Jason Spice believes Bristol Rugby face one of their biggest challenges of the season so far when they resume their Championship campaign at Coventry on Saturday.

The leaders will not have played for 22 days by the time they run out at Butts Park Arena, following consecutive postponements against Moseley and Doncaster.

And skipper Spice, whose side are aiming to record a ninth successive league win, says picking up where they left off before the enforced break will not be straightforward.

"We have got to the stage now where we need to play – and I am sure the first 10 minutes on Saturday will be a bit of a shock to the system," said the scrum-half.

"Everyone is over the break now and we have maybe lost a bit of touch with where our momentum was going . But at the same time we've got quite a few guys coming back from injury so hopefully our squad is stronger.

"It's been a little like a mini pre-season with some of the training we've been doing – and I guess we'll find out on Saturday how much this break has affected us.

"I had a few weeks off a while back and the first game back was a bit of a struggle. When you've got a whole team feeling the same, you can get tipped up, so we know this will be a big test of our resolve."

And Spice feels the key to Bristol avoiding being on the wrong end of a shock result at the home of the 11th-placed side is to perform the basic aspects of their game well.

"The key for us this weekend is keeping it simple," he said.

"The biggest hurdle we had at the start of the season was getting individual guys to prepare the right way and have the right attitude for every game – but I'm confident we've got that right now.

"So then it becomes about making sure we play the game as basically as possible and as accurately as possible. We have to accept that things are probably not going to go completely to plan, particularly in the first quarter of the game, so we need to be patient.

"We are looking at using this game to kick-start things again after that break – and we are going to try to maintain some of the things we were doing well before the postponements."

With Bristol out of action last weekend, Exeter were able to cut their lead at the top of the Championship back to four points.

But Spice can sense a determination within the Bristol ranks to resume on Saturday what had appeared to be a seemingly unstoppable promotion charge before the recent poor weather.

"One thing this break has done has made sure everyone is really keen, which is not always the case at this time of year when guys have been playing week in, week out since August," said Spice.

"But everyone here has had a rest now and Saturday is the first chance for the guys to prove to each other that we have still got what it takes and are still on the right path."