It's killing me but..........

[Bigpikle]

Having the 205 as a key event might be a good focusing point, just to make sure I do enough volume in the run up to the summer. My other A goal is the Raid Alpine in early Sept for a week across the Alps, so although there are no days over 100 miles in that event, it does mean 6 days back to back of serious riding. Being fit enough to last 205 miles in June will be a very useful stepping stone to a good Raid as well. I know I could do it and it looks like I'll have enough time to train but I have really struggled to get solo rides of >3hrs done and much of my available time for long rides will be weekdays and hence solo. I need to develop the 'Felt' zone and get into the zone for long steady solo rides. I harbour a goal for a solo 100 so again need to build a plan to get these done - as spring draws closer it will be good to get out of the door early and spend the full morning riding at least once per week along with the club rides and FTP work.

Swampy - a season of 10's this year has taught me that I need to suffer. Our club circuit is a traffic free air field perimeter road so collapsing across the line unable to remember your own namelet alone talk, is a regular occurance....

 

[jsirabella]

Sounds like everyone here but me has a big event pretty much set for 2014. I think I better find or decide on a local one that I think I can pull off. I may do the Grand Fondo NYC again or I am thinking of going old skool which for me is a ride from NYC to Boston to do AnimeBoston this year or maybe NYC to Baltimore to do Otakon this year...hmmmm

-john

 

[swampy1970]

Originally Posted by Felt_Rider
bp, sounds like a nice challenge. I almost got roped into one of those from a cycling friend that wanted to do her first double century in 2013. It ended up falling apart as most of her training peeps had serious injuries or could not train consistently. I had my doubts for myself that I was ready for it. Like you said it helps to have a fairly good FTP and as swampy says you have to ride at a lower percentage of that FTP for an "an all day pace." Unfortunately my % puts me down low enough that I am not sure I could have made it to some of the time cutoff points that were in this particular event (goes through the Blue Ridge mountains). At your FTP or swampy's you guys would be fine to cruise along and make those cutoffs.

I can handle about 75% of FTP for my out and back 100 mile course solo if it is relatively flat, but usually I am still pretty well spent at the end of that 100. This same group did RAIN (Ride Across Indiana) a few years ago, which was a 160 and averaged 22 mph for the total and were at 25 mph in a working pace line group at the 100 mark, but the roads were dead flat and they had a substantial tailwind the whole time. Working in a good group (good rotation) I could reserve enough and move fast enough to hit the cutoffs.

Sounds fun though and since we generally work on FTP it is always something to keep in mind as the event gets closer. Unless there are limited entries that forces you to commit early.

Felt,

Part of the problem that most people have with long rides is beating the cut offs but it isn't always just due to riding too slow. Quite often you see people faffing around at rest stops when it'd probably serve them better to plan ahead and figure out what they need ahead of time. Do you need to stop at all the rest stops or just every other one? If you use Speedplay pedals then rest stops add another element of time hemorrhaging - cleat cleaning, especially if the ground is a little muddy. Just little things like emptying the bottles a mile or so before the rest stop as you ride, eating on the bike so you don't waste time eating when standing around and deciding what to eat next all help save a minute here and a minute there and over a dozen rest stops, well, you get the idea. It's almost as bad a the classic going to hard and really suffering at the end, mistake.

FTP is everything. Even RAAM riders rarely do over 6 hours, which means they put in about the same amount of time on Saturdays and Sundays as quite a lot of cycling folk. Sure there'll be times where they knock out big rides on a semi regular basis to get used to the effort and I remember in 2012 when I did a full brevet series and two double centuries (one of which was in the Sierra Nevada mountains) I certainly did feel better on the long rides towards the end than I had done in previous years. Had it not been for a silly mistake in bar placement and a wrist injury that followed, I'd probably would have romped around the 125 mile Death Ride in fairly short order. But it's a game of percentages and the higher the 1 and 2 hour power then the better that 70% figure will be. It'd probably be very time consuming to work off a lower FTP and bring up the percentage that you could sustain for the duration of a long event but if your FTP plateaus it might be time for a change anyway.

Long rides should be included if you have a 200 miler planned but not just to get used to the effort. Fatigue changes perception so you tend to forget to drink/feed and digestion isn't quite as seamless as it is in shorter events when you're fresher. What tastes good in a 4 hour ride may not taste good after 8 hours. Simple things like making drinks a little weaker and nibbling on something tasty rather than just relying on carbo drinks may be the key for you. Sometimes on long rides on very hot days things get very simple very quickly - what tastes good enough to drink enough of to stay hydrated and figure out the carbs/protein as you go along. I dig Hammer Perpetuem plain (I used to really like the orange flavor until one Alta Alpina I was yacking the stuff up and ended up with the 'aftersmell' of it in my nose) on cold to pretty hot days but when it's 90+ then it's time to switch to Heed mixed fairly weak with a ton of ice (if possible) and nibble on fruit and bread based snacks. The hotter it gets the weaker the mix unless ice is available and insulated water bottles are used. If it gets silly hot 100F+ then it's time to drop the effort a bit and maybe ride more aero with an unzipped shirt. You don't lose a ton of speed but you do become cooler. Then you run into other fun stuff. The slower pace means that by default you tend to not smash the pedals and consequently the nether regions receive a bit more pressure from the saddle which is compounded by often sitting up a little more on very long rides...

 

[Felt_Rider]

swampy, there is so much in your post that I can relate with and much of it I concentrated on in my own long solo training efforts last year and the some of 2012 as well. Prior to that most of my special event training had been with the same group of guys and gals before going to mainly solo training. It was nice to see the contrast between the two and find out the flaws in my and their style of training, which was very typical of recreational club cyclists. Now that I have the combination to analyze the rides with groups and solo using a power meter the flaws stand out even more.

For instance you made an impact statement several years ago in relation to doing the long course events, "free speed." It was a just a simple statement within a lot of good info just like this post of yours and yet it is so basic that it is hard to comprehend why more cyclist don't comprehend. My example is in 2012 when I was asked to lead my typical group on a 100 mile course. The day before the ride I prepared the email to the group with the route link for the GPS download to their Garmin so that if we split apart everyone would have the route. I had strategic store stops spaced out far enough for everyone's capability and then I warned that the temperature was supposed to be near 100 degrees (F) by lunch so we needed to roll out quickly at first daylight. I stated that my intention was to have a solid pace at the start to get as far north as quickly as possible so that we would not be as effected by the heat. No one disputed my email the night before, but the next morning there was a slight revolt by a few saying they needed some warm up miles.......ugh!!! So we rolled out and they were in this stupid 16 mph pace at less than 100 watts (I am the only one using a PM) and I could literally feel the heat of the day coming on and faster than the pace we were rolling. It was an effort nearly equal to sitting on the couch. We could have been at over 20 mph and still would have been under 200 watts, which is far below all of the group's capability. Even after they warmed up there were some of them leading the pace line at very low watts that I spent most of my time feathering my brakes and the day just kept getting hotter. There were so many opportunities to get that "free speed" (fast pace at low watts) during that morning and yet we missed most of the moments.

So can you imagine what happened next?

The temperature was near 100 and now we were on the way back quite a few were starting to get sick and were suffering from heat exhaustion more than fatigue. We were now having to stop often to help some of the team members and some of them were the ones that revolted on the starting pace were now wishing that hadn't goofed around and were literally saying, "you were right." Thankfully I was doing okay because of spending a lot of hours solo training in heat and was able to help those suffering. I was also very annoyed at the same time thinking that this should not have happened had they been willing to manage the effort better.

When I train solo I am constantly thinking of your statement, "free speed" at those times when you get to a long stretch (miles) with a downward tilting gradient and to have the watts up enough pedaling to raise the speed and get those miles ticked off quickly with less cost.

Anyway thought I would let you know of that statement you made a few years ago made a very good impact on my riding and training.

 

[jsirabella]

swampy and felt, long posts with lots of good reading, maybe this year I can relate if I put some time in doing those longer events. For myself I am really thinking I can make a go of it for a longer touring/ride with a hotel stay here and there. I will see what the cards hold.

Today I had to put in flooring to keep paying the bills in my indie lifestyle but before I got into that I decided to put in 90 minutes in the morning. While the ride was to keep the CTL at bay and keep my legs moving, one great thing happened. I guess the CT helped me to even out my pedal stroke while the lower end fluid cyclops I always felt I was pedaling too hard and low and behold once I really focused on making the up and down stroke a bit more even the trainer felt much smoother.

Lesson learned in the hope that a lesson was learned here....

On a side note, the weather here has just been awful on so many levels. It was cold, snowing and finally when it warms up we get huge rainfall...just can not win.

-js

 

[swampy1970]

Felt,

Glad that the "free speed" info years ago was useful. I wish I could say that on todays ride I could have taken advantage of the tailwind home on the return leg but I was smashed from the 30 miles in a bloc headwind that killed my legs that were still dead from yesterday. Rookie mistake, too hard, not enough food between rides and not enough sleep. I was just happy that there was a tailwind otherwise that last 35 miles would have taken an eternity.

I can't stand it when folks mess around for no reason whatsoever, so I just slowly ramp up the speed When folks are drafting, it's harder for them to notice the slight increase in effort than the gradually rising speed.

JS,

The only thing you need to worry about on the upstroke is not wasting your time trying to produce power. Do just enough to unweight the pedal and spend more time "smashing the f**k"TM out of the pedals on the down stroke.

 

[danfoz]

Swampy, I share your sentiment on the pedaling force. However as the gastrocs connect above the knee and along with the obvious extension of the foot's plantar surface work to flex that joint, the real benefit of working that upstroke is sexy looking calves for the beach... not a total waste of time

Meanwhile I hit the road today and with looming clouds decided against my weekly ride up 9W, instead going to my local park to do several laps. I usually hit the lap counter on the garmin500 but instead just focused on checking ride time looking to log about 2.5 hours. With my old man eyes in recent need of reading glasses I was focused mostly on the hour, not paying much attention to the minutes. After some time my legs were feeling like they had logged quite a bit more than the 1:30 the timer was showing. I had latched onto a small group forgetting about it and looking down at the unit again four laps later saw the timer was still showing 1:30... the bloody thing had frozen. My feeling of mild despondence did an immediate 180 to cackling laughter and a few hard taps got it going again. This ever happen to anyone else?

 

[Felt_Rider]

Dan, I've not had the Garmin freeze on me like that, but as a similar result had manually stopped the timer and then realized miles or minutes later that I forgot to start the timer again. On my Garmin 800 I use outside I have the alert set to remind me to start the timer again if there is movement, but the Garmin 500 that I use indoors doesn't alert because it doesn't sense (GPS) motion.

Last week in fact I was about 3 or 4 minutes into an L4 interval and looked down an the interval timer was still at zero. Because my legs were already burning I was quite annoyed with myself for not remembering to restart the timer.

On some outdoor rides in the past I have gone many miles only to look down and see the miles unchanged because I forgot to start. Argh!!

 

[jsirabella]

Hey df, has happen to me more than once. The worst was during an important ride for me when I was riding to Boston from NYC and noticed on the second day when I road into Boston, the batter died and it was an old unit so lost all its information. I almost fell to the floor. The amazing thing I have found over the years is how this is pretty much become my only form of reinforcement to keep going. There are times I have debated whether to ride or not cause I did not have my PT working. I came to the conclusion...sad on my part.

-js

 

[jcm01]

Originally Posted by Felt_Rider
Dan, I've not had the Garmin freeze on me like that, but as a similar result had manually stopped the timer and then realized miles or minutes later that I forgot to start the timer again. On my Garmin 800 I use outside I have the alert set to remind me to start the timer again if there is movement, but the Garmin 500 that I use indoors doesn't alert because it doesn't sense (GPS) motion.

I can relate! I do this a lot by mistake. Hate it. That is cool the 800 has that functionality. Sure wish the 500 did (which is what I use).

 

[Felt_Rider]

As Dave once said to me after my PM hub battery died in the middle of a big ride, "at least it was recorded in your legs."

Keeps it in good perspective

 

[jcm01]

Haha..very true! I like it!

 

[Bigpikle]

I'm with you guys on the forgetting to start the Garmin but most frustrating was finishing the Maratona dles Dolomites (the biggest ride of my life up to that point) and finding the damn Garmin hadn't recorded ANY of the power data from the entire ride I'd ridden the damn 9 mountain passes with my heavy old PT wheel and not got a thing from it.....

Trying to make the most of the slightly improved weather here right now. Its cold and a little icy first thing but some days working from home mean I can get out a little later. I've also stopped looking at the rollers and started riding them for a bit of L4 work and am feeling good and the numbers arent too bad after so long just 'riding around'. 2x20's @ 250-260w arent killing me yet so I'm encouraged. The next demon to overcome is not just staring at the TT bike on the turbo but getting on the damn thing and training more specifically for the racing. Maybe tomorrows forecast deluge will be just what I need - I'm just scared I'll be crying like a baby at 230w!

Also picked up a bargain set of Ultegra 6800 wheels in the sales. These are VERY nice wheels and are going to be my staple 'training wheels' once the roads are dry enough to leave the winter bike at home. They are 23mm wide rims so I'm keen to see what all the fuss is about and hopefully benefit from some additional comfort. I need to put 3000 miles on them this spring so hope there is some truth in the hype!

 

[jsirabella]

Have to ask a I just use my old PT and not the Garmin computer, is it that much better? Does it give you that many more functions?

We finally got two days of good weather here but ofcourse rain with it.

-john

 

[Felt_Rider]

Originally Posted by Bigpikle

Trying to make the most of the slightly improved weather here right now. Its cold and a little icy first thing but some days working from home mean I can get out a little later. I've also stopped looking at the rollers and started riding them for a bit of L4 work and am feeling good and the numbers arent too bad after so long just 'riding around'. 2x20's @ 250-260w arent killing me yet so I'm encouraged. The next demon to overcome is not just staring at the TT bike on the turbo but getting on the damn thing and training more specifically for the racing. Maybe tomorrows forecast deluge will be just what I need - I'm just scared I'll be crying like a baby at 230w!

Also picked up a bargain set of Ultegra 6800 wheels in the sales. These are VERY nice wheels and are going to be my staple 'training wheels' once the roads are dry enough to leave the winter bike at home. They are 23mm wide rims so I'm keen to see what all the fuss is about and hopefully benefit from some additional comfort. I need to put 3000 miles on them this spring so hope there is some truth in the hype!

I noticed the roller session last night. Nice work!!
I cannot seem to hold as smooth of power output when I am training on the eMotion rollers.

Did you get a Quarq last year?

As for the 23mm rims I kind of feel it and most of all I feel a bit more confident now on fast technical descents.

Originally Posted by jsirabella
Have to ask a I just use my old PT and not the Garmin computer, is it that much better? Does it give you that many more functions?

We finally got two days of good weather here but ofcourse rain with it.

-john

I thought about you yesterday reading this guy's blog and his experience with CT eating tires. He makes some comments and some pictures further down in his article.

http://ggtri.wordpress.com/stuff/wahoo-kickr-worth-the-upgrade-over-a-computrainer/

Same with us. It warmed up substantially, but it has continued to rain for two days. I have to train inside anyway due to my work schedule so it is not a big deal for now, but I certainly hope to get some dry weekends in the near future.

 

[jsirabella]

Originally Posted by Felt_Rider

I thought about you yesterday reading this guy's blog and his experience with CT eating tires. He makes some comments and some pictures further down in his article.

http://ggtri.wordpress.com/stuff/wahoo-kickr-worth-the-upgrade-over-a-computrainer/

Same with us. It warmed up substantially, but it has continued to rain for two days. I have to train inside anyway due to my work schedule so it is not a big deal for now, but I certainly hope to get some dry weekends in the near future.

The pictures look exactly like mine as far as eating tires but what really got to me was the latest issue which was my fault but I just do not have the time or energy to send it back to them and pay another 300 or more dollars to wait 2 weeks especially given my current budget situation. So as silly as it sounds I went with the cheaper CT fluid trainer and while not happy with it, it gets the job done and the tires are fine.

It is just very hard to get the watts you want plugged in but instead I deal with ranges now. Like today the watts will go from 190-200 through out the ride. The CT was great at simply upping and lowering the watts when you wanted. With the fluid a change of gear can work or a lower and upper of cadence can but some days like today my legs were better at >90 cadence but for me to get the watts I wanted and last as long as I wanted I really needed to do an 80-85 with higher resistance. So I did today 2 hours at 190 than a 3 x 20 @ 220 as planned This trainer is very good if you simply want to focus on lets say a 2 hour ride at pretty much the same wattage and that is what I am doing and it is kicking my butt right now.

I can not wait for better weather and getting out there especially now that I do not use the CT. By summer cash should be better and may think about the kickr.

-js

 

[danfoz]

Originally Posted by Bigpikle
Also picked up a bargain set of Ultegra 6800 wheels in the sales. These are VERY nice wheels and are going to be my staple 'training wheels' once the roads are dry enough to leave the winter bike at home. They are 23mm wide rims so I'm keen to see what all the fuss is about and hopefully benefit from some additional comfort. I need to put 3000 miles on them this spring so hope there is some truth in the hype!

Hi Bigpikle, I'm not 100% sure on the width of the 6800's but I think they may be closer to 21mm. I had a set of Zipp101's and while wider than the typical 19mm rim, didn't seem to offer as noticeable a difference as my 23mm HED's. Either way they look like a nice set of wheels.

 

[swampy1970]

Have to ask a I just use my old PT and not the Garmin computer, is it that much better?  Does it give you that many more functions? We finally got two days of good weather here but ofcourse rain with it. -john

I just got mine for the navigation and for the most part I just look at time of day, elapsed time and power. I don't really worry about how much TSS I racking up and so far I haven't synced it to my iphone and used it for weather reports (displayed on the garmin) or live tracker so the wife can follow my progress on the PC. After from the rather nice navigation ( I have the optional maps ) it's nice that the rides download into WKO very quickly... Between google earth and garmin connect and the edge 810 I've put together a few rides on roads that I've never been down before. street view on google earth is much easier than just going down the remote road and discovering the road turns into a dirt road from hell. My "main screen" shows elapsed time, power, speed, distance to next turn (which is useful on the recent very windy rides). It switches to the map screen just before each turn and then switches back again shortly afterwards. Some of the useful tidbits that have been handy are data fields for stuff like time of sunset - I always seem to cut it a little late on Sundays and distance remaining in ride, which only works if you're working off a preset course. If you're not into navigation and like just looking at time, power and speed then the little old yellow Cervo still gets the job done. It's what I still use indoors and I may still use it on very long events like the Alta Alpina where I know the route and like the "love you long time" battery life of the Cervo compared to the garmin.

 

[jsirabella]

Originally Posted by swampy1970


I just got mine for the navigation and for the most part I just look at time of day, elapsed time and power. I don't really worry about how much TSS I racking up and so far I haven't synced it to my iphone and used it for weather reports (displayed on the garmin) or live tracker so the wife can follow my progress on the PC.

After from the rather nice navigation ( I have the optional maps ) it's nice that the rides download into WKO very quickly...

Between google earth and garmin connect and the edge 810 I've put together a few rides on roads that I've never been down before. street view on google earth is much easier than just going down the remote road and discovering the road turns into a dirt road from hell. My "main screen" shows elapsed time, power, speed, distance to next turn (which is useful on the recent very windy rides). It switches to the map screen just before each turn and then switches back again shortly afterwards.

Some of the useful tidbits that have been handy are data fields for stuff like time of sunset - I always seem to cut it a little late on Sundays and distance remaining in ride, which only works if you're working off a preset course.

If you're not into navigation and like just looking at time, power and speed then the little old yellow Cervo still gets the job done. It's what I still use indoors and I may still use it on very long events like the Alta Alpina where I know the route and like the "love you long time" battery life of the Cervo compared to the garmin.

Holy Cow so when will they build in the feature where it will start your coffee pot to be ready before you ride...lawl. You would think with my background I would love all the techie but while it is quite enticing I have enough trouble just keeping up with my industry and company let alone all this stuff. It sounds amazing and would love to find a few other routes along the way but may be a bit too much for me to even get it to work right.

-john

 

[swampy1970]

It's actually pretty easy to use. The only gripe was by default it has route recaclution turned on - which is great if you want to get from A to B but crappy if you want to follow a preset course that you map on Garmin Connect, for example. It's easy to turn that off. There's probably a ton of stuff on there I'll a ever use. Just spotted that there's a recurring timer function - could have that beep every 15 minutes for a drink timer... Hmmm. It's ironic though that I like the sound of having weather forecasts on the GPS but there no cell reception in most of the big hills that you can ride on in the Sierra. It's one thing to be drizzled on in the valley - another to go from 100F to 45F at 7,500ft and hailed on. Life gets grim when that happens even with a waterproof jacket, under helmet beanie and gloves. Apparent from the nav, mostly "fun stuff" rather than very useful. I guess you could say if your eyesight ain't the best the option to have some whopping big numbers would be useful too. I'm not too happy about the battery life. An upcoming 200km has a simple route that I know well. I'll take the Cervo and the garmin and see how the garmin does with the backlight on and have it set to follow the course (but not showing the map). If the garmin dies on that one I know where I'll stand with regards to battery life. I guess I better figure this stuff out for the 400 and 600km rides. I'm waiting for a bluetooth remote that opens the garage door when you get close - that same remote could turn on the coffee pot. There are "smart homes" apps for that already - if you're using an iphone for data service for the garmin's weather and live track, you could use the garmin to signal your phone to do its stuff. You could always use the phones GPS but running an app for that and running the cell service for the garmin might kill the phones battery.