good. I need to get my motivation back.

So, how badly have I done? This time last year I’d done 1500 miles, and was happily cycling towards my 3000 mile annual target. I’ve now done just over 1000 miles this year, and only in June have I got anywhere close to my monthly target, if I was aiming for 3000 miles again this year. So, it seems like 2500 miles is a plausible target for this year – meaning another 1500 miles in the second half of the year. Doable, but not easy. I’m going to have to get some motivation back to hit that target. Hmmm…

OK, on to some plans for the rest of the year. I have a friend who is seriously interested in doing London to Paris next year, but doesn’t do anywhere near as much cycling as me so we’ve started some training now. Hopefully a few weekend rides with him, building up the distance slowly, will help me get going again. I also need to get back to 2 or 3 lunchtime rides a week, and to take a few afternoons off and try a few 50-mile rides. When it cools down a bit, maybe:-)

Oh, and yes, that does seem to mean I will be doing London to Paris next year, specifically, this ride for Christian Aid. One of the attractions of the event is that it arrives in Paris the day before the Tour de France does, so you get to watch the finish of the final stage before hopping on the train back. Anybody else want to join me? It would be really nice to get a group involved…

Steve Rumsby : 02 Jul 2009 10:52 |  Tags: Cycling |  Comments (1) |  Close comments |  Report a problem