I have been spending the winter evenings riding my bike on a turbo trainer watching Downton Abbey. I bought the DVD’s on Amazon and copied them onto my iPad. Each episode is about an hour’s ride and because I am hooked up to my bike computer I can monitor my heart rate and the distance I cover as part of my training. I guess this is what living in the future is all about.

It would seem that in the Downton era people had much simpler life’s. You either worked hard to maintain your place in the social pecking order or worked hard to better yourself.

The ambitious folk I meet in life today are similar, it’s all about climbing the corporate ladder, securing your financial future, getting your kids into the right school and making sure you drive the right car.

There is no doubt ambition plays an important role in driving and motivating people to perform and achieve.

This got me thinking about my current ambitions, or lack of them. The only real ambition I have ever had in my life was to live in Australia and meet a nice girl. Maybe having achieved this, I have been devoid of ambition.

Recently I have spent many an hour spinning the pedals thinking about what my current ambitions could be. By about the middle of Series 2 the best I could come up with is that I want to own a Cervelo R3 racing bike. If I really push it then I want the top of the range bits and pieces to go on it as well.

I am not sure if I should be thoroughly impressed that I am so content with my life that this is the best I can do. Maybe if I could get as excited about my business or my financial future as I am about a carbon fiber racing bike, then who knows what I might be able to achieve.

Then whilst watching the Christmas Special I started to think, what happens when I get the bike? Will that be as good as it gets?

Fortunately the Tour de France has come along to fuel my ambitions further. Ambition alone cannot mask the sad truth that I have taken up cycling too late to make the Pro Peloton. But there is nothing to stop me riding on the same roads, so my new ambition is to buy a new Cervelo R3 and ride the Alpine stages of the 2013 Tour De France.

Now that is something to genuinely get excited about. I see it as a significant milestone in my mid-life crises. An activity that allows me to justify spending excessive amounts of cash on a totally self indulgent, some may say, pointless task.

I have told the family they are more than welcome, providing they can ride up Alpe d’Huez on their own. I also believe I have found justification for the SRAM Red groupset on my new bike.

On the turbo trainer dreaming of Alpine passes, carbon fiber bikes and Lady Mary