Final Day of London 2 Paris charity ride

Day 4 and the ride into Paris is always a memorable one. I rode with Group 1 for the first half, no time trials on the last day and a relatively steady pace because of the poor weather conditions, unfortunately the day started with some heavy rain.

We re-grouped for lunch. I managed to get my third massage of the tour even though I didn't feel like I had any aches and pains. The massage was welcomed and there actually some areas that needed some work on, so I was told. It was certainly painful but after some recommended post-stretches I was ready to go again.

The final 50km (total of 95km on last day) was as one large group. We only had a small window of opportunity to enter Paris on closed roads so there was quite a lot of stopping and starting that broke the flow a little.

Riding into the centre was as expected an amazing experience (yet again). A huge cheer went up as we saw the Arc de Triomphe and the atmosphere was electric as we passed the Eiffel Tower for the last few hundred metres of our 460km journey.

It was quite an emotional finish and the celebratory dinner that evening was a great finale for one of my top cycling events to date.

My bike certainly needs some serious attention so I will be investigating different options and costs over the coming days.

Next week I hope to get back to some normality and better balance on the training front. Meanwhile the 20 hours I spent on the bike should help me as I look towards my next events - Vachery 70.3 middle-distance triathlon and RideLondon100.