12 Hour - good training for a 10TT?

After a couple of days recovery from the 12 hour I did the club 10 last night.

I set a ride goal of filling in some of the gaps on my 2008 v 2007 power profile. (I still remember the first time I saw WKO at "Flammerouge" Tony's March last year. One the most powerfull images I got was the ability to compare years in terms of performance. In the graphic above 2008 is the solid line, 2007 the dotted. Over most of the chart the solid line is above the dotted showing how I have improved this year).

Target was 5-6 minute power so I set out to ride the first km at around 300W then put the hammer down and try to keep above 360W.

Turned up on time but a bit late so started down the field. Route was my favourite, H10/3 west of Newbury down A4 to Hungerford and back. Weather was typical August, occasional drizzle and a bit windy. Having done without music for 12 hours last weekend I decided I could do without it for 10 miles. (Quite enjoyed it as bike currently running smooth as silk.)

All went very well. I achieved my training goal and recorded season best power from 5-9 minutes and all time best 5 mins of 359W.

But ride went even better than that. I knew I was going well as speedo was mostly over 40kph, even on return let when I eased off a bit. As ride went on I made a conscious effort to keep it above 40 and managed to hold enough back to finish strong.

Ended up mullahing my PB, knocking 25secs off it with 23.45.

Strangely watts for the ride (321W/325NW) were not any different from slower rides and pacing was opposite to "ideal" with hard first half and "easy" second (not due to wind which was more against on return).

I put improvement down to a combination of factors

- As result of 12 found a comfortable aero position (biggest single factor I reckon)

- Not listening to music I was more aware of breathing

- Seeing speed displayed (previously set to cadence) acted as a motivator

- Being towards the end of rider list I expected to get caught, which had never yet happened. Did not consciously try to avoid this but think must have acted as a spur.

Whatever the reason left me pretty happy.

One final strange thing is HR. It levelled out at 172, which is well short of the 177 that I have done in the past (though more 2007 than 2008).

12 hours - the counting

After the ride the analysis:

Power/Speed:

WKO file for the 12 hour time trial is above (I forgot to take my HR strap so no HR).

Shows the story of the ride pretty well. I was planning to ride at around 210W or so. In first 4 hours I overdid it a bit, partly due to enjoying myself but mainly because I could not see display due to rain!

As weather brightened and I started the B loops the average speed started to drop though power still around the 210W mark average. Both speed and power took a hit between 6 and 7 hours into the ride during the 30 minute transfer upwind between the B and C loops. This was the low point of the ride and first C loop was pretty poor as well. Only averaged 173W/185NW for these sections, just 30.3kph. Remaining 4 C loops were 1.5kph faster but power still only averaged 178W/186NW. Finishing section was hard going, just 166W/180NW and a slow 30.5kph (though not helped by need to slow down 2xper lap to get water).

Food:

I started off with 4 bottles of PSP + 6000 cals of food (mix of suger sweets, breadsticks, cereal bars, sweet chestnuts and sandwiches). Rain messed food up and I forgot (doh!) I had some cereal bars in my jersey pocket under my gilet. I reckon I ate about 60% of the food so say 3600 cals or so. This probably was not quite enough and I certainly needed to drink more as the sun came out.

Doing unsupported:

It was a good decision not to follow original plan of Mr M Jnr coming along. Route meant it would have been difficult to work out where he could have stopped and it would not have been much help. However mobile (i.e. with car) support would have been a great help. The route was a bit hillier than I expected and I suffered a bit from all the stuff I had to carry. Also it would have helped to have dry food rather than wet mush. Biggest needs though were

-more sports drink (the stops only supplied water, if you kept moving you only got 1/4 bottle. If you stopped it took an age to fill up)

- moral support. My spirits dropped a bit during the B and C loops and I could have done with a familiar face. I could also have done with someone to do the sums for me in terms of pacing. Due to my detour and the fact that my powertap does not record time stopped I was not sure how far ahead/behind the pace I was.

The next time?

Any challenge that really pushes you is a funny old thing. At the time it cannot be over quick enough but soon after you feel like trying again. This is definitely the case for this event. With hindsight I regret not pushing a bit harder and at least got past the 247.1 mile club record.

So I will give the event another go next year, choosing a race more in advance to be sure of getting something that is both a fast course and makes support straight forward.

I will also use aerobars (and other TT gear) next time. I did not want to do this for my first attempt as I did not want to feel that, if I broke the record, it was just because of my equipment.

My ride on Sunday pretty much settled this score. Had I not taken a wrong turn and if the wind had been just a bit less strong I would have taken the record and so have no qualms that my next attempt should try to set the bar as high as possible.

12 hours of wind rain and some pain...

Well its over. Did my first 12 hour time trial on Sunday and, not surprisingly I guess, it was probably the hardest days cycling of my life.

Limitations on dates meant the event I took part in also happened to be the National Championship. So it was quite a large affair with over 100 riders taking part. The course was around and about Cambridge/Newmarket and consisted of 4 sections
A - Up and down the A11 dual carriage way a couple of times (around 85 miles)
B+C 2 different loops of around 13 miles, each ridden a number of times (in my case 4 times round B and 5 times round C)
Finish: A final loop of near 14 miles that you ride until your time is up (I got round 2 and a bit times)

Having originally planned to rope in Mr M Junior I eventually decided it would be easier to do self supporting as it was not obvious where Mr M J could wait given the various loops. I stayed nearby at on the "Genome Campus", a strange mix of Regency manor house and cutting edge research institute.

12 hours of riding means an early start and I got up at 4.15. On going outside I found, to my gloom, that it was drizzling. Found the start and got numbers, also noticed warning specifically banning use of MP3s.

I loaded food and drink onto bike. Plan was to take all food with me, some on tri-bags on crossbar, reaminder hanging off rear. I started with 4 full bottles, planning to fill up at stops.

Start facilities were nice but only had one poo loo, not really enough given number of competitors. Time was pressing and so had to make use of womens facilities (fortunately was not spotted...)

Only just made it to start in time, still drizzling. Set of and went all of 250m before one of my bottles dropped off the back of my bike. Sorted quickly and set off again.

Ahead of time I thought the first A section would be the worst as it was up and down a long stretch of dual carriageway. However this turned out not to be the case and this was the bit I enjoyed most. The road surface was good and I made good time. This was despite the drizzle turning into occasional downpours. Unfortunately during one of these I managed to get lost and went up the wrong bit of road. Realised after a mile or so and had to conduct a tricky u-turn that including manhandling bike over crash barrier. Still one advantage of early start was that there was not much traffic...

At the end of the A section, despite being soaked, my sprits were high. After 4 hours I had covered over 140km so a healthy average over 35kph. We then moved on to the B course and that coincided with good and bad news on the weather front:
Good news - the rain stopped
Bad news - the wind picked up. It had already been blowing but now this developed into a strong wind.

The B loop was not really flat, more rolling and it had some sections that combined uphill with upwind that sapped the legs and damaged my morale. On the second loop I decided to stop. I rummaged through my food bag and found the rain had seeped in and turned some of my food to mush. Still I scoffed a chicken sarnie and restarted. Though not with much joy, I could see my average speeed falling and started to get a bit down. Not soon enough I was waved off the B loop and onto the C.

This transfer was the low spot of the ride. It was 15km, mostly down a dual carriage way, all the way into wind. It was very hard work and I hated it. Eventually we came to loop C where the sun was out and there were lots of spectators. I even heard someone cry "come on Martin" which confused me a bit. This loop was more enjoyable than B being a mix of slow into wind and fast wind behind. I was running very low on water by this time so made some stops to fill up. This plus taking it easy on the downwind stretch meant my average speed continued to fall and hopes of beating the club record started to dwindle.

They were pretty much gone by the time I was waved onto the finishing course but I soldiered on, aiming to at least hit 240miles. Eventually I was flagged down and told I could stop. Luckily this was right next to the control so I only had a short ride back.

Results took a while to come through but when mine came up I was happy to find I had managed 241.6 miles. Just 5.5 miles short of the club record, even less as the extra couple of miles I did as a detour obviously did not count.

During wait for results the mystery of the "come on Martin" yells of encouragement was cleared up. An ex Newburian was supporting one of the other riders. By coincidence he was the brother of the clubs junior record holder (the one that is longer than the senior one I was trying to break).

Result of the main competition was close, being won with 284.5 miles, just 0.65 miles from second place. Winner, Ian Cammish, is apparently 51, so doubly impressive and encouragement to keep training.

http://www.cyclingweekly.co.uk/news/Ian_Cammish_Wins_National_12Hour_Championship_article_265729.html

M & Ms big adventure

Not sure how many beers I had had over a Cornish meal with Mrs M but at some point or other, somehow or other we came up with a cunning plan for a joint challenge to keep us active and save us from premature senescence.

No matter how good Mrs M becomes on 3 wheels its unlikely she will be joining me going up (and much less likely down) any Alps

However she is a good walker and talking about this and what to do when we both have more time on our hands (as birds fly nests and we lay down tools) somehow we both hit on the idea of doing a long walk.

Its much better if any journey has a purpose (e.g. as my original plan to ride the tour) and Mrs M has always wanted to visit Iona, a (very) small island of another (slightly bigger) island off the north west coast of Scotland.

http://www.scotland-inverness.co.uk/iona.htm

So we put 2 and 2 together and came up with the idea of walking there (or at least the bits that did not involve boats). Originally the intention was to walk from home but we thought that may be a bit much so revised plan to start from Durham.

Plan was hatched Friday night and we spent much of a dismal Saturday buying some books and doing some first planning. On first appearences we seem to have lucked out. A route from Durham can make use of some of the long distance footpath network and, judging from Rough Guide advice on distance per day, a rough and ready route marked out on my Truckers atlas seems to show us needing about 30 days or to make the journey. So a pretty big challenge but well doable....time will no doubt tell but this blog will have to broaden into Mr Ms Iona Adventure some time over the next year or so...

Many happy returns

Mrs M and I kept an appointment we made 25 years ago and spent last week having a second honeymoon at the same hotel in Newquay were we celebrated our first

http://www.trebarwith-hotel.co.uk/

Happily the hotel had not changed much and we had a great time, despite a typically British week of summer weather that saw more use of brollies than beach clothes.

Newquay was much the same as we left it 25 years ago though there seemed to be a lot more emphasis on surfing and no signs of things made from shells or naughty postcards.

Arriving Friday,
Saturday we looked around and spent some time enjoying the sun on the beach just below the hotel.
Sunday we got wet, joined the National Trust and Mrs M made her first ride on her new trike
Monday we went to the Eden project, which was very impressive
Tuesday I went for a long (wet and windy) ride up to Boscastle and Tintagel where I holidayed as a lad
Wednesday Mrs M got smelly therapy and I got a surfing lesson (and chaperoned her for lunch in a dressing gown)
Thursday we enjoyed some more sun on the beach
Friday was spent by me lazing on beach, Mrs M explored Newquay some more.
Saturday set a record for worst weather experienced on holiday so we passed time at hotel and having nice pots of tea/cakes and planning ahead......

We came back with "Trebarwith" a new addition to our bear family plus a new long term challenge....

12 hour TT - how much to eat?

I am still mulling over how much to eat on the 12 hour TT this weekend.

Interesting couple of articles here

http://www.saris.com/athletes/PermaLink,guid,6db7d592-53a6-4a3e-839b-93703a780ba8.aspx

and here

http://www.saris.com/CalorieCalculator.aspx


Based on latter I have done some sums:

Assuming I weigh 73kg on the day of the ride and that I am pretty fit I will have

73 * 25 cals of onboard glycogen so around 1900 cals.

Assuming I do my plan 220W per hour then I will be using something like

220 * 12 * 3600/1000 = 9500kj

I reckon I am pretty high efficency so cals = 9500 * 1.05 = 10000

The ride will be a bit harder than easy so say 60% of cals come from carb = 6000

So less 1900 from onboard so means I will need to eat around 4100 cals during the ride, about 340 cals per hour.

So that's my plan...interesting to see how it turns out

How to adjust front derailleur

This can be a bit tricky.

Guides to do this are here

//www.parktool.com/repair/readhowto.asp?id=75

and for Shimano here

http://techdocs.shimano.com/media/techdocs/content/cycle/SI/SI_5JD0A_001/SI_5JD0A_001_En_v1_m56577569830616200.pdf


Indebted to Grahamharpin off Bikeradar forum who knocked up this easy to follow checklist

• Lift the bike so the pedals will drive the wheel
• Slacken off the cable tension, this will move the mech to the smallest chainring.
• Shift rear to largest sprocket
• Adjust lower stop screw so there is about 1 mm clearance between chain and front mech cage.
• Tighten cable again as far as it will go
• Shift to biggest chainring & smallest rear sprocket
• Adjust upper stop screw until the change up to the big chainring is easy and does not overshoot.
• Set rear sprocket to middle of the cassette
• Change down to lowest chainwheel, if the cable was really tight it probably will not change down so gradually relaase cable tension until it changes cleanly.
• Check change over both (or 3) chainrings.

Tour of the Black Mountains - the climbs

The Tour of the Black Mountains has a great sportive route, in my opinion the best in the UK due to the extent and variety of its climbs, linked to great views and (generally) good roads.

The climbs start from the off with 20km up an ever increasing gradient to Gospel pass.

Then after a long descent you a false flat leads you south of Brecon where you head west up the Mynydd Illtud. After that you turn south and a succession of climbs hits you, long ones, steep ones and long steep ones (longest steepest coming on the 160km/100 mile mark).

Finally there are a couple of stings in the tail on the run in to home.

All in all I count 13 climbs in all, listed below. These add up to 2300m climbing. The ride is rarely flat though and you end up doing another 13oom of climbing to make a grand total for the route of 3600m over its 185km length.

(Distances in kilometres)

		Route	Route	Elevation		Distance	Metres	Gradient
Climb		Start	End	Start	End	of Climb	Climbed	Average	Max	Comments
1	Gospel Pass	1.3	20.6	121	540	19.3	419	2.2%	16.2%	U valley, the further you go the steeper it gets.
2	Mynydd Illtud	57.6	63.0	134	340	5.5	206	3.8%	10.1%	Old roman road. Look left to see Pen y Fan
3	Cerrig Duon	76.8	84.1	210	473	7.2	263	3.6%	11.5%	Turn south and head up
4	Bryn Rhudd	89.8	93.8	222	378	4.0	155	3.9%	7.9%	Main road drag on A4067
5	Chwyth	95.3	97.3	338	418	2.0	80	4.0%	6.6%	Short climb after leaving A4067
6	Bryn Melyn	103.7	105.6	257	446	1.9	188	10.0%	14.4%	Sheer climb with hairpins, don’t look up at the bottom, feed at top
7	Aber Illia	112.4	114.2	248	346	1.8	99	5.6%	18.9%	Unexpected wall round a corner in the woods.
8	Sychbant	118.0	122.6	244	400	4.6	156	3.4%	9.2%	Straight on through the cows
9	Ponsticill Reservoir	132.3	134.2	257	362	1.9	104	5.4%	9.2%	Climb out of Merthyr ending in forest
10	Creigiau	140.0	141.5	329	438	1.5	109	7.3%	16.1%	Steep towards end just before feed.
11	Blaen Onnau	158.4	162.7	121	441	4.3	320	7.4%	11.0%	A mini Alp at 100 miles, great descent
12	Crickhowell	170.6	172.0	96	210	1.4	114	8.1%	11.7%	Evil climb around the corner out of Crickhowell
13	Forest Coal Pit	176.7	179.2	162	249	2.5	87	3.4%	11.8%	Last climb of the day!

Gradient details of some of the climbs:

A new challenge - 12 hours on a bike

The Marmotte was my main target for this year and now I am suffering a bit from post goal gloom...what to do next.

Actually I already had an inkling from a conversation back on our club tour in France. Ours being the club it is the topic of time trialling had come up at some point or other (not sure why) including 12 hours. This are rarities and our senior mens club record (247 miles) is a bit special for a couple of reasons: it was set back in 1977 (not quite as old as the woman's which dates back to 1964!) and the record for a junior is actually more (255 miles).

Struck me that the 247 miles does not seem so far if you think of it as just being a bit more than 20mph. The problem is the 12 hours bit. However have done day long rides before and reckon I might be able to cope with doing 12 hours non-stop.

Only one way to find out so I have entered an event on 17th August. Just happens to be the National Championships so will be interesting.

Got some good advice that will need a helper to feed and encourage me so I have roped in Master Miff to come along as well..

Marmotte Guide

Last post on the Marmotte.

Had some time on my hands on the journey back to France so wrote up a guide to the Marmotte based on experiences there.

Put link for it in Wiki under article here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Marmotte

Direct link to article here: http://www.keepandshare.com/doc/view.php?id=693883&da=y

(Any changes/comments feel free to email me or add some stuff into Wiki...)

Marmotte - Compared to the best

Following on from last post there another comparison to be made is with that of Andrew Bye, a top British road racer who came in 9th. http://andrewbye.blogspot.com/

Table below shows how we compared on the various sections of the event. It's possible to add a couple of columns to each set of stats to look at power/weight and power as a % of FTP (Andrew did a MAP in January with a result of 457 which gives FTP of 343 (assuming 75% of MAP). My FTP (as per 25TT) is 305 (BTW my most recent MAP was 408 = 306 @ 75% ) 

		Me 2008		71	kg			Andrew Bye		74	kg
Section	Distance	Time	Work	Power	Npwr	Npwr/kg	Power %	Time	Work	Power	Npwr	Npwr/kg	Power %
Start to Glandon base	13	0:23	230	152	198	2.7	65	0:23	311	222	273	3.8	80
Glandon Climb	23	1:23	1262	254	268	3.8	87	1:04	1281	331	355	5.0	104
Glandon Descent	42	1:09	572	137	201	2.8	66	0:24	203	137	177	2.5	52
Glandon base to Telegraphe								0:36	606	277	293	4.1	85
Telegraphe	12	0:50	763	250	254	3.6	83	0:40	821	335	338	4.8	99
Tel descent to Gal base	5	0:07	29	74	119	1.7	39	0:06	239	171	239	3.4	70
Galibier	18	1:24	1112	224	229	3.2	75	1:06	1224	306	309	4.4	90
Gal descent to ADH base	48	1:08	396	101	170	2.4	56	1:02	694	185	224	3.2	65
Alpe D'Huez	13	1:10	934	222	229	3.2	75	0:54	1019	313	318	4.5	93
	175	7:34	5298	195	230	3.2	75	6:19	6398	273	306	4.3	89

The statistics from Andrew Bye make impressive reading especially the absolute power on the climbs. (The first climb seems to have been done at over FTP which probably means my guess of FTP based on a January MAP is low.)

The biggest lesson for me, I think, lies in the power % column. Even if I have underestimated his FTP it looks as if Andrew rode the event at a much higher relative intensity than I did. His climbs were all over 90% and is overall ride was at 89%.

My figures seem a bit timid by comparision, after the Glandon (87%) I rode the remaining climbs at a more conservative 80>75%, with my overall effort for the ride being just 75%.

I will try to take some lessons from this:

• I am too scared of pain. Partly I am a coward, but this I think is also because I came at cycling through doing long solo tour when each day needed to be judged because there was always another (often harder) day to come. So I am more used to pacing myself to finish rather than finish fast.
• Power meters are great for training and pacing but I think I am now paying a little too much attention to mine. I felt great on the climb of the Glandon but got worried because I was over schedule and to some extent I think I made myself take it easy on the last climbs for fear of blowing up.

Coming up this weekend I will be doing another sportive (the "Legbreaker") which I entered just to get the opportunity to see a new bit of the country. I will try an experiment and tape over the displays on my Powertap and Etrex and just ride on feel. There are some tough hills on the ride and I will try to push myself up to and over my pain threshold on these. Should prove interesting...

Marmotte and Power Revisited

A while back, when Marmotte was still in the planning stage I put out this post:

http://mr-miff-on-tour.blogspot.com/2008/02/marmotte-and-power.html

Having now done the event its time to revisit it.

As a result of a combination of events (cockup-did not reset powertap and planned-did not want pressure of time to make me take risks on descents) I did the Marmotte without actually having any track of time I was taking. Instead I just focussed on aiming to do all the climbs at around 260W and see what happened.

The result was a mixture of no surprise and big surprise.

No surprise was that I overcooked the first climb and did 268NW, doing over 280NW for the first part of this. So later climbs came in at 254NW, 229NW, 229NW.

Big surprise was that I finished in 7:34 so pretty much dead on target of 7:30.

Overall very pleased with result, both in terms of time taken and use of power to train/pace. If I do the event again (and probably will) I think I have enough of an insight to do better.

Table below shows my stats for the ride compared to those I got from the year before.

		Rider 1 2007				Me 2008
Section	Distance	Time	Work	Power	Npwr	Time	Work	Power	Npwr
Start to Glandon base	13	0:21	260	199	235	0:23	230	152	198
Glandon Climb	23	1:21	1193	245	258	1:23	1262	254	268
Glandon Descent	42	1:05	469	120	184	1:09	572	137	201
Telegraphe	12	0:48	732	251	252	0:50	763	250	254
Tel descent to Gal base	5	0:07	43	100	141	0:07	29	74	119
Galibier	18	1:14	1077	241	243	1:24	1112	224	229
Gal descent to ADH base	48	1:06	352	88	152	1:08	396	101	170
Alpe D'Huez	13	0:58	928	263	267	1:10	934	222	229
	175	7:04	5054	199	235	7:34	5298	195	230

There was a difference of 30 minutes in the finish times and most of this is accounted for by the last 2 climbs where my power dropped off while those from the 2007 ride show great pacing to allow a final sub hour climb of the Alpe.

One interesting thing is how even when I put more power into a climb (as on Glandon) this did not translate into me climbing it quicker. Think this is for a couple of reasons.

• Experience: the 2007 stats show the benefit of 4 years experience riding the Marmotte. The better you know a climb the better you can pace it in order to turn power into climbing speed. The Glandon for example includes a couple of short descents and if you execute these well you can gain quite a bit of time for not much effort.


• Weight: I weighed a bit more than the 70kg I had hoped, due to a surfeit of great food. Also I carried more food than I ended up eating + 2kg of sports drink, due to worries about feed stops. Actually found (if you start in early group/ride fast) plenty of food/drink and if doing again would carry less

Final interesting thing is how much extra power I needed on the descents/rides to base of Telegraph/ADH, yet still lost time. This is just a matter of luck. In both cases I was in small groups out of which only a handful of us seemed interested in doing any work. I think this was in part because I started well back within the first 2000 group to go off. Up the Glandon I moved quickly through the field but all the fastest people were already over the top by the time I hit it. If (most likely when) I do the event again I will get up earlier to ensure a place at the front of the group and may also risk going even harder up the Glandon, so as to ensure on the next section I have some fast company to work with.

SUS08

As mentioned did the Southern Uplands Sportive last weekend. Couple of things were especially good about the event:

• The final climb up to Lowther Hill, the highest road in Scotland at 725m. This is a private road that leads to a golf ball radar station used for military/air traffic control. So we only got the chance to ride it because of the event. It was tough going with some very steep sections but the view from the top made it all worth while (see photo above)
• B&B at Allershaw House nearby http://www.allershawhouse.co.uk/ This is a very friendly farm B&B standing all alone on a hill overlooking the moors. What makes the place especially special is that they breed and rear rare breed pigs. This means you get some of the best bacon and pork you have ever tasted. This meant I could not forgo a full Scottish breakfast (including black pud and haggis) on the day of the event, not necessarily the best pre ride nutrition but what the hell...

Blog Guilt

Just back from holidays and to find an email from Tony "Flamme Rouge" pointing others here...

Only problem with going away is that makes keeping blog up to date a bit tricky and I haven't posted for a while here and now guilty for not doing so...

In a nutshell what's happened over last few weeks

Went to France and rode first ever French sportives in the "Trophee D'Oisans" which consists of 2 full 175km sportives: the Vaujany and the Marmotte in on 2 successive weekends + a mise en bouche for the Marmotte of les Grandes Rousses (up Alpe d'Huez, down then up to Vaujany, a mere 6km@10%). Finally you can grimpe the alpe on the Sunday morning after the Marmotte has finished.

Had a thoroughly good time, spent enjoying the hospitality of the King of the Mountains team, Helyn and Guy. All the events went well, Vaujany done in 7:10 despite a puncture, Grandes Rousse in just over 2 hours including a 58" climbe of the Alple (to the top 300m short of tour finish) 7:34 in the Marmotte and 1:03 in the Grimpe (last being very much a case of a sore head on a sore body after much post Marmotte celebrations.)

Marmotte was a real surprise as pretty much dead on target time of 7:30 made all the more suprising by fact that during the event I did not have any time measure, just power.

Returned last Monday and since them done first ever cycling in Scotland on great SUS08 event, that made 3rd mountain finish in 3 weeks, to Lowther hill. Not quite as high as ADH but definitely steeper in parts.

May write more about all above shortly, but right now thinking ahead to last 2 sportives (Legbreaker and Tour of the Black Mountains.) Then thinking about doing a 12 TT.

Strength Training

I started cycling to lose weight and get fit. When I started to get a bit more serious and thought about doing the TDF I got some professional keep fit advice from a personal coach who gave me a couple of months training.

This was not cycling specific but general stuff, using free weights and a lot of core workouts.

I was very glad I did this. The core workouts certainly help with the cycling and the general weights work helps, I think, keep you sharp. Also while I want to be a good cyclist, not sure I want the body of one. Finally I think having a bit of upper body strength helps out when you come off.

So I have kept on with the weights and do them year round. I follow the Joe Friel guide of using winter to build max strength, then during the season just aim to maintain with a session or so a week. Latter is because of popular wisdom that aging (or as the US more politely refers to us, "masters") athletes need to do year round strength work. Interestingly though when reading the Robert Millar biog it mentioned he did weights during his build phase and recent interview with David Millar coach said they had learned weights were important part of training schedule.

FWIW and as a reminder to me when I am old and feeble here is my typical strength maintenance (SM) drill. It takes an hour or so to do, with 30s-2min rest between each set, spent setting up next exercise and stretching

SM workout
Core
2 x 90s Plank
2 x 45s Crunch+4kg
2 x 45s Altknees
2 x 45s Backcycle

Upper Body Do here as warm up prior to step ups. (+ figures are weight of bar)
2x202.6@20+2.6kg Bent Row
2x12@20+2.6kg Back Pull

Quads This is only cycling specific. Its also the hardest single exercise. Do single let step ups as no spotter so squats not safe. Also think its now recognised as being better quad drill. Load is 85% of body weight which is close to 90% max Friel recommends so will not up load until next winter, just up number of reps bit by bit.

2 x 8@50+9.6kg Single Leg Step Up

Calves
2x30@50+9.6kg Calf Extensions

Arms (biceps just for show but triceps and lateral raise good for standing climbs)
2 x 9@5.5+1.7kg Lateral Raise *
2 x 20@5.5+1.7kg Triceps Curl
2 x 15@9.5+1.7kg Biceps Curl *
2 x 2mins Single Leg Balance *

* On Pilates cushion: makes the dumb-bell sessions more of a whole body exercise.

Dragon 2008

(photo copyright phil o'connor, photo bought but not arrived yet)

Did second Dragon ride last Sunday. No rooms near to the event, so I had decided to drive down in the morning. Mrs M convinced me to do otherwise so ended up at a farm near Merthyr Tydfll, about 40 miles from event.

Turned out to be good choice, a: because I ended up with a whole house to myself and got some provisions for breakfast along with friendly welcome and b: because massive queues for the event. Had I driven up in the morning think it would have turned into a very long day.

Got sorted out in double quick time and headed for start. First tryout for new Zipp 303 front wheel (back still on the way). Very smooth, very nice. Met fellow Newburyer at start but no sign of others so we joined the (very) long queue and set off.

Weather perfect, bright but not sunny and no sign of threatened (by crap BBC forecast) rain. Cycled with fellow clubby unti traffic light which split us up. First climb shortly after and I got into serious mode.

Plan was to ride all climbs at or above threshold, taking rest of run as it comes.
9 climbs in all and pretty much managed to hit goal. First 2 where quite big, 4.6 and 6.2k and did each over 300W. Next 3 were a bit difficult to pace as had descents as well as climbs did in a range of 260-280W. Next couple over 300W again. Final couple I took a bit easier at 240 and 260W as by then riding with group.

Met couple of fellow clubbies on the way and ended up haring to line. Final ride time was 5:47, again over 30kph average which again wasnt bad as not really going for speed.

Took time at finish then headed home. Great day, nice climbs, great views, fast descents and good weather.

Sportives/Tours Index

This post is intended to be an index of info re my sportives/tours so I can find in one place and my be of interest to others who did/planning to do same routes. If in latter category and come across this page feel free to ask any questions re any of the rides via comments...

Links are to WKO files hosted on Dino. Some more recent rides also have GPX tracklogs and and accompanying XLS spreadsheet which shows stuff WKO doesnt show (if you have a Powertap) like elevation profile, gradients, moving average speed and cumulative climbing stats. Some of the older rides have JPG elevation profile, gradients via HAC.

(Obviously will need WKO to view WKO files. WKO/GPX/JPG files are small. Some of the Excel files are around 5MB since contain all tracklog data + calculations/charts.

Sportives

2007

Tour of Wessex Day 1 TOW_Day1_WKO
Tour of Wessex Day 2 No data: terrible weather so did on winter bike.
Tour of Wessex Day 3 TOW_Day3__WKO

Highclere (June) Highclere_2007_WKO
Dragon Dragon_2007_WKO
Roses Round RosesRound_2007_WKO
Tour of the Black Mountains TOBM_2007_WKO

2008

Tour of Ireland Day 1 TOI_Day1_2008_WKO
Tour of Ireland Day 2 TOI_Day2_2008_WKO
Tour of Ireland Day 3 TOI_Day3_2008_WKO
Tour of Ireland Day 4 TOI_Day4_2008_WKO

Tour of Wessex Day 1 TOW_Day1_2008_WKO
Tour of Wessex Day 2 TOW_Day2_2008_WKO
Tour of Wessex Day 3 TOW_Day3_2008_WKO

Highclere Highclere_2008_WKO/ Highclere_2008GPX_XLS/ Highclere_2008_GPX

Dragon Dragon_2008_WKO/ Dragon_2008gpx_XLS/ Dragon2008.GPX

Tours

(Two files for some days, pre and post lunch)

Raid Dolomite Day 1 DolomiteDay1_2007_WKO/ DolomiteDay1_postlunch_2007_WKO
Raid Dolomite Day 2 DolomiteDay2_2007_WKO/ DolomiteDay2Postlunch_2007_WKO
Raid Dolomite Day 3 DolomiteDay3_2007_WKO
Raid Dolomite Day 4 DolomiteDay4_2007_WKO/ DolomiteDay4_Postlunch_2007_WKO
Raid Dolomite Day 5 DolomiteDay5_2007_WKO
Raid Dolomite Day 6 DolomiteDay6_2007_WKO/ DolomiteDay6_postlunch_2007_WKO
Raid Dolomite Day 7 DolomiteDay7_2007_WKO
Raid Dolomite Day 8 DolomiteDay8_2007_WKO
Raid Dolomite Day 9 RaidDolomiteDay9_2007.WKO
Raid Dolomite Day 10 DolomiteDay10_2007_WKO
Raid Dolomite Day 11 DolomiteDay11_2007_WKO

Raid Pyreneen Day 1 Pyreneen_Day1_2007_WKO
Raid Pyreneen Day 2 Pyreneen_Day2_2007_WKO
Raid Pyreneen Day 3 Pyreneen_Day3_postlunch_2007_WKO
Raid Pyreneen Day 4 Pyreneen_Day4_2007_WKO
Raid Pyreneen Day 5 Pyreneen_Day5_2007_WKO

FTP/Weight

2007 285W/73kg
2008 305W/70kg

Hermitage Hilly

Following trip to Coventry, managed to come back in time for TT in the evening. New course for me, north of Newbury, starting from just outside Hermitage.

Nice evening, threat of showers but they never came. Roadworks on route meant that start was moved to just after traffic light (with finish just before). So course about 100m shorter than official.

Planned to use session as a VO2 workout, going at 340 or so uphill.

Felt great, really sharp and had very enjoyable ride. Hit target in terms of power, finding much easier/better to pedal fast. As a result average cadence was over 80 with work efforts closer to 90.

Managed to get lost on course plus had to slow down hard on downhill junction when landrover ahead stopped. Did not do any real pacing other than trying on hills and end came as a shock. Still felt very fresh and took long road round back to finish doing 5km in level 3.

Despite this managed a time of 33:25 and finished 3/11, only 35s from 2nd. First was 30:01. I reckon the 2 delays on route took about 1:30 so I could have been a comfortable 2nd.

Ride info from Etrex.


WKO file, good to see how much of ride in upper powerband and above (VO2/Anaerobic range)

Mind of a 49 year old in body of an 18 year old

Little sad but daily habit I have got into since deciding to lose weight has been to weigh myself first thing in the morning, last thing in the evening.

To help with this got myself one of these Tanita scales, which comes with various gizmos to keep a geek happy:
http://www.tanita.co.uk/index.php?id=22&tx_f03showxtcommerceproducts_pi1[showUid]=5&cHash=ae110dfbd7

One of its features is something called "metabolic" age. This tells you how old it thinks your body is (using stuff like weight, fat%, bone density, days in the week, taking away the last number you thought of etc.)

Yesterday evening my fat% was an all time low** at 12.4%. I pressed the "Metabolic Age" button and my scales told me I had the body of an 18 year old...so time to dust off my old LPs, get out my flares and tanks tops once again miss the punk revolution.

** Geek time: Having used the scales for over 3 years I have found the fat % to be quite consistent and make a degree of sense. However it is sensitive to time of day and whether you have eaten/exercised in past few hours. I get the lowest measures in the evening of a rest day after eating a calorie balanced day (so cals in = or a bit more than cals burnt). On days when exercising fat % is usually a percent or two higher and morning measure is similarly a percent or two higher than evening.

Highclere 2008 Sportive

Highclere 2008 yesterday. Lovely sunny day (again, third year running for this event).

Had a great time. Objective was to ride over 30kph and make an effort on Hannington/White Hill just before finish.

Best part of ride was initial couple of hours, went hard up Woodhay, Coombe and Faccombe then formed a largish (15?) group and assisted in blast down the Test valley. Only about 5 of us took turns but it was enough to see an average of 34kph after 2 hours, not bad given the early climbs.

After 6okm or so the terrain started to get lumpy and group broke up. I ended up with a couple of others that I think had caught group from behind. Worked with them for a while but let them go just before control as already well ahead of target 30kph for ride. A few km past the control was joined by some other riders including some from Army (sportive was being used as a combined services event). We worked for quite a while then, coming to hill at 90km I led up a bit too fast for all but 3. They sprinted to top, but I did not join in as did not fancy busting a gut on second half of ride as at that point was still averaging over 33kph.

Next climb came at 100km and did this solo though shortly after joined by a couple of Pedalon riders who finished 2007 in the fastest time. I latched onto their wheel and was able to work with them for a while. However it was tough going and, while they were obviously pushing for a fast time, I was happy with days work. So I eased off and let them go.

This turned out bad for all of us. A few km on came a very quick descent and at the bottom I passed an ambulance tending to one of the Pedalon riders who had come to grief on a sharp corner covered in grit. I negotiated this OK but shortly after the ride started to head north and into a hot headwind and I really could have done with some company.

I eased up as not much fun riding alone into a wind and I knew I would hit my speed goal. I was sort of hoping I would be overtaken and eventually was though not, frustatingly until I had ridden for 60km solo and the final climbs were in sight. Still being in a group helped in raising tempo up Hannington and White Hills as planned.

Eased up again to enjoy the run home and glad I did when 10km sign came 5km late. Completed ride in 6:48 pretty much spot on my 30kph target.

When final results posted finished with 25th best time. Interestingly the first pair I had ridden with had best 2 times (6:20), second 3 had 3rd/4th times (6:35) and the Pedalon guys were quickest on the course up to point where they came to grief.



Some course info below (interestingly the total ascent was more than I thought it would be at 3000m spot on)



WKO file showed PBs in terms of speed/power for 6 hours. Also shows me taking it easier on second half of ride. Assuming it still happens I may target Highclere as an A event next year and, despite my reservations on sportives being treated as races, ride it to go as fast as possible and see where I end up.

Powertap back - return to HCC247 - new FTP

Banjo did a great job and got my Powertap working again. Also pointed out that my rear wheel is showing signs of wear with cracks at base of one of the spokes.

Decided to do a rerun of the 25TT. Conditions were pretty much the same and so was result in terms of time (1:01:35) and pacing, fast start, slow to turn and faster back.
















Key thing I was interested in was power for the hour and happy to see able to average 305W, comfortably above the 280W I managed same day last year. Getting above 300W was a target for this year and happy to be able to do it sooner rather than later.



















Little sad but one other thing that made me happy was that power combined with current weight nudged me up a category in the WKO Power Profile. I am now "Very Good" in terms of 60 minute power at 4.35W/kg. (Still pants at sprinting though..)

Not quite the hour

Did second 25TT of life (on anniversary of first) Wednesday night. Had goal of getting under an hour but sadly did not quite make it. No Powertap (since its axle sheared in half..) so had unfamiliar experience of looking at average speed and HR to judge pacing.

Got depressed when finding it hard after halfway and had slipped under pace approaching turn. Too late realised that we were riding into a headwind and by the time I had snapped myself out of doldrums had too much to do on return leg. Final time as 1:00:56, over 3 minutes better than last year but still tad frustrating.

Did not realise but I was riding in legendary company as John Woodburn was also taking part. He just managed to beat 60 minutes, not bad for someone past 70.

Stuck resultant time into watts calculator http://www.kreuzotter.de/english/espeed.htm
and interestingly it guesstimated power was 297W, so pretty much what I think FTP is now. Also reckoned I would do 57 mins or so if had tri-bike but will keep from straying down that route for time being at least.

Hoping Powertap will be back from Banjo soon and will try again....

Gradients/Average speeds from Memory Map GPX

Necessity being the mother of invention, in the absence of Powertap from TT last night I knocked up an Excel file that would take GPX output from Memory Map and give some info on ride.

Quite pleased with result as gives some info that both Powertap and Memorymap lack.

Top plot is elevation, second is gradient (something that frustratingly the Etrex does not display while 305s etc do).

Last plot is average speed over time which for last nights ride clearly shows my fast start, decline as head to turn then speeding up on way back.

Catching Up ---

Been a while since last proper post apart from boasting of hitting 11 stone again.

Very quickly:
- Did Tour of Ireland. Great fun, felt like a "real" rider being bussed to and from starts, staying at great hotels and having police escorts everywhere. Rode well and did well despite the occasional mechanical. Had a pretty bad fall on day 3 but picked self up and carried on riding.

- Also did Tour of Wessex: rode days 1/2 solo so as to be a better test, did well, only just missing golds due to mechanicals and terrible head winds. Final day weather appalling so stuck with group.

Training going well, 25TT tomorrow night and Highclere this weekend will be good tests. May have to do without Powertap as broke in half and in intensive care.

Yippee I'm a light me

Its been a while since the last blog entry. Quite a lot has happened, most notably Tour of Ireland which happened last weekend. Had a thoroughly good time there, despite mechanicals and a new, unwanted, PB in terms of fall severity.

However reason for this post is that...finally after 25 years of trying..I weighed myself this morning and had just snuck under 11stones for the first time in as long as I can remember.......so I will give myself a big pat on the back and have an extra bowl of cornflakes each day...

Ergomo vs Powertap comparison

I carried out a rough and ready turbo test to check Ergomo mounted on my fixed Langster vs Powertap on my Roubaix.

Protocol was pretty basic, I used my HR as a control and did 3 sets of 40 minutes each comprising:
A-Ramp up 100W-270W 10W per minute (so from rest through endurance to top of tempo zone)
B-Hold 270W 3 minutes (so to halfway through)
C-4 5 minute intervals at 260W/250W/240W/250W

Interval 1 was done on the Powertap, Interval 2 on Ergomo, Interval 3 on Powertap.

I chose this power range as I will mostly be using fixed for endurance/tempo riding so its the most important.

I reasoned that if the power was comparable the HR should be as well. During the intervals I kept the HR display off to make sure it did not influence me.

Results summarised in graph above. The first 2 intervals were remarkably similar, exactly the same in terms of power and HR was pretty much the same. Last Powertap interval was up a bit in terms of power and higher in terms of HR. Put the latter down to a bit of cardiac drift and the fact I started the interval 10 beats up on the first two.

Test could be improved and I could repeat with 2 Ergomo intervals and 1 Powertap. Nonetheless seems to show the two are pretty close.