Today was one of those days. Even before I got on my bike for the ride from the ‘burbs to the Angel I felt slow and knackered, largely because I had spent a good 20 minutes writhing around sat on a tennis ball to relieve various muscle knots occasioned by chasing a seven-year-old nephew around a garden at the weekend – and muscle massage apparently releases magnesium into the blood stream, making the sufferer feel woozy.

Then I started riding – into a block headwind even more block than yesterday’s. I had to pedal to get down the hill from Rose Hill into Mitcham and progress on the flat was agonisingly slow. Whereas I generally keep an eye on traffic lights with a view to sprinting for the green if I think I can make it, one or two failed attempts this morning were enough to deter me from making any more.

The result of this, of course, was that I had to stop at many more sets of lights than usual, disproving to my satisfaction the idea that one encounters red lights at random and that they therefore have the same effect on journey time no matter what the speed of the rider.

So slow was my ride that I found myself feeling really dispirited about cycling, right up to the moment I pushed my Indy Fab Club Racer into the office and encountered young DA. He, too, had had a grovel of a ride into work and had encountered more than the usual share of red lights, which meant that he, too, was a bit cheesed off. At this news I immediately felt a lot better, my mood being further improved by the arrival of a RadioShack replica team Trek Madone 6 for my attention.  

Add in the prospect of a tailwind on the way home and, well, bring on the sunshine…