Garmin

November 2025 Ride Selfies

| Richard Morris

We had another fortnight’s holiday in Corralejo, Fuerteventura, so I again hired a Specialized Allez Elite from Easy Riders Bike Centre and went for a morning ride each day from the villas at Bahiazul along the FV-1 to Tamaragua and/or the FV-104 between the shore and the famous dunes.

In total, I managed 300km whilst we were there (plus some walking/hiking).

I continued doing my little selfie videos to annoy friends on Facebook, so here’s a collection from November 2025, all shot on my Apple iPhone 17 Pro.

Bahiazul Resort Fuerteventura: https://www.bahiazul.com/en/

Easy Riders Bike Center: https://www.easyriders-bikecenter.com/e/index.php

November 2025 Stats

| Richard

It’s the 1st of December and it’s the start of a strange week: last Friday, I had a painful injection into my knee to see if that will temporarily help with the everyday crippling pain, rather than moving straight to my recommended knee replacement surgery to sort out my lack of cartilage and arthritis in that knee.  The consultant then told me, “no swimming and no saunas” – due to the infection risk – and “no running at all, ever, no cycling for a week, and drastically reduce my step count”, all for the first week of December.

Bugger!

November started with a ride on ROUVY’s Great World Adventure as well as getting a couple of my usual  John Hallas’ Weekly Challenges on FulGaz into the bank before our holiday: another two glorious weeks in our home-from-home, Corralejo.

I’d hired the Specialized Allez Elite from Easyriders Bike Centre again, so it was off to do 300km whilst we were out there with pre-breakfast rides along with a bit of a new route.

So, here are November’s stats:

November 2025 Statistics

November 2025 Statistics

Activities: 35 Distance: 568.59 km Time: 27:24:43 Calories: 26,818

Turning to my weight, at the end of October I weighed 90.4kg and at the start of December I weigh 91.3kg, which is up by 0.9kg and indeed up 1kg from last Friday, thanks to one of our family Christmas Dinners.

Body fat percentage was down slightly from 26.2% to 26.0%.

Longest Ride

| Richard

Many people – OK, nobody, actually – ask me what my longest ride was, either in real life or virtually.

The answer is 162.89km virtually, and I rode this back on 25 February 2024 on FulGaz.  They say:

“Are you up for the challenge? Located in the stunning California Alps, the “Tour of the California Alps – Death Ride®” course crosses three Sierra Nevada mountain passes, for a total of six highly categorized climbs. Included are both sides of Monitor Pass, both sides of Ebbetts Pass, and both sides of the Pacific Grade. For the first time ever, FulGaz is excited to have the complete 2024 route available to ride.”

The main difference between riding it virtually with my setup and riding it in real life is coasting. On my trainer, if I stop pedalling, I stop. Completely. So unlike real life you have to pedal up hills and then pedal down the other side, which makes it really hard work.

But at least I could stay in the Pain Cave all day avoiding family who’d come to stay.

So the stats: 162.89km, 3,973m of climbing, an average speed of 25.1km/h, taking 6 hours, 31 minutes and 40 seconds, and burning 5,880 calories.  Garmin Connect thought I was overreaching…

FulGaz/adidas/Strava Graphic
FulGaz/adidas/Strava Graphic

October 2025 Stats

| Richard

Much later than usual as I forgot to do the stats and only realised when we were on holiday last week, so my apologies.

October was much of the same as September whilst trying to clear the decks at work for our imminent holidays.

So I was doing more virtual rides on ROUVY, and I’ve even enjoyed a Group Ride with Wout van Aert (from the pro cycling Team Visma Lease a Bike).

I’ve been doing my usual  John Hallas’ Weekly Challenges on FulGaz as well.

Running is now stopped after some more consultations and an MRI: I need a partial knee replacement but I’ve decided to grin and bear it for a bit and try some injections later this year.

Alos in health issues, I came down with some manflu which stopped my exercising, and the symptoms were very reminiscent of when I had COVID, so that was fun.

So, here are October’s stats:

October 2025 Statistics

October 2025 Statistics

Activities: 25 Distance: 443.62 km Time: 16:05:36 Calories: 15,224

Turning to my weight, at the end of September I weighed 89.4kg and at the end of October I weighed 90.4kg, which is up by 1kg; not good with a holiday coming up.

Body fat percentage was down slightly from 26.8% to 26.2%.

August 2025 Stats

| Richard

August was back to normal after a busy July being was mainly spent in Bangkok so it was back into the Pain Cave with less running and more cycling. The reduction in running is entirely due to my knee being super-painful having aggravated something in it in Thailand, due to overuse.

So I also made an appointment with a consultant who has now recommended and MRI before deciding what course of treatment it will need, surgical or non-surgical.

And the end of August saw us saying goodbye to my Mum when we scattered her ashes into the sea at Cromer yesterday.

In terms of the cycling, we’ve been watching La Vuelta and I’ve been doing my usual  John Hallas’ Weekly Challenges and the FulGaz Vineyards and Valleys Tour 2025 that runs until the end of September, but which I finished today…

Anyway, here are August’s stats:

August 2025 Statistics

August 2025 Statistics

Activities: 33 Distance: 516.11km Time: 22:30:12 Calories:  20,719

Turning to my weight, at the end of July I weighed 88.7kg and at the end of July I weighed 88.9kg, which is up by 0.2kg.

Body fat percentage was down from 26.3% to 25.7%.

November 2024 Stats

| Richard Morris

November 2024 was more work, work, work keeping me busy, plus a number of trips into London for work and pleasure (The Script and London Grammar) and Motorcycle Live at the NEC Birmingham, all of which somewhat disrupted my training schedule.

Over on FulGaz, I continued their Around the World in 80 Days challenge as well as doing some more of John Hallas’ Weekly Challenges and another Ironman Sprint Series ride. Plus I continued with yet more (painful) treadmill runs with JRNY as well.

Anyway, here are November’s stats:

November 2024 Statistics

November 2024 Statistics

Activities: 29 Distance: 406.37 km Time: 17:52:00 Calories:  17,145

Turning to my weight, at the end of October I weighed 86.7kg and at the end of November I weighed 85.9kg, which is down by -0.8kg.  Still eating too many sweets and dried pineapple of an evening with the cats!

August 2024 Stats

| Richard

August 2024 continued the holiday theme following my son, Jack’s wedding before heading off to Venice for a few days at the Hilton Molino Stucky and ending with a few days in Prague at probably the best hotel we’ve ever stayed at, the Mandarin Oriental.

Hitting the gym at these luxury hotels was difficult so we also went walkabout a lot – Alison is going to compete in 2025 in the Masters’ Bikini Class, so needs to bang in many thousands of steps every day along with her workouts.

So here are August’s stats:

August 2024 Stats

August 2024 Stats

Activities: 22 Distance: 288.87 km Time: 21:34:09 Calories:  14,161

Turning to my weight, at the end of July I weighed 84.7kg and at the end of August I weighed 85.4kg, which is up 0.7kg.

May 2024 Stats

| Richard

So, May 2024 was a continuation of FulGaz’s challenge over the course of the year, the FulGaz Ironman Sprint Series which I had started last month.

There was also a quick work trip to Madrid working long days, but with the chance of hitting our boutique hotel’s gym … which was utterly shite with only a prehistoric treadmill to use.  This had the potentially lethal feature of speeding up and slowing down randomly, coupled with a worn surface which made it like running on ice … and then there was the abrupt emergency full stop shortly after I’d started going full tilt. Nice…

So, here are May’s stats:

May 2024 Stats

May 2024 Stats

Activities: 33 Distance: 425.73 km Time: 19:32:24 Calories:  17,398

Turning to my weight, at the end of April I weighed 85.0kg and at the end of May I weighed 83.4kg, which is down 1.6kg.  Today, I’m down again to 83.2kg.

April 2024 Stats

| Richard

April 2024 was a continuation of March’s heavy workload, but there was also my birthday as well as a new challenge over the course of the year, the FulGaz Ironman Sprint Series which I signed up to. Looking at the stats, I did work out longer and harder, which is a good thing.

So, here are April’s stats:

April 2024 Stats

April 2024 Stats

Activities: 31 Distance: 505.79 km Time: 22:02:43 Calories:  20,205

Turning to my weight, at the end of March I was 84.3kg (the same as this morning, 1 May), and at the end of April I weighed 85.0kg, so up 0.7kg.  I’m not too concerned, given today I’m back at 84.3kg and my weight has been up and down like a whore’s drawers!

You can also see a new feature in the stats which is that a blood pressure reading has been taken. This is because our blood pressure monitors have only allowed to take manual readings which we can then manually add to Apple Health, but there’s no way to automatically import them into Connect. And then I got a promotional email from Garmin about their Index BPM Smart Blood Pressure Monitor and it was a no-brainer to get it ordered.