Without the train this week. It has been pretty wet around here, and I've also been trying to beat back the demons at work so that I'm not as buried upon my return from vacation. Tonight and tommorow look better. I've got my work cut out for me to get packed and out of here Friday morning so that I can get to Vermont in time for a decent warmup before the GMSR "prologue," which is actually a mass start hill climb. The start list for the 40+ field is up to 95 entries, and I count almost 25 that have won races in the past year or two, and that is just the riders from the northeast that I know of. Generally the ones who travel from around the US and Canada to this race have good reasons for doing so too. Once again, this race could be quite humbling.
I would have started running this week if I weren't entered in GMSR. Next week I'll be on vacation from work, so I should be able to ease into it without compromising my relaxation and training. We still have the Haverhill crit and the Bob Beal master's stage race coming up for road events, and I am much more suited to those than to the GMSR, so I am treating this weekend as a training adventure, but of course I would like to avoid finishing near the bottom in the hard stages.
I'm also looking for golf partners next week if anyone is interested. Canterbury Woods in Canterbury NH looks interesting, and I'd like to go sometime midweek. Email me soon if you think you might want to go, because if I line someone up I'm going to need to figure out how to squeeze the clubs in the car amongst all the stage race rubble. Later in the week I'll be back at home in Mass, and on Friday we'll be playing Lost Brook (free passes), so give me a shout if you can make that too. Gotta run now, we have a group meeting this morning, so no telecommuting today. Maybe tommorow. Thanks for reading.
since 2006
Wednesday, August 30, 2006
Monday, August 28, 2006
Fuel
Here is a list of the food I consumed for D2R2:
1) toast (GREAT bread), butter, jam and delicious coffee at JD and Meg's. (230 cal)
2) bagel, egg, and cheese sandwich with 2 packets of salt from D&D right before the start. (470 cal)
3) 10 packages zero caffeine, 4x sodium Power Gel (2 flasks plus one package). (1100 cal)
4) 200+ ounces of full strength Gatorade (1200 cal)
5) Two PB&J sandwiches at the rest stops. (500 cal)
6) 3/4 of one long past the expiration date Clif bar (200 cal)
7) one plain donut from D&D, eaten at around the 50 mile mark, which tasted SOOOOO good. (300 cal)
This all adds up to approxiametly 4000 calories taken in before/during the ride. The Polar estimated 3885 consumed at the time it ran out of memory. I never bonked, and felt pretty strong at the end. I think starting out at an easy pace, and using the flasks of gel to remain fueled made all the difference on this ride. The 100k crew came back to the start with sandwiches just as I finished cleaning up, and it was delicious, but I wasn't starving like you normally might be after a century.
It took me a years to learn this, but once again I've found that if you stay fueled, and never go too hard (my HR never exceeded my LT on this ride), you can go forever. Thanks for reading. Thanks for reading (twice, because I forgot yesterday).
1) toast (GREAT bread), butter, jam and delicious coffee at JD and Meg's. (230 cal)
2) bagel, egg, and cheese sandwich with 2 packets of salt from D&D right before the start. (470 cal)
3) 10 packages zero caffeine, 4x sodium Power Gel (2 flasks plus one package). (1100 cal)
4) 200+ ounces of full strength Gatorade (1200 cal)
5) Two PB&J sandwiches at the rest stops. (500 cal)
6) 3/4 of one long past the expiration date Clif bar (200 cal)
7) one plain donut from D&D, eaten at around the 50 mile mark, which tasted SOOOOO good. (300 cal)
This all adds up to approxiametly 4000 calories taken in before/during the ride. The Polar estimated 3885 consumed at the time it ran out of memory. I never bonked, and felt pretty strong at the end. I think starting out at an easy pace, and using the flasks of gel to remain fueled made all the difference on this ride. The 100k crew came back to the start with sandwiches just as I finished cleaning up, and it was delicious, but I wasn't starving like you normally might be after a century.
It took me a years to learn this, but once again I've found that if you stay fueled, and never go too hard (my HR never exceeded my LT on this ride), you can go forever. Thanks for reading. Thanks for reading (twice, because I forgot yesterday).
Sunday, August 27, 2006
Shovels, rakes, and implements of destruction
Well, OK, not quite, but the D2R2 Randonee exposed us to the most eclectic, oddball collection of bikes I could imagine. In these days of cookie-cutter carbon/unobtanium racing machines, it was refreshing to be riding amongst a herd of Bruce Gordon's, old Raleigh's, countless MTBs fitted with rigid forks and skinny tires (including a 1988 Wicked Fat Chance converted to 700c!), Rambouliet's, and dozens of 'cross bikes with all sorts of unique mods. And after 10+ hours in the saddle around the beautiful, remote northwest corner of Massachusetts, no post would be complete without paying homage to Arlo.
You read that correctly, over ten hours to complete this ride. My optimistic estimate of seven or eight hours was based on thinking that even riding a cross bike on dirt roads, 13 mph should be fairly easy, and that would nearly cover the advertised 106 mile distance in just around eight hours. Well, 13 mph did not turn out to be too far off, as my actual riding time average speed was just over 12 mph, but three other factors made the day longer. First, I did not take into account the amount of time that would be spent at the stops. Having never done a randonee, I didn't know that the route would not be marked, and that part of the lure of these events is the navigational challenge of finding your way along an incredibly convoluted route using a "cue sheet." Well, Mr. Solobreak is rather far-sighted in his old age. I got a prescription for bifocals last spring, but never got it filled. I can see distance fine, but reading a cue sheet while on the bike is not possible. Even if I could, I didn't put a speed sensor on this bike, so I didn't have a distance measurement. KL, Meg, and JD had elected to take the 100k option rather than the death ride duration. This situation left me at the mercy of others for navigation. This was not too much of an issue, as after starting at around 6:10 am (just a few minutes late), following the dozen or so guys from Team Benidorm, I eventually hooked up with a group of three guys riding skinny-tired mountain bikes who knew most of the loop, and had the requisite handlebar-mounted cue-sheet holders. They were pretty hard to keep up with on the dirt descents, but were climbing at a good pace for me, so along with one other vision-challenged guy, we made up a quintet that stuck together for the final 80 of 115 miles.
That's right, I said 115, not 106. I'd seen a few different numbers published for the length of this ride, but the final route on the cue sheet totaled 115. At five minutes/mile, the extra nine miles tacks on 45 minutes to the ride. Combine this with needing to wait at the lunch stop, and other stops, for as long as my seeing-eye dogs cared to stay there (no point leaving without them), which turned out to be pretty long (we were at the lunch stop for a half hour). This added around an hour of downtime to the total. I don't have my exact finishing time, because my Polar ran out of memory after about nine hours (I was dumb and didn't shut off the cadence and speed functions, which still use up memory even though I had no sensors/readings), but I checked in at the finish around 4:30 pm, so I think my actual riding time was about 9:20, for an average of 12.3 mph.
Why so slow? Well that brings us to reason three: the route was fucking hilly! Again, the published figure of 11,300 feet of climbing is suspect, as my Polar registered 3900 meters by the time it ran out of memory at the top of Patten Hill. There were another 250 meters or so after that, so the real number might have been closer to 13000 feet. Normally, of course, you get a big payback in the speed department on the subsequent downhills, and there were a few 50 mph paved descents along the way, but much of the descending was on the same kinds of gravel and clay goat paths as the climbing, meaning less speed return on your climbing investments. I'm anxiously waiting for a ride report from climbing-stud, ultra-numbers geek Doug Jansen for two reasons, one because I know he'll have reliable data, and two, to see what kind of obscene time he completed the course in. I'm sure it was a few hours less than mine.
So what were the hills like? Western New England dude. Imagine doing the Mt A TT fourteen times in a row, except the dirt road is half as wide, and extends all the way up to the summit, and you have a pretty good picture of the terrain. Of course, this was scenic beyond description, and at some points the "road" was mountain bike/jeep double track. The low points on the course were all the river crossings, which seem to have been around 500 feet above sea level (I don't calibrate the scale on my Polar, but the relative readings should remain semi-accurate). The seven "major" summits were around 1400 feet, and there were over a dozen lesser ascents to contend with, all of these ranging from 10-25% grade. On dirt. You get the idea. My Polar graph uses time on the x-axis, so it doesn't portray the grades correctly the way distance would.
I could go on forever about this ride, but I'll leave that to others. Here is a link to a ride description from last year that I found, all of which I can agree with. This link is for some flickr pics from this year that someone already posted, capturing some of the scenery.
You read that correctly, over ten hours to complete this ride. My optimistic estimate of seven or eight hours was based on thinking that even riding a cross bike on dirt roads, 13 mph should be fairly easy, and that would nearly cover the advertised 106 mile distance in just around eight hours. Well, 13 mph did not turn out to be too far off, as my actual riding time average speed was just over 12 mph, but three other factors made the day longer. First, I did not take into account the amount of time that would be spent at the stops. Having never done a randonee, I didn't know that the route would not be marked, and that part of the lure of these events is the navigational challenge of finding your way along an incredibly convoluted route using a "cue sheet." Well, Mr. Solobreak is rather far-sighted in his old age. I got a prescription for bifocals last spring, but never got it filled. I can see distance fine, but reading a cue sheet while on the bike is not possible. Even if I could, I didn't put a speed sensor on this bike, so I didn't have a distance measurement. KL, Meg, and JD had elected to take the 100k option rather than the death ride duration. This situation left me at the mercy of others for navigation. This was not too much of an issue, as after starting at around 6:10 am (just a few minutes late), following the dozen or so guys from Team Benidorm, I eventually hooked up with a group of three guys riding skinny-tired mountain bikes who knew most of the loop, and had the requisite handlebar-mounted cue-sheet holders. They were pretty hard to keep up with on the dirt descents, but were climbing at a good pace for me, so along with one other vision-challenged guy, we made up a quintet that stuck together for the final 80 of 115 miles.
That's right, I said 115, not 106. I'd seen a few different numbers published for the length of this ride, but the final route on the cue sheet totaled 115. At five minutes/mile, the extra nine miles tacks on 45 minutes to the ride. Combine this with needing to wait at the lunch stop, and other stops, for as long as my seeing-eye dogs cared to stay there (no point leaving without them), which turned out to be pretty long (we were at the lunch stop for a half hour). This added around an hour of downtime to the total. I don't have my exact finishing time, because my Polar ran out of memory after about nine hours (I was dumb and didn't shut off the cadence and speed functions, which still use up memory even though I had no sensors/readings), but I checked in at the finish around 4:30 pm, so I think my actual riding time was about 9:20, for an average of 12.3 mph.
Why so slow? Well that brings us to reason three: the route was fucking hilly! Again, the published figure of 11,300 feet of climbing is suspect, as my Polar registered 3900 meters by the time it ran out of memory at the top of Patten Hill. There were another 250 meters or so after that, so the real number might have been closer to 13000 feet. Normally, of course, you get a big payback in the speed department on the subsequent downhills, and there were a few 50 mph paved descents along the way, but much of the descending was on the same kinds of gravel and clay goat paths as the climbing, meaning less speed return on your climbing investments. I'm anxiously waiting for a ride report from climbing-stud, ultra-numbers geek Doug Jansen for two reasons, one because I know he'll have reliable data, and two, to see what kind of obscene time he completed the course in. I'm sure it was a few hours less than mine.
So what were the hills like? Western New England dude. Imagine doing the Mt A TT fourteen times in a row, except the dirt road is half as wide, and extends all the way up to the summit, and you have a pretty good picture of the terrain. Of course, this was scenic beyond description, and at some points the "road" was mountain bike/jeep double track. The low points on the course were all the river crossings, which seem to have been around 500 feet above sea level (I don't calibrate the scale on my Polar, but the relative readings should remain semi-accurate). The seven "major" summits were around 1400 feet, and there were over a dozen lesser ascents to contend with, all of these ranging from 10-25% grade. On dirt. You get the idea. My Polar graph uses time on the x-axis, so it doesn't portray the grades correctly the way distance would.
I could go on forever about this ride, but I'll leave that to others. Here is a link to a ride description from last year that I found, all of which I can agree with. This link is for some flickr pics from this year that someone already posted, capturing some of the scenery.
Friday, August 25, 2006
Time Warp
Friday already. This week flew by. Next week will fly by even faster, with the Green Mountain Stage Race starting on Friday. The website says the course for the Saturday stage is still subject to change. I'd heard we would not be racing on the Roxbury course from last year, which is kind of a bummer because I liked the course and it was the longest, if not the hardest stage. The rumor is we're going back to the old circuit course, which I've never raced on, but those who have seemed to have liked it. The stage will be shorter though, only about 90k instead of 130k. We'll see. Rain outside my windows right now. Tommorow in Deerfield, scattered showers and highs around 70 are forecast. This will probably be about perfect for the D2R2, except the 6 am start might be a wee bit chilly.
Last night I got water bottle cages installed on the boss-less cross frame, using Zefal wraparound mounting brackets. They should hold up for the day. I also broke from my religion of ratty handlebar tape and re-did the bars with some plastic, but nice feeling "carbon wrap." I'm an old school Tressotar black cloth tape guy, but the mondo oversize bars on my cross bike require three or four rolls to wrap properly (you gotta increase the overlap if you want it to last for as long as I do), and I didn't have that many. I'm wondering if a clipon fender might be a good idea for the mud, but I think I'll go without. We're heading out to Meg and JD's tonight, as they are graciously letting us park our asses at their home so that I can make the early start. Thanks kids!
I wrote back and forth to some of the Benidorm Team guys who are also doing this thing. They are expecting a very long day in the saddle. Matt D is taking his cross bike with a 38x25 low gear -- ouch. I'm still optimistic that this can be done in not much more than seven hours, but I'm a little concerned about the fit of the cross bike (which I've not ridden in months) on such a long ride. The past few days I've tried to get used to going back to Look pedals, because I don't want to wear my Rocket 7s if it is muddy, so that rules out Speedplays. The MTB shoes just don't have the support, so that left the Looks. My old Look-equipped Northwaves are in great shape and were always pretty comfy, so this seemed like a great choice. The problem is, while adapting to the extremely thin-soled, low-profile Rocket/Speedplay combo, I guess I've increased my effective seat height quite a bit. And it has been working. Going back to the high-rider, thick soled Northwave/Look combo, my standard 765 mm center of BB to seat position felt way low. I've tweaked it up at least 5 mm, but it still does not feel natural like the road bike. Part of this can be attributed to the other differences like the higher bars and Q-factor, but going into what may end up being my longest day on a bike ever, it's a little scary. Grizzly details of how it all turns out will follow on Sunday. Thanks for reading.
Last night I got water bottle cages installed on the boss-less cross frame, using Zefal wraparound mounting brackets. They should hold up for the day. I also broke from my religion of ratty handlebar tape and re-did the bars with some plastic, but nice feeling "carbon wrap." I'm an old school Tressotar black cloth tape guy, but the mondo oversize bars on my cross bike require three or four rolls to wrap properly (you gotta increase the overlap if you want it to last for as long as I do), and I didn't have that many. I'm wondering if a clipon fender might be a good idea for the mud, but I think I'll go without. We're heading out to Meg and JD's tonight, as they are graciously letting us park our asses at their home so that I can make the early start. Thanks kids!
I wrote back and forth to some of the Benidorm Team guys who are also doing this thing. They are expecting a very long day in the saddle. Matt D is taking his cross bike with a 38x25 low gear -- ouch. I'm still optimistic that this can be done in not much more than seven hours, but I'm a little concerned about the fit of the cross bike (which I've not ridden in months) on such a long ride. The past few days I've tried to get used to going back to Look pedals, because I don't want to wear my Rocket 7s if it is muddy, so that rules out Speedplays. The MTB shoes just don't have the support, so that left the Looks. My old Look-equipped Northwaves are in great shape and were always pretty comfy, so this seemed like a great choice. The problem is, while adapting to the extremely thin-soled, low-profile Rocket/Speedplay combo, I guess I've increased my effective seat height quite a bit. And it has been working. Going back to the high-rider, thick soled Northwave/Look combo, my standard 765 mm center of BB to seat position felt way low. I've tweaked it up at least 5 mm, but it still does not feel natural like the road bike. Part of this can be attributed to the other differences like the higher bars and Q-factor, but going into what may end up being my longest day on a bike ever, it's a little scary. Grizzly details of how it all turns out will follow on Sunday. Thanks for reading.
Wednesday, August 23, 2006
On Friday night, she's all decked out
With D2R2 on Saturday, as promised, here is some bike porn for you to feast your eyes upon. Maybe it'll just bring tears of sorrow as you feel sad for me, who knows. I still need to rig up some water bottle cages, and maybe spring for some new handlebar tape. New rear brake pads wouldn't hurt either.
This gem is one of two bikes in my stable that I bought from a pro cyclist who was formerly my neighbor. Markie Mark has won the national cyclocross championship before, but I don't think he was using this bike at the time. Regardless, it was ridden to many cross victories before the transfer of ownership to me and its current life in the slow lane. The frame was made by Hot Tubes, and it was painted up as a Lemond because they were the bike sponsor for Team Saturn, and at first were not making their own cross bikes. The bike was mostly Dura Ace when I got it, but I've swapped on a 105 long cage derailleur. For D2R2, I'm thinking about changing the current 38/47 DA crank for a 34/50 FSA compact, but I'm not sure if I feel like taking on that project this week. I've got an 11/32 9spd cluster on the back now, and even though the grades at D2R2 are reportedly up to a heinous 25%, I'm thinking a 38x32 should be good enough. Check out the fat discount-whorehouse $5.95 Panaracer Pasela 700x35 touring tires!
Yes, I know, I really should clean up my bikeroom. I don't want to admit how many times I've come back from the shop with a component only to find I already had one... Thanks for reading.
This gem is one of two bikes in my stable that I bought from a pro cyclist who was formerly my neighbor. Markie Mark has won the national cyclocross championship before, but I don't think he was using this bike at the time. Regardless, it was ridden to many cross victories before the transfer of ownership to me and its current life in the slow lane. The frame was made by Hot Tubes, and it was painted up as a Lemond because they were the bike sponsor for Team Saturn, and at first were not making their own cross bikes. The bike was mostly Dura Ace when I got it, but I've swapped on a 105 long cage derailleur. For D2R2, I'm thinking about changing the current 38/47 DA crank for a 34/50 FSA compact, but I'm not sure if I feel like taking on that project this week. I've got an 11/32 9spd cluster on the back now, and even though the grades at D2R2 are reportedly up to a heinous 25%, I'm thinking a 38x32 should be good enough. Check out the fat discount-whorehouse $5.95 Panaracer Pasela 700x35 touring tires!
 |  |  |
Yes, I know, I really should clean up my bikeroom. I don't want to admit how many times I've come back from the shop with a component only to find I already had one... Thanks for reading.
Tuesday, August 22, 2006
The Walk of Life
KL's coach uses an interesting term for an easy, easy recovery day: "walking on your bike." The idea is to just head out and roll around, not focusing on heart rate, power, or even pedaling form. Just loosening up, stretching, moving a little blood around and getting into the true spirit of active recovery, with emphasis on the recovery, not the active. This might seem like a waste of time to you, but during the periods of your hardest training, this kind of "ride" can be the best thing in the world for you. You might not want to listen to me, but Justin, having ridden for two teams that are now part of the Pro Tour has a finish of the Giro d Italia on his palmares, and knows what he is talking about. Luckily for solobreak, my suburban surroundings lend themselves perfectly to this kind of activity.
I've used this form of recovery since long before ever meeting KL or her coach. During the heart of the racing season, many of my "training" nights consist of just going out and doing what I describe as "riding around the neighborhood like you are a little kid again." Kids don't use HRM's or power meters, and for the most part they're barely aware of gearing, cadence, or position. They just roll around, speed up, coast, dive bomb corners, and do J-turn skids. The latter might not be such a good idea on your $45 folding clinchers, but all the rest of it will pass the night and help you work out the soreness from the races and "real" training rides.
Astute observers will notice the racing season brought a big jump in purple "JNK" time on my bar graphs below. Much of this comes from these playtime recovery rides. Not all of it does though. My HRM settings define zone 1 as 100-129 bpm, and anything below 100 gets classified as "junk," or zone 0. During the winter and spring, if I'm pedaling at 90 rpm or better, my HR will be over 100 no matter how little resistance is on the pedals. Not so now. During the peak of the season, especially on long, easy days following harder efforts, I can be rolling along at 30 kph and look down and see 90 bpm. Yeah, sure, if I had a power tap I could confirm or deny whether or not my "true intensity" was still in my "zone 1 power range," but I don't believe it makes much difference. On days like that, I'm riding at the intensity that feels right to me, and if my heart only wants/needs to beat 1.5 times every second, who am I to argue with it?
Racing bikes is not a steady state, easy effort anyway. The other day, Bolder's blog linked to a piece on pedaling form by a coach named Dan Proulx. In this article, the author makes a reference to "aggressive accelerations." That pretty much sums up what bike racing is all about. I like to call it "crunch time." Nobody ever gets dropped when the pack is just riding along. The whole thing is sort of like the bottleneck principle. There isn't much point in making improvements in areas that aren't holding you back. Sure, if you can't finish races due to premature fatigue, then you might need to increase your miles and do more steady riding.
Most of us (who already race anyway) don't fall into that category. What we need is to more reliably come up with the goods when the battle is on and the efforts are extreme. What was happening in the race the last time you cracked? Maybe an "aggresive acceleration?" That is what you have to train. Simple right? This was enough to crack you, so it's going to hurt, but you gotta do it. Hard enough on your hard days isn't just a cliche. Neither is "easy on your easy days." Going out and "walking on your bike" is the best way to assure yourself of an easy enough easy day. Easy right? Thanks for reading.
I've used this form of recovery since long before ever meeting KL or her coach. During the heart of the racing season, many of my "training" nights consist of just going out and doing what I describe as "riding around the neighborhood like you are a little kid again." Kids don't use HRM's or power meters, and for the most part they're barely aware of gearing, cadence, or position. They just roll around, speed up, coast, dive bomb corners, and do J-turn skids. The latter might not be such a good idea on your $45 folding clinchers, but all the rest of it will pass the night and help you work out the soreness from the races and "real" training rides.
Astute observers will notice the racing season brought a big jump in purple "JNK" time on my bar graphs below. Much of this comes from these playtime recovery rides. Not all of it does though. My HRM settings define zone 1 as 100-129 bpm, and anything below 100 gets classified as "junk," or zone 0. During the winter and spring, if I'm pedaling at 90 rpm or better, my HR will be over 100 no matter how little resistance is on the pedals. Not so now. During the peak of the season, especially on long, easy days following harder efforts, I can be rolling along at 30 kph and look down and see 90 bpm. Yeah, sure, if I had a power tap I could confirm or deny whether or not my "true intensity" was still in my "zone 1 power range," but I don't believe it makes much difference. On days like that, I'm riding at the intensity that feels right to me, and if my heart only wants/needs to beat 1.5 times every second, who am I to argue with it?
Racing bikes is not a steady state, easy effort anyway. The other day, Bolder's blog linked to a piece on pedaling form by a coach named Dan Proulx. In this article, the author makes a reference to "aggressive accelerations." That pretty much sums up what bike racing is all about. I like to call it "crunch time." Nobody ever gets dropped when the pack is just riding along. The whole thing is sort of like the bottleneck principle. There isn't much point in making improvements in areas that aren't holding you back. Sure, if you can't finish races due to premature fatigue, then you might need to increase your miles and do more steady riding.
Most of us (who already race anyway) don't fall into that category. What we need is to more reliably come up with the goods when the battle is on and the efforts are extreme. What was happening in the race the last time you cracked? Maybe an "aggresive acceleration?" That is what you have to train. Simple right? This was enough to crack you, so it's going to hurt, but you gotta do it. Hard enough on your hard days isn't just a cliche. Neither is "easy on your easy days." Going out and "walking on your bike" is the best way to assure yourself of an easy enough easy day. Easy right? Thanks for reading.
Monday, August 21, 2006
Do the Tighten Up
I'll see if I can make this dance week on solobreak... The long ride Saturday has left me with a big knot in my left ass muscle, and a bit of tightness in the hamstrings as well. This week's training may have to be of a therapeutic nature. I'll also post some bike porn of my D2R2 rig, which came to life yesterday.
This morning I am a bit short on time. You may have noticed recently that I've caught on to the "a picture is worth a thousand words" theory of blogging, and since I haven't got the time for a thousand words, I'll post a few pictures. Here are some more geeky Polar graphs. If you've got a Polar, maybe you've never taken the time to explore past the default graphing settings. Here I have my 2006 bike training by HR zone. Selecting the summarize by month option, I made two graphs, one with all zones, and one with just zones 4-5c. On the latter, it is interesting to note that from April to July the total stays about the same, but the intensity keeps getting higher. Cool. More analysis to come. Thanks for reading.
This one has just the high-intensity stuff. Also please note that August isn't over yet.
This morning I am a bit short on time. You may have noticed recently that I've caught on to the "a picture is worth a thousand words" theory of blogging, and since I haven't got the time for a thousand words, I'll post a few pictures. Here are some more geeky Polar graphs. If you've got a Polar, maybe you've never taken the time to explore past the default graphing settings. Here I have my 2006 bike training by HR zone. Selecting the summarize by month option, I made two graphs, one with all zones, and one with just zones 4-5c. On the latter, it is interesting to note that from April to July the total stays about the same, but the intensity keeps getting higher. Cool. More analysis to come. Thanks for reading.
This one has just the high-intensity stuff. Also please note that August isn't over yet.
Sunday, August 20, 2006
The End of the World as we know it
There was a lot to overcome this past week. With both GeWilli and Move it Fred away on vacation, the supply of blogger wisdom ran short of demand. At least those two will return soon, and we'll wonder why we ever missed them. Not so for the other dwindling August commodity, daylight.
August has always been a tough month for maintaining cycling form. Weekend races make it tough to pile in the miles, and with the later sunrises, and rapidly receding time of the sunsets, getting out during the week requires much more discipline. By contrast, in June and July I can work until 6 pm, drive home, read my mail, have a snack, and still ride nearly two hours and be home before dark. Not so now. I have to prepare in the morning, and hustle in the afternoon in order to get more than an hour ride. Next month will be even worse, but at least by then racing will have wound down. Well, sort of.
Oddly enough, more racing days are planned for September than in August. With the cancellation of Hilltowns, I had only Bow and Mt A. this month. September will bring four days at the GMSR, then the Haverhill Crit, and finally two days at the Bob Beal. In order to make the best of this, my plan is to take advantage of these race-free weekends in August to rack up the miles. Hopefully this will put some form in the bank and when September comes I can skate through those races without a lot of weekday training.
With the D2R2 century assuring ample saddle time for next week, I had the bright idea of doing a long ride this weekend to prepare for it. This year I haven't got out for more than four hours in a session even once. I sent out a post to my club list to try and recruit some mates for a six hour epic on Saturday, but I got no response. Pussies. I haven't had this much trouble getting people to ride with me since the last time my form was good...
Luckily, KL is a trooper and this week she was doing her own massive block of training to prepare for GMSR. Despite having gone out for a five-plus hour solo on Thursday, the Little Big Girl was eager to stay out on the bike all day Saturday. I couldn't really come up with any original ideas for a route, so we decided to follow the path of my longest ride from last year, basically combining my three hour "north loop" with my equal length "south loop." Saturday dawned with perfect weather, not too sunny, not too hot, a light breeze, and with little traffic. Apparently most residents of southeastern Mass were away on vacation or holed up in their homes getting ready to watch the Sox get their asses kicked by the dreaded Yankees.
We left the house just before 10 am, after having only the usual toast for breakfast. I packed two Clif bars and two Power Gels, along with a full flask of the same 4x sodium formula PG in my pockets, and two bottles of Gatorade on the frame. We rolled out north through Stoughton, Canton, and Westwood along a slightly extended version of my commute to work. From there we headed up the nice quiet winding road into toney Dover, hitching up with the loop from the Wednesday night "Hagen throwdown" ride. This took us across Sherborn, briefly into Holliston, and back down across 109 in Medway. Here I messed up a bit. My plan was to take us west across I-495 into Bellingham, but I wanted to avoid the traffic of the sprawl-mart complexes that have cropped up around every exit on the highway. The problem was, I don't get out that far too often, and I didn't know of any quiet over/underpass. Heading off the routes I did know, we explored some interesting side roads, but ended up crossing back and forth over 109 a few times before getting plopped right back onto 126, precisely what I had hoped to avoid. Oh well. KL went to the front and powered us through the mall and pub food mecca, and across the interstate.
Now we were going into uncharted territory. At three hours we stopped at the Hopedale Mini Mart where a delightful central-Asian clerk gave me some kind of deal on Gatorade and Nutrigrain bars, and I headed back out to the bikes with an armload of supplies for only $4. Topping up the bottles, KL chatted with some locals who were convinced she was a teenager and that I was her Dad. Must be the pigtails and pink powder-coated 650 wheels. They were astonished when she told them she planned on riding 100 miles today.
Continuing west on a nice road that headed toward the teeming metropolis of Mendon, we eventually turned back south on Providence Road, which by its name promised to head in approximately the right direction. This was a great stretch, no traffic, nice pavement, shade, perfect rural Mass roadway. We flew through Blackstone and the road kept going. I knew if we weren't careful we would end up in the mill town ghetto of Woonsocket, Rhode Island, which was one more spot I'd hoped to avoid. Well, the road we were on was just too good to turn off, and sure enough it led us straight into the big W. Not to fear, even with several traffic lights, a stretch of road construction, and some really interesting roadside characters, we quickly made it to the other side of town, and within a few miles we were back on the kind of roads we came out here to find.
Wrentham Road took us back into familiar territory around the northeast corner of RI, where it borders with Mass. This area is the normal turning point for my three hour "south loop." Picking up the pace a bit, we headed down the serpentine Tower Hill Road in the opposite direction of the usual, descending rather than climbing. This was a treat. After that, we crossed the reservoir causeway and went back to Sheldonville, where we made a second stop for supplies. At this point, we were 4:15 into it, and heading straight home would only take about an hour and a half, thus leaving us short of our goal. We therefore headed back northwest for a bit, climbing through the nearby apple orchard before looping back toward Wrentham. From there we started going pretty hard, enjoying a tailwind and keeping the pace around 35 kph. We flew down another cool roller-coaster road through Gilbert Hills State Forest in Foxboro, and made our way across Mansfield to do some long LT efforts on nice uninterrupted stretches of road in Norton. I did an eight minute pull on John B. Scott boulevard, then another six minutes up Route 140 past Wheaton College. After a short break, KL took over with a ten minute effort across Bay Road and down Howard Street, back into the hometown. I realize all this detail is pretty much useless to those of you from outside the area, but I needed to give GeWilli something to plod through when he gets back to the tower.
We had thought about stretching this to seven hours and 200k, but both of us were getting sore in the shoulders so we headed home and wound it up at 6:24 ride time for 186k (115 miles), an average of around 29 kph. Both of us finished up pretty fresh, and I have a bit more confidence in my endurance going into D2R2, although with three times the climbing of yesterday's ride, that will not be a walk in the park. Back to back weekend centuries should make the 80 mile stage at GMSR seem pretty short, and all these miles can't hurt. I try to do at least one long ride per year, and it feels good to have it behind me. Today it's raining, but I still feel like getting out there, and that's a good sign. Thanks for reading.
August has always been a tough month for maintaining cycling form. Weekend races make it tough to pile in the miles, and with the later sunrises, and rapidly receding time of the sunsets, getting out during the week requires much more discipline. By contrast, in June and July I can work until 6 pm, drive home, read my mail, have a snack, and still ride nearly two hours and be home before dark. Not so now. I have to prepare in the morning, and hustle in the afternoon in order to get more than an hour ride. Next month will be even worse, but at least by then racing will have wound down. Well, sort of.
Oddly enough, more racing days are planned for September than in August. With the cancellation of Hilltowns, I had only Bow and Mt A. this month. September will bring four days at the GMSR, then the Haverhill Crit, and finally two days at the Bob Beal. In order to make the best of this, my plan is to take advantage of these race-free weekends in August to rack up the miles. Hopefully this will put some form in the bank and when September comes I can skate through those races without a lot of weekday training.
With the D2R2 century assuring ample saddle time for next week, I had the bright idea of doing a long ride this weekend to prepare for it. This year I haven't got out for more than four hours in a session even once. I sent out a post to my club list to try and recruit some mates for a six hour epic on Saturday, but I got no response. Pussies. I haven't had this much trouble getting people to ride with me since the last time my form was good...
Luckily, KL is a trooper and this week she was doing her own massive block of training to prepare for GMSR. Despite having gone out for a five-plus hour solo on Thursday, the Little Big Girl was eager to stay out on the bike all day Saturday. I couldn't really come up with any original ideas for a route, so we decided to follow the path of my longest ride from last year, basically combining my three hour "north loop" with my equal length "south loop." Saturday dawned with perfect weather, not too sunny, not too hot, a light breeze, and with little traffic. Apparently most residents of southeastern Mass were away on vacation or holed up in their homes getting ready to watch the Sox get their asses kicked by the dreaded Yankees.
We left the house just before 10 am, after having only the usual toast for breakfast. I packed two Clif bars and two Power Gels, along with a full flask of the same 4x sodium formula PG in my pockets, and two bottles of Gatorade on the frame. We rolled out north through Stoughton, Canton, and Westwood along a slightly extended version of my commute to work. From there we headed up the nice quiet winding road into toney Dover, hitching up with the loop from the Wednesday night "Hagen throwdown" ride. This took us across Sherborn, briefly into Holliston, and back down across 109 in Medway. Here I messed up a bit. My plan was to take us west across I-495 into Bellingham, but I wanted to avoid the traffic of the sprawl-mart complexes that have cropped up around every exit on the highway. The problem was, I don't get out that far too often, and I didn't know of any quiet over/underpass. Heading off the routes I did know, we explored some interesting side roads, but ended up crossing back and forth over 109 a few times before getting plopped right back onto 126, precisely what I had hoped to avoid. Oh well. KL went to the front and powered us through the mall and pub food mecca, and across the interstate.
Now we were going into uncharted territory. At three hours we stopped at the Hopedale Mini Mart where a delightful central-Asian clerk gave me some kind of deal on Gatorade and Nutrigrain bars, and I headed back out to the bikes with an armload of supplies for only $4. Topping up the bottles, KL chatted with some locals who were convinced she was a teenager and that I was her Dad. Must be the pigtails and pink powder-coated 650 wheels. They were astonished when she told them she planned on riding 100 miles today.
Continuing west on a nice road that headed toward the teeming metropolis of Mendon, we eventually turned back south on Providence Road, which by its name promised to head in approximately the right direction. This was a great stretch, no traffic, nice pavement, shade, perfect rural Mass roadway. We flew through Blackstone and the road kept going. I knew if we weren't careful we would end up in the mill town ghetto of Woonsocket, Rhode Island, which was one more spot I'd hoped to avoid. Well, the road we were on was just too good to turn off, and sure enough it led us straight into the big W. Not to fear, even with several traffic lights, a stretch of road construction, and some really interesting roadside characters, we quickly made it to the other side of town, and within a few miles we were back on the kind of roads we came out here to find.
Wrentham Road took us back into familiar territory around the northeast corner of RI, where it borders with Mass. This area is the normal turning point for my three hour "south loop." Picking up the pace a bit, we headed down the serpentine Tower Hill Road in the opposite direction of the usual, descending rather than climbing. This was a treat. After that, we crossed the reservoir causeway and went back to Sheldonville, where we made a second stop for supplies. At this point, we were 4:15 into it, and heading straight home would only take about an hour and a half, thus leaving us short of our goal. We therefore headed back northwest for a bit, climbing through the nearby apple orchard before looping back toward Wrentham. From there we started going pretty hard, enjoying a tailwind and keeping the pace around 35 kph. We flew down another cool roller-coaster road through Gilbert Hills State Forest in Foxboro, and made our way across Mansfield to do some long LT efforts on nice uninterrupted stretches of road in Norton. I did an eight minute pull on John B. Scott boulevard, then another six minutes up Route 140 past Wheaton College. After a short break, KL took over with a ten minute effort across Bay Road and down Howard Street, back into the hometown. I realize all this detail is pretty much useless to those of you from outside the area, but I needed to give GeWilli something to plod through when he gets back to the tower.
We had thought about stretching this to seven hours and 200k, but both of us were getting sore in the shoulders so we headed home and wound it up at 6:24 ride time for 186k (115 miles), an average of around 29 kph. Both of us finished up pretty fresh, and I have a bit more confidence in my endurance going into D2R2, although with three times the climbing of yesterday's ride, that will not be a walk in the park. Back to back weekend centuries should make the 80 mile stage at GMSR seem pretty short, and all these miles can't hurt. I try to do at least one long ride per year, and it feels good to have it behind me. Today it's raining, but I still feel like getting out there, and that's a good sign. Thanks for reading.
Wednesday, August 16, 2006
You know your man is workin' hard
Here is my Gene Simmons face from Mt Friggin' A:
Matthew McNeely has several more photos from Mt. A on his flickr page, including many examples of why you don't need to go to the Tour to find a crazy fan dressed like the Devil. We have this one of Ge Willi, this pic of Feltslave not riding a Felt, and finally, this pic of Zoo (aka Dave) doing something to his bike that looks like it must be illegal in every state except Nevada. Many thanks to Matt for taking and publishing these photos. Be sure to check out the others, as we have Armand, the Cronoman, and of course KL.
Sticking with the same theme, we have mounting evidence (huh-huh) that the summer is winding down. I'm pretty happy with the year, despite not winning anything. My fitness came along much better than expected, no injuries, and I've been down near my fighting weight for several months. At this point, I realize the love handles just aren't going to come off, but my diet lately might have something to do with that.
Last week, I took Monday off from training to hit the driving range with the Wog, Jeff the Genius, and Super Sammy. This was my first time swinging a golf club all year, and I was pleased to be putting some good distance on my shots, despite spraying them over an area a bit wider than the average fairway. Afterwards we went to Golden Abacus for some Mai Tais and a Chinese feast, just the right fuel for a rest day. The following Saturday before Mt A, KL and I headed over to my company picnic for ribs, beans, slaw, fruit, etc, all before noontime (well, of course KL only ate fruit). These calories were much needed for the grueling 8 mile TT on Sunday. On the way home from Mt A, KL led us to a gourmet market in Portsmouth where I got a delicious ham and cheese panini sandwich. Monday was another day off the bike, but this time I took a half vacation day to take to the course for a real round (well, actually it was just a par three, or "par free" as we like to call it, on our company-owned course). Me, the Wog, and JTG got in fifteen holes, skipping a few to get around some slowpokes. You wouldn't think that walking a par three would be all that taxing, but at the end I was wiped. Maybe this will be a good way to ease back into running. Of course, no good day of golf ends with just golf, so we headed over to Lewis's in Norwood to top off my week of gluttony with a massive burger, fried calamari, onion rings, and a few pints of Guinness. No Rasmussen diet for me hombes! Oh yeah, I almost forgot, on the way home I stopped at Crescent Ridge Dairy for a double cone of Mocha chip with jimmies.
Tuesday night I headed to Wompatuck. Traffic hasn't been too bad this year. I logged off work right at 5:10, and clicked into my pedals at 6:14. Riding in through the park, I got ten minutes of easy warmup and rolled up to registration just as Tom was giving final instructions, so I didn't miss any laps. There were almost forty riders present, although mostly the local crew, as the Boston guys don't have as much daylight for riding back to the subway station. The race wasn't too fast, average just under 42 kph, but the field split in half several times. I made some efforts, trying to go out for five minutes at a time, hard, to work on my VO2 max. Near the end a big split occured, and I got stuck in the back. Knowing this was it, I bridged with another guy, but ditched him just as I made the junction on the little rise after the finish. The front split was big, over a dozen riders, and everyone was just watching everyone else. Following suit, I sat in near the back of the group, and moved up on the last lap when it started to unwind. I was trying to slot in to fourth wheel in the train, but little sixteen year old Gavin Mannion fought me for it and I let him have it, which turned out to be a mistake. One guy jumped, and Gavin let a gap open, and just then Markie Mark comes flying by on the inside. I didn't want to jump left because I thought someone had to be on Markie's wheel (nobody was) and by now Gavin was starting to accelerate. I thought I'd get him, but he kept going to the line. Markie and a Coast punk sprinted for the win, and Skip Foley came around the outside of me and Gavin to take third. So I got fifth.
My recovery was amazing last night. I could pull hard for two laps and as soon as I drifted back and got a wheel I felt fine. Doesn't it just figure there are no crits in the immediate future? I have my best speed in years, so what am I going to do? Go to the 106 mile D2R2 dirt road slog, and then the long and slow Green Mountain Stage Race, of course. After that we have Haverhill and the Bob Beal Master's Omnium, so at least I'll have a few more chances to see if I can do something, if my form holds that is. Thanks for reading.
Matthew McNeely has several more photos from Mt. A on his flickr page, including many examples of why you don't need to go to the Tour to find a crazy fan dressed like the Devil. We have this one of Ge Willi, this pic of Feltslave not riding a Felt, and finally, this pic of Zoo (aka Dave) doing something to his bike that looks like it must be illegal in every state except Nevada. Many thanks to Matt for taking and publishing these photos. Be sure to check out the others, as we have Armand, the Cronoman, and of course KL.
Sticking with the same theme, we have mounting evidence (huh-huh) that the summer is winding down. I'm pretty happy with the year, despite not winning anything. My fitness came along much better than expected, no injuries, and I've been down near my fighting weight for several months. At this point, I realize the love handles just aren't going to come off, but my diet lately might have something to do with that.
Last week, I took Monday off from training to hit the driving range with the Wog, Jeff the Genius, and Super Sammy. This was my first time swinging a golf club all year, and I was pleased to be putting some good distance on my shots, despite spraying them over an area a bit wider than the average fairway. Afterwards we went to Golden Abacus for some Mai Tais and a Chinese feast, just the right fuel for a rest day. The following Saturday before Mt A, KL and I headed over to my company picnic for ribs, beans, slaw, fruit, etc, all before noontime (well, of course KL only ate fruit). These calories were much needed for the grueling 8 mile TT on Sunday. On the way home from Mt A, KL led us to a gourmet market in Portsmouth where I got a delicious ham and cheese panini sandwich. Monday was another day off the bike, but this time I took a half vacation day to take to the course for a real round (well, actually it was just a par three, or "par free" as we like to call it, on our company-owned course). Me, the Wog, and JTG got in fifteen holes, skipping a few to get around some slowpokes. You wouldn't think that walking a par three would be all that taxing, but at the end I was wiped. Maybe this will be a good way to ease back into running. Of course, no good day of golf ends with just golf, so we headed over to Lewis's in Norwood to top off my week of gluttony with a massive burger, fried calamari, onion rings, and a few pints of Guinness. No Rasmussen diet for me hombes! Oh yeah, I almost forgot, on the way home I stopped at Crescent Ridge Dairy for a double cone of Mocha chip with jimmies.
Tuesday night I headed to Wompatuck. Traffic hasn't been too bad this year. I logged off work right at 5:10, and clicked into my pedals at 6:14. Riding in through the park, I got ten minutes of easy warmup and rolled up to registration just as Tom was giving final instructions, so I didn't miss any laps. There were almost forty riders present, although mostly the local crew, as the Boston guys don't have as much daylight for riding back to the subway station. The race wasn't too fast, average just under 42 kph, but the field split in half several times. I made some efforts, trying to go out for five minutes at a time, hard, to work on my VO2 max. Near the end a big split occured, and I got stuck in the back. Knowing this was it, I bridged with another guy, but ditched him just as I made the junction on the little rise after the finish. The front split was big, over a dozen riders, and everyone was just watching everyone else. Following suit, I sat in near the back of the group, and moved up on the last lap when it started to unwind. I was trying to slot in to fourth wheel in the train, but little sixteen year old Gavin Mannion fought me for it and I let him have it, which turned out to be a mistake. One guy jumped, and Gavin let a gap open, and just then Markie Mark comes flying by on the inside. I didn't want to jump left because I thought someone had to be on Markie's wheel (nobody was) and by now Gavin was starting to accelerate. I thought I'd get him, but he kept going to the line. Markie and a Coast punk sprinted for the win, and Skip Foley came around the outside of me and Gavin to take third. So I got fifth.
My recovery was amazing last night. I could pull hard for two laps and as soon as I drifted back and got a wheel I felt fine. Doesn't it just figure there are no crits in the immediate future? I have my best speed in years, so what am I going to do? Go to the 106 mile D2R2 dirt road slog, and then the long and slow Green Mountain Stage Race, of course. After that we have Haverhill and the Bob Beal Master's Omnium, so at least I'll have a few more chances to see if I can do something, if my form holds that is. Thanks for reading.
Monday, August 14, 2006
He said "Mount" huh-huh
The Mount Agamenticus time trial is a very unique event. Part hill-climb, part time trial, the 7.9 mile course also includes a two mile dirt road section, and the transition from pavement comes at over 50 kph. This year the great turnout of riders were rewarded with a nice tailwind on the flat, paved portion of the course which comes in the first half. The Boston Scientific Cycling Club also provided a cool starting ramp, a nice professional touch for a low key event. They also created a team competition where clubs could designate teams of four to compete on the basis of combined time. The winning team got handmade medals that included medallion-shaped vials of Mt A dirt from the unpaved portion of the course.
Mt. A is not all that high, but the final portion of the course goes up the access road, which is a switchbacked climb of 1.1k at about 8%, much steeper near the top. Before you get to that, the dirt road also climbs quite a bit, so metering out your energy on this course presents quite a challenge.
Last year I cautiously fitted my bike with GP4 wheels and TUFO tubulars. Due to the speed on the first part of the dirt section, aero bars are not allowed at this event. With my not so speedy wheels, last year I rode a time of 24:04, which was respectable, but well out of the medals for the master's field. This year, I decided to go with normal 23 mm Michelin Race clinchers fitted onto my bladed spoked Shimano aero wheels. This would surely give me more speed on the flat section, and I would hope for the best on the dirt.
After a good warmup on the trainer, where I felt great, I hurried to the start ramp just in time. The Cronoman was starting thirty seconds behind me, so the pressure was on. I took off down the ramp and the first thing I saw was my speedometer reading zero. I guess the sensor was mispositioned, but I would just have to deal with it and ride by feel. Mostly staying in the 14 cog, I did not feel that fast, and the anticipated tailwind seemed non-existent. I tried the 13 on a few of the rollers, but without electronic feedback I honestly couldn't tell whether or not I was doing a good ride. My HR was only in the low 160's, less than I saw in warmup, and lower than what I've been hitting at Rehoboth this year.
At 6k the course takes a right turn and starts heading uphill. Here I got a time check of 8:25 to compare to last year's 9:10. So far so good! The first portion of the climb is fairly steep, but I powered up in my 52x17, passing a rider. Next there is a left turn, with the course continuing uphill for another 500m or so, but not as steep. Lately I've been climbing well in the saddle, so here I went as far as the 52x21 and rolled it up and over, maintaining good momentum into the crest. Building speed down toward the transition to dirt, I tried to relax and get ready to float over the bumps fast and smooth. I flew onto the dirt, and immediately it seemed bumpier and more gravelly than last year. The road is closed to oncoming car traffic, so I stayed in the center and kept flying along so as to keep some speed for the rises that were soon to come. But then... psssst! Flat rear tire. Damn. Coasting to a stop, I hit the lap button on my HRM out of instict. There was a guy with a camera poised next to the road on a rock, and he asked if I was OK. I said yes, flat tire.
Right away, my teammate Mickey came down the road, returning from his earlier finish in the 55+ group. Seeing me, he says "you need a wheel?" and I was like, "Sure!" I started taking off mine, and I say "10 speed?" and he replies "Eight." Ohhh-Kaayyy... We get the wheel in very quickly, and I'm now wondering why the Cronoman hasn't come by yet. Mickey works the shifter as I crank the pedals, and we get the chain up onto the second largest cog. I remount and start rolling, and lo and behold but the chain is miraculously not skipping! I hit my lap counter again and see that only 56 seconds have elapsed during my troubles. The rest of the way is mostly uphill, so I make due by leaving the rear shifter alone and switching back and forth between the 52x21 and the 38x21. For the most part this is OK, I am lugging some here and spinning some there, but soon the dirt ends and it is on to the access road.
I tried to power up in the 52x21, but about halfway where it turns steep I realize that is not going to work. I went to the 38 just before the first switchback, where I found that even this wasn't so easy. After a hundred more meters or so, I gamble and hit the right lever, and amazingly the chain grabs the 23 and does not skip. Keeping my butt right on the saddle, I got in a rhythm and kept this gear going. At the last switchback, I looked left and could now see the Cronoman powering up the hill. The finish line seemingly took forever to appear, but I crossed in 23:39, 25 seconds faster than last year, despite my troubles!
Everyone was faster this year, due to the tailwind. Looking back over my data, I estimate that in addition to my 56 seconds at the side of the road, the lost focus and lack of gears over the latter portion of the course probably cost me an additional 10-30 seconds. At the time of the flat, I was 1:40 ahead of last year's pace. That is life. The fast wheels and skinny tires ended up costing me. Next year I'll give up some speed on the early part of the course and go back to something more appropriate.
No race next weekend, Hilltowns was cancelled. Bummer. Oh well, we sent in our entries for Green Mountain though! Thanks for reading.
Mt. A is not all that high, but the final portion of the course goes up the access road, which is a switchbacked climb of 1.1k at about 8%, much steeper near the top. Before you get to that, the dirt road also climbs quite a bit, so metering out your energy on this course presents quite a challenge.
Last year I cautiously fitted my bike with GP4 wheels and TUFO tubulars. Due to the speed on the first part of the dirt section, aero bars are not allowed at this event. With my not so speedy wheels, last year I rode a time of 24:04, which was respectable, but well out of the medals for the master's field. This year, I decided to go with normal 23 mm Michelin Race clinchers fitted onto my bladed spoked Shimano aero wheels. This would surely give me more speed on the flat section, and I would hope for the best on the dirt.
After a good warmup on the trainer, where I felt great, I hurried to the start ramp just in time. The Cronoman was starting thirty seconds behind me, so the pressure was on. I took off down the ramp and the first thing I saw was my speedometer reading zero. I guess the sensor was mispositioned, but I would just have to deal with it and ride by feel. Mostly staying in the 14 cog, I did not feel that fast, and the anticipated tailwind seemed non-existent. I tried the 13 on a few of the rollers, but without electronic feedback I honestly couldn't tell whether or not I was doing a good ride. My HR was only in the low 160's, less than I saw in warmup, and lower than what I've been hitting at Rehoboth this year.
At 6k the course takes a right turn and starts heading uphill. Here I got a time check of 8:25 to compare to last year's 9:10. So far so good! The first portion of the climb is fairly steep, but I powered up in my 52x17, passing a rider. Next there is a left turn, with the course continuing uphill for another 500m or so, but not as steep. Lately I've been climbing well in the saddle, so here I went as far as the 52x21 and rolled it up and over, maintaining good momentum into the crest. Building speed down toward the transition to dirt, I tried to relax and get ready to float over the bumps fast and smooth. I flew onto the dirt, and immediately it seemed bumpier and more gravelly than last year. The road is closed to oncoming car traffic, so I stayed in the center and kept flying along so as to keep some speed for the rises that were soon to come. But then... psssst! Flat rear tire. Damn. Coasting to a stop, I hit the lap button on my HRM out of instict. There was a guy with a camera poised next to the road on a rock, and he asked if I was OK. I said yes, flat tire.
Right away, my teammate Mickey came down the road, returning from his earlier finish in the 55+ group. Seeing me, he says "you need a wheel?" and I was like, "Sure!" I started taking off mine, and I say "10 speed?" and he replies "Eight." Ohhh-Kaayyy... We get the wheel in very quickly, and I'm now wondering why the Cronoman hasn't come by yet. Mickey works the shifter as I crank the pedals, and we get the chain up onto the second largest cog. I remount and start rolling, and lo and behold but the chain is miraculously not skipping! I hit my lap counter again and see that only 56 seconds have elapsed during my troubles. The rest of the way is mostly uphill, so I make due by leaving the rear shifter alone and switching back and forth between the 52x21 and the 38x21. For the most part this is OK, I am lugging some here and spinning some there, but soon the dirt ends and it is on to the access road.
I tried to power up in the 52x21, but about halfway where it turns steep I realize that is not going to work. I went to the 38 just before the first switchback, where I found that even this wasn't so easy. After a hundred more meters or so, I gamble and hit the right lever, and amazingly the chain grabs the 23 and does not skip. Keeping my butt right on the saddle, I got in a rhythm and kept this gear going. At the last switchback, I looked left and could now see the Cronoman powering up the hill. The finish line seemingly took forever to appear, but I crossed in 23:39, 25 seconds faster than last year, despite my troubles!
Everyone was faster this year, due to the tailwind. Looking back over my data, I estimate that in addition to my 56 seconds at the side of the road, the lost focus and lack of gears over the latter portion of the course probably cost me an additional 10-30 seconds. At the time of the flat, I was 1:40 ahead of last year's pace. That is life. The fast wheels and skinny tires ended up costing me. Next year I'll give up some speed on the early part of the course and go back to something more appropriate.
No race next weekend, Hilltowns was cancelled. Bummer. Oh well, we sent in our entries for Green Mountain though! Thanks for reading.
Friday, August 11, 2006
Crazy
It's Friday again; here comes the weekend. There are only six weekends left in the road season, including this one. Sunday we have the time trial at Mount (huh-huh) Agamenticus, otherwise known as Mt. Friggin' A. This is a fun event, not really a hill climb, as the "mountain" is only about 150 meters high. Most of the TT leading into it consists of flat roads, but there is an interesting section of 55 kph downhill that turns to dirt right in the middle of it. From there it flattens out, then starts climbing, and eventually turns back to pavement when you hit the Mt. A access road. The dirt section is so fast that the race organizers forbid aero bars, for fear of what might happen. Because this event is so different, it's hard to predict the results, as both a TT'er or a climber have advantages on some parts of the course. Last year we started a tradition of wagering on this event. This year the organizers have upped the ante with a team competition combining the times of four pre-selected riders from the same team. The host club Boston Scientific will be hard to beat, but BOB will assemble a motley squadra and have a go.
Next weekend is the Tour of the Hilltowns. I've never done this one, but it's a KL favorite, so I'll find out what's up. All I know is it's a hilly race in a hilly area in the middle of the day in the middle of August. I think I know what to expect.
The weekend after that looks like it's gonna bring something completely different. There are no races on the calendar, but apparently having lost all sense, it looks like I'll be signing up for the D2R2 Randonee. You'll have to read the link to get the full lowdown, but basically this is a 106 mile gumby ride over a course that has 68 miles of dirt road, with the balance on lumpy rural pavement. The route includes 11,300 feet of climbing, and since the highest point in Massachusetts is like 4000 feet, this means steep pitches going up and down all day. A crazy event for sure, but I see a number of racers signed up for it, so I think it will be game on.
Labor Day weekend brings the Green Mountain Stage Race. We haven't worked out the details yet, but so far it looks like we're going. Stay tuned. After that I have the Team BOB Wayne Elliot Memorial Criterium, named for a team member who was tragically killed while training several years ago. Finally, the third weekend is September wraps things up at the MCRA Bob Beal Stage Race in Charlestown RI.
These races should provide ample fodder for posts in the future. I'm thinking of a rant on gearing (inspired by the D2R2), of course an annual piece on litter (the shitheads will no doubt be tossing gel wrappers again at GMSR), tales of suffering on the hills (almost all of the above), and lots of other stories. You'll just have to wait, because after being "sick" (thanks for the inspiration Bold) yesterday (hey Ge, we went up Tower Hill in Cumberland!) I need to get in to work early. Thanks for reading.
Next weekend is the Tour of the Hilltowns. I've never done this one, but it's a KL favorite, so I'll find out what's up. All I know is it's a hilly race in a hilly area in the middle of the day in the middle of August. I think I know what to expect.
The weekend after that looks like it's gonna bring something completely different. There are no races on the calendar, but apparently having lost all sense, it looks like I'll be signing up for the D2R2 Randonee. You'll have to read the link to get the full lowdown, but basically this is a 106 mile gumby ride over a course that has 68 miles of dirt road, with the balance on lumpy rural pavement. The route includes 11,300 feet of climbing, and since the highest point in Massachusetts is like 4000 feet, this means steep pitches going up and down all day. A crazy event for sure, but I see a number of racers signed up for it, so I think it will be game on.
Labor Day weekend brings the Green Mountain Stage Race. We haven't worked out the details yet, but so far it looks like we're going. Stay tuned. After that I have the Team BOB Wayne Elliot Memorial Criterium, named for a team member who was tragically killed while training several years ago. Finally, the third weekend is September wraps things up at the MCRA Bob Beal Stage Race in Charlestown RI.
These races should provide ample fodder for posts in the future. I'm thinking of a rant on gearing (inspired by the D2R2), of course an annual piece on litter (the shitheads will no doubt be tossing gel wrappers again at GMSR), tales of suffering on the hills (almost all of the above), and lots of other stories. You'll just have to wait, because after being "sick" (thanks for the inspiration Bold) yesterday (hey Ge, we went up Tower Hill in Cumberland!) I need to get in to work early. Thanks for reading.
Wednesday, August 9, 2006
Weasels Ripped My Flesh
Today on cyclingnews, we have a reported gem from Quick Step manager Patrick LeFevere:
http://www.cyclingnews.com/news.php?id=news/2006/aug06/aug09news2
This genius suggests sueing Landis for "tarnishing the reputation of cycling" with the latest drug scandal. Isn't that kind of like Paris Hilton sueing someone for calling her a slut? The spin-doctoring from all sides on this one is bad enough, but give me a break. After Quick-Step's dismal performance in the tour, I can only guess that LeFevere is pissed that only he (and apparently Discovery) chose to suspend systematic doping of their riders during this year's tour. What a dink. In this entire mess, do we have a single voice actually suggesting how to stop doping?
On the spin doctoring thing, I know I keep beating this to death, but the Armstrong civil case is the best example. Armstrong held a press conference and declared that the ruling in his favor exonerated him from the doping allegations. No it didn't. The arbitration ruling was that the insurer had to pay him whether he doped or not. Period. They chose to settle for the full $5 million plus attorney's fees, and the judgement phase of arbitration never took place. Yet Armstrong succeeded in convincing everyone that he somehow proved in court that he did not dope, just by going on TV and saying so.
No wonder Floyd keeps saying over and over that the leaks, unfollowed protocols, and general cluster-phuck nature of this entire affair has forced him to deal with this in the media. Once again, I must say it: we are hearing everything about this except the truth. Thanks for reading.
http://www.cyclingnews.com/news.php?id=news/2006/aug06/aug09news2
This genius suggests sueing Landis for "tarnishing the reputation of cycling" with the latest drug scandal. Isn't that kind of like Paris Hilton sueing someone for calling her a slut? The spin-doctoring from all sides on this one is bad enough, but give me a break. After Quick-Step's dismal performance in the tour, I can only guess that LeFevere is pissed that only he (and apparently Discovery) chose to suspend systematic doping of their riders during this year's tour. What a dink. In this entire mess, do we have a single voice actually suggesting how to stop doping?
On the spin doctoring thing, I know I keep beating this to death, but the Armstrong civil case is the best example. Armstrong held a press conference and declared that the ruling in his favor exonerated him from the doping allegations. No it didn't. The arbitration ruling was that the insurer had to pay him whether he doped or not. Period. They chose to settle for the full $5 million plus attorney's fees, and the judgement phase of arbitration never took place. Yet Armstrong succeeded in convincing everyone that he somehow proved in court that he did not dope, just by going on TV and saying so.
No wonder Floyd keeps saying over and over that the leaks, unfollowed protocols, and general cluster-phuck nature of this entire affair has forced him to deal with this in the media. Once again, I must say it: we are hearing everything about this except the truth. Thanks for reading.
Call Me - part 2
So I spend the next two hours sitting around the school parking lot waiting for the 35+ race to start (since this course is only 10.5 miles around, they can only run so many races at once. 35+ was in the afternoon wave with the Cat 3 and Cat 1-2). The weather was warmer, hotter really, than what was forecast. The guy parked next to me had a tent, so at least I got some shade while pinning up my number. I tried to keep an eye on the course to see how KL was doing, but I never really saw anything.
I had Ranger Rusnak and Jay C in the race for teammates. An hour before the start, I started getting hungry. I'd only had some toast and a yogurt smoothie for breakfast. That might have been fine for the four lap 45+ race, but now with the extra time and extra lap, I knew I had made a mistake in trying to get there for the 45+ instead of stopping somewhere like McDogfood for a nice salty egg sandwich on the way up. All I had with me was another yogurt smoothie and some outdated Cliff bars. I forced two of the bars down as our start neared, and drank the smoothie. I washed it down some more with some over-strength Gatorade, and packed a flask of Power-Gel for the race.
We had around sixty starters. We rolled out slowly as usual. The uphill grind starts right away, and I was at the front as a few riders spun ahead one by one, forming a small break that began to pull away. The hill at Bow goes up in pitches for a few miles, not too steep, probably three or four percent. There are a few flats, false flats, and slight downhills mixed in there. Not a problem at all unless the hammer is down. The last mile of the climb gets a bit more serious, and then the final 400 meters comes into view. This nasty pitch of 10-15% would be hard enough were it standalone, but coming at the end of a two mile grind doubles the degree of difficulty. Did I mention the face of the hill angles toward the afternoon sun, and there is no shade?
With the party of five a few seconds up the road and the pace sedate, drifting from the front to the back on the steepest part save me even more energy. Everyone stayed on. The descents weren't that fast either, and lap one finished uneventfully. The second and susequent times up there would be KOM sprints, and obviously attacks as well. I positioned myself well and hit the steep part mid pack, but the pace was pretty severe and the field split roughly in half by the top. Splits separate very quickly on the downhill, and we in the wrong end of the split found ourselves at least ten seconds back in short order. Ranger and I led the chase back with the help of a few others, but it too an uncomfortable three k or so before it was grouppo compacto again on the descent. By now I was already feeling early signs of cramping, as well as a very uncomfortable bloating from my belly full of sugar.
Lap three I vowed not to wind up in the back split again, and I fought to the death on the climb. Staying with the leaders, and cresting about eighth wheel, I quickly realized I may have been mortally wounded in this battle. I had simply dug too deep, with an effort more fitting of the end of the race. Adding insult to injury, this time the back split rejoined the front after less than a kilometer, and had I held a more comfortable pace on the climb I'd probably have been in much better shape.
Despite the threat of quad cramps, I was feeling a bit better as the lap finished, and I took a feed from KL as the climbing began again. Luckily, our pace on the early portions was quite slow, and I started to think that maybe I could hang on after all. Nearing the top though, things got very surgy, not good for me. I almost went off the front just so I could keep a steady tempo, but I didn't, and tried to keep following wheels as things kept speeding up and slowing down. The group was down to just over twenty riders at this point, with only one guy remaining from the original break still dangling off the front. We hit the steep part and I started coming unglued. You can see the top from there, and I tried everything to limit the damage as the gap grew, but there was nobody home in the engine room. Even at the crest, I was probably not more than fifteen seconds off the last guy, but I was toast.
On the descent, I grouped up with three other victims and we gave the chase a go. We could still see the pack, maybe fifteen or twenty seconds ahead, when we roared through the ninety degree left hander at the bottom of the longest descent. This stretch leads into another small hill, and when one of the foursome said "you know, even if we catch them at the base of the climb, we're all going to come right back off again" I knew he was right... Seconds later, standing to try to maintain tempo on the small rise, both my legs started cramping severely. I had to sit down and let the other three go.
I worked the cramps out on the next descent, and sucked down half the flask of gel, washing it down with more sugary Gatorade. Fighting over the last few up and down kilometers of the course, I thought about dropping out, but since it seemed there was still a shot at top twenty, I took a feed of much needed plain water from KL and kept going. The last lap was more like a cooldown than a race. I was in my 38x27 all the way up the hill. I was passed by the Cat 3 field, then the 1-2 break, and finally the entire 1-2 field as they finished their sixth'd lap. Some Masters must have glombed in there too, because in the final results I ended up 27th, over 14 minutes down. I know there were only 22 still in the lead group when my foursome popped, so who knows where the other five came from. Not that it matters...
So there you go Ge. Riding one lap of Bow, you may not think that it is too hard, but anyone who had done it will tell you this is one of the most grueling and selective races we do all year. Thirteen years ago, I won this race (Cat 3). Since then, I've had a few decent finishes, some horrible DNFs, and more than one off the back, drag my ass to the line races like this one. I was brutalized by the end, but the feeling of accomplishment was still there, and days like this make the memory of past victory on this course that much sweeter. Thanks for reading.
ps - I'm a day behind, so I'm not proofing this.
I had Ranger Rusnak and Jay C in the race for teammates. An hour before the start, I started getting hungry. I'd only had some toast and a yogurt smoothie for breakfast. That might have been fine for the four lap 45+ race, but now with the extra time and extra lap, I knew I had made a mistake in trying to get there for the 45+ instead of stopping somewhere like McDogfood for a nice salty egg sandwich on the way up. All I had with me was another yogurt smoothie and some outdated Cliff bars. I forced two of the bars down as our start neared, and drank the smoothie. I washed it down some more with some over-strength Gatorade, and packed a flask of Power-Gel for the race.
We had around sixty starters. We rolled out slowly as usual. The uphill grind starts right away, and I was at the front as a few riders spun ahead one by one, forming a small break that began to pull away. The hill at Bow goes up in pitches for a few miles, not too steep, probably three or four percent. There are a few flats, false flats, and slight downhills mixed in there. Not a problem at all unless the hammer is down. The last mile of the climb gets a bit more serious, and then the final 400 meters comes into view. This nasty pitch of 10-15% would be hard enough were it standalone, but coming at the end of a two mile grind doubles the degree of difficulty. Did I mention the face of the hill angles toward the afternoon sun, and there is no shade?
With the party of five a few seconds up the road and the pace sedate, drifting from the front to the back on the steepest part save me even more energy. Everyone stayed on. The descents weren't that fast either, and lap one finished uneventfully. The second and susequent times up there would be KOM sprints, and obviously attacks as well. I positioned myself well and hit the steep part mid pack, but the pace was pretty severe and the field split roughly in half by the top. Splits separate very quickly on the downhill, and we in the wrong end of the split found ourselves at least ten seconds back in short order. Ranger and I led the chase back with the help of a few others, but it too an uncomfortable three k or so before it was grouppo compacto again on the descent. By now I was already feeling early signs of cramping, as well as a very uncomfortable bloating from my belly full of sugar.
Lap three I vowed not to wind up in the back split again, and I fought to the death on the climb. Staying with the leaders, and cresting about eighth wheel, I quickly realized I may have been mortally wounded in this battle. I had simply dug too deep, with an effort more fitting of the end of the race. Adding insult to injury, this time the back split rejoined the front after less than a kilometer, and had I held a more comfortable pace on the climb I'd probably have been in much better shape.
Despite the threat of quad cramps, I was feeling a bit better as the lap finished, and I took a feed from KL as the climbing began again. Luckily, our pace on the early portions was quite slow, and I started to think that maybe I could hang on after all. Nearing the top though, things got very surgy, not good for me. I almost went off the front just so I could keep a steady tempo, but I didn't, and tried to keep following wheels as things kept speeding up and slowing down. The group was down to just over twenty riders at this point, with only one guy remaining from the original break still dangling off the front. We hit the steep part and I started coming unglued. You can see the top from there, and I tried everything to limit the damage as the gap grew, but there was nobody home in the engine room. Even at the crest, I was probably not more than fifteen seconds off the last guy, but I was toast.
On the descent, I grouped up with three other victims and we gave the chase a go. We could still see the pack, maybe fifteen or twenty seconds ahead, when we roared through the ninety degree left hander at the bottom of the longest descent. This stretch leads into another small hill, and when one of the foursome said "you know, even if we catch them at the base of the climb, we're all going to come right back off again" I knew he was right... Seconds later, standing to try to maintain tempo on the small rise, both my legs started cramping severely. I had to sit down and let the other three go.
I worked the cramps out on the next descent, and sucked down half the flask of gel, washing it down with more sugary Gatorade. Fighting over the last few up and down kilometers of the course, I thought about dropping out, but since it seemed there was still a shot at top twenty, I took a feed of much needed plain water from KL and kept going. The last lap was more like a cooldown than a race. I was in my 38x27 all the way up the hill. I was passed by the Cat 3 field, then the 1-2 break, and finally the entire 1-2 field as they finished their sixth'd lap. Some Masters must have glombed in there too, because in the final results I ended up 27th, over 14 minutes down. I know there were only 22 still in the lead group when my foursome popped, so who knows where the other five came from. Not that it matters...
So there you go Ge. Riding one lap of Bow, you may not think that it is too hard, but anyone who had done it will tell you this is one of the most grueling and selective races we do all year. Thirteen years ago, I won this race (Cat 3). Since then, I've had a few decent finishes, some horrible DNFs, and more than one off the back, drag my ass to the line races like this one. I was brutalized by the end, but the feeling of accomplishment was still there, and days like this make the memory of past victory on this course that much sweeter. Thanks for reading.
ps - I'm a day behind, so I'm not proofing this.
Tuesday, August 8, 2006
Call Me
Monday must have been pretty tough to get through without your daily dose of solobreak. My apologies. The weekend took its toll on your hero, thus sacrificing the blog. Saturday started easily enough. The weather here in the lovely Commonwealth of Massassachusetts couldn't have been much better. The thousands of gumbies and Phreds (and I say that in the most sincerely endearing voice) who rode the Pan-Mass Challenge finally were rewarded after what seems like years of rain on their big day. There was also a huge three-day, sixty mile breast cancer walk in the area, so they made out too, although the walkers I saw looked like they might have been better off with a few clouds in the sky. They were soaking up some serious sunshine and I suspect many of them were burned to a crisp by Sunday.
I was on call for my job Saturday night. This meant that from 6:30 pm until 7:30 am on Sunday morning, I had to be at home, ready to spring into action to solve the software crisis of the day at any one of the 1800 hospitals who are our customers. I skipped out on racing at Concord on Saturday, as I figured my weekend would be stressful enough without it. Also knowing that as the likelihood of a good night's sleep was extremely low, I was pretty doubtful about making the 11 am start of the 45+ road race at Bow on Sunday. Therefore, I decided to go out and do a fairly hard three hour ride from home Saturday afternoon, and headed over to Big Blue Hill for some repeats. Hedging against the possibility that I might have a quiet night and still race at Bow the next day, I decided to try to ride my repeats as close to LT as possible, avoiding digging too deep. This would also allow me to use the calculation tools at analyticcyling.com to estimate my average power at LT.
I felt good on my ride over, going via Moose Hill Road in Sharon. The massage on Wednesday night had left my legs in good shape. The first time up I mostly used a 38x24, but it was still difficult to hold my HR at LT on the steep parts. I really had to ride slow. 6:23. I rolled back down and tried again, experimenting with gears, rode a 6:40 or so, but still went 3-5 bpm over LT in a few spots. The third time I said screw it, and I went really hard on the steep parts, letting my HR go as high as it wanted. On the flatter sections I would immediately go to the 38x27 and ride slow to see how fast I could recover. I was hitting 171 bpm on the steeps, but was pleased to see it drop right back to 160 when I eased. That ended up being a 5:38 and was probably too hard, as I never quite felt the same after that. The fourth and final time up I left it in the 38x27 the entire way, traversing and riding as slow as I needed to in order to keep my HR under 160. It took 8 minutes.
When I got home I looked over the graphs and crunched some numbers and came up with an estimate of about 275-295 watts at LT, which is in the 3.6-3.7 w/kg range. Not too impressive, but lately I've been wondering if maybe I have succeeded in bumping my LT up a bit, and maybe it is now more like 163 than 160. The past two months have been hot, which is also a big factor, but I've been putting up consistently higher HR numbers for the same RPE.
Late Saturday afternoon I tried to take a nap, but never even got close to falling asleep. I sat at home resting in the evening, and at first no calls came in. Maybe this would be a quiet night... Wrong! Starting at 11:05, I got a call about every 45 minutes, right up until a nice two in a row at 5:30 am, when the sun was coming up and I threw in the towel. There is no way that I can get to sleep when the sun is rising, especially when its a gorgeous day. I just went ahead and made a pot of coffee.
Feeling like shit, I had to decide on whether or not to go to Bow. I swapped out the cassette (putting my 27 onto my race wheels) and cleaned up my bike a bit, and packed up my kit. It was now 8:30 and my responsibilities to the man were over.
Bow is at least an hour and a half drive from here. Exhausted, I sat and thought the situation over. I could leave now and make the four lap (of the 10.5 mile, very hilly course) 45+ race, I could relax a bit and go later on and still make the afternoon wave, choosing between the Cat 3 race or the 35+, or I could just stay home. Decisions, decisions. After talking to KL, I decided to go for the 45+. Problem was, it was now 9:00 am and I probably wasn't going to make it. Like an idiot, I tried anyway, and pulled into the parking lot as they were calling the race to the line. I'm not that stupid, so I gave up and entered the 35+, which was five laps, and didn't start for another two hours. And I hadn't slept one minute last night, and hadn't eaten much this morning...
To be continued...
I was on call for my job Saturday night. This meant that from 6:30 pm until 7:30 am on Sunday morning, I had to be at home, ready to spring into action to solve the software crisis of the day at any one of the 1800 hospitals who are our customers. I skipped out on racing at Concord on Saturday, as I figured my weekend would be stressful enough without it. Also knowing that as the likelihood of a good night's sleep was extremely low, I was pretty doubtful about making the 11 am start of the 45+ road race at Bow on Sunday. Therefore, I decided to go out and do a fairly hard three hour ride from home Saturday afternoon, and headed over to Big Blue Hill for some repeats. Hedging against the possibility that I might have a quiet night and still race at Bow the next day, I decided to try to ride my repeats as close to LT as possible, avoiding digging too deep. This would also allow me to use the calculation tools at analyticcyling.com to estimate my average power at LT.
I felt good on my ride over, going via Moose Hill Road in Sharon. The massage on Wednesday night had left my legs in good shape. The first time up I mostly used a 38x24, but it was still difficult to hold my HR at LT on the steep parts. I really had to ride slow. 6:23. I rolled back down and tried again, experimenting with gears, rode a 6:40 or so, but still went 3-5 bpm over LT in a few spots. The third time I said screw it, and I went really hard on the steep parts, letting my HR go as high as it wanted. On the flatter sections I would immediately go to the 38x27 and ride slow to see how fast I could recover. I was hitting 171 bpm on the steeps, but was pleased to see it drop right back to 160 when I eased. That ended up being a 5:38 and was probably too hard, as I never quite felt the same after that. The fourth and final time up I left it in the 38x27 the entire way, traversing and riding as slow as I needed to in order to keep my HR under 160. It took 8 minutes.
When I got home I looked over the graphs and crunched some numbers and came up with an estimate of about 275-295 watts at LT, which is in the 3.6-3.7 w/kg range. Not too impressive, but lately I've been wondering if maybe I have succeeded in bumping my LT up a bit, and maybe it is now more like 163 than 160. The past two months have been hot, which is also a big factor, but I've been putting up consistently higher HR numbers for the same RPE.
Late Saturday afternoon I tried to take a nap, but never even got close to falling asleep. I sat at home resting in the evening, and at first no calls came in. Maybe this would be a quiet night... Wrong! Starting at 11:05, I got a call about every 45 minutes, right up until a nice two in a row at 5:30 am, when the sun was coming up and I threw in the towel. There is no way that I can get to sleep when the sun is rising, especially when its a gorgeous day. I just went ahead and made a pot of coffee.
Feeling like shit, I had to decide on whether or not to go to Bow. I swapped out the cassette (putting my 27 onto my race wheels) and cleaned up my bike a bit, and packed up my kit. It was now 8:30 and my responsibilities to the man were over.
Bow is at least an hour and a half drive from here. Exhausted, I sat and thought the situation over. I could leave now and make the four lap (of the 10.5 mile, very hilly course) 45+ race, I could relax a bit and go later on and still make the afternoon wave, choosing between the Cat 3 race or the 35+, or I could just stay home. Decisions, decisions. After talking to KL, I decided to go for the 45+. Problem was, it was now 9:00 am and I probably wasn't going to make it. Like an idiot, I tried anyway, and pulled into the parking lot as they were calling the race to the line. I'm not that stupid, so I gave up and entered the 35+, which was five laps, and didn't start for another two hours. And I hadn't slept one minute last night, and hadn't eaten much this morning...
To be continued...
Saturday, August 5, 2006
American Bad Ass
Check out this picture of Floyd Landis way back before he started to look like Kid Rock.
Friday, August 4, 2006
No Comment
I've got no song to quote, and nothing to say today, so I shall refrain from forcing the issue and go postless. Instead I'll devote my attention to absorbing the wisdom you all extoll on your blogs, and try to post as many comments as I can. There is nothing like feedback to validate the misdirection of energy and juvenile silliness that is blogging. Hey, I could have called this "I don't wanna grow up." Let's hear your Ramones comments. Thanks for not reading.
Thursday, August 3, 2006
Lightning Strikes
Last night just before I left work, it got cloudy and began to rain a bit. I'd planned to beat the heat by just going out for a spin right before dark, so I figured if the storm passed quickly, I'd still be fine. Driving the thirteen miles back home in light rain, I could see dark clouds and dozens of lightning strikes off in the direction of, hmmmm, my house. Well, no, my residence did not suffer a direct hit, but when I got off the highway at my exit, the road was covered in debris, leaves, and fallen branches. On the way to my neighborhood, one large tree lay in the road. When I got to my street, Elm Street, which oddly enough is lined with elm trees, I was greeted with flashing lights and a bunch of people doing three-point turns. Fallen trees had completely blocked the road. There were huge puddles everywhere, but at this point it wasn't even raining.
I turned around and took the circuituitous route around town in order to approach from the other direction. On the way, I noticed the traffic lights were out and all the houses and businesses were dark. When I got back to my house, all the neighbors were standing in the street looking at the sky like they'd just seen a UFO. I guess quite a little storm had blown through. There were more trees in the road just down from my house, and of course we had no power. I'd left one window open in my spare room upstairs, and the door of that room had blown open and shit was all strewn about the room (I mean, moreso than normal).
Life without power kinda sucks. Luckily I had some nice hummus and pumpernickel to make sandwiches with, and a half-pot of ice coffee leftover from the morning. The roads were too messy to go for a ride, and it was prematurely dark anyway, not to mention my idea of a good time does not include coming home after a ride to a hot, humid house with no power. So I sat there in the dark until I got bored and finally fell asleep. We got power back around 4:30 this morning, so at least I think all my food will be fine. Tonight I have a massage scheduled, so I may not get a chance to ride today either. Oh well, I can probably use the rest. Hope your day was cooler in more ways than one. Thanks for reading.
I turned around and took the circuituitous route around town in order to approach from the other direction. On the way, I noticed the traffic lights were out and all the houses and businesses were dark. When I got back to my house, all the neighbors were standing in the street looking at the sky like they'd just seen a UFO. I guess quite a little storm had blown through. There were more trees in the road just down from my house, and of course we had no power. I'd left one window open in my spare room upstairs, and the door of that room had blown open and shit was all strewn about the room (I mean, moreso than normal).
Life without power kinda sucks. Luckily I had some nice hummus and pumpernickel to make sandwiches with, and a half-pot of ice coffee leftover from the morning. The roads were too messy to go for a ride, and it was prematurely dark anyway, not to mention my idea of a good time does not include coming home after a ride to a hot, humid house with no power. So I sat there in the dark until I got bored and finally fell asleep. We got power back around 4:30 this morning, so at least I think all my food will be fine. Tonight I have a massage scheduled, so I may not get a chance to ride today either. Oh well, I can probably use the rest. Hope your day was cooler in more ways than one. Thanks for reading.
Wednesday, August 2, 2006
Tell me something good
Exhibit A, my Polar graph from last night's session at Wompatuck clearly illustrates the difference between sitting in the pack and going in a breakaway. Not too hard to tell when we went up the road, eh? The race started normally enough. The scorching temps around the city weren't quite as bad in Hingham, with the proximity to the water and the thick growth of trees around the course, the Polar recorded a mere 86F. We had about thirty starters, with the plethora of Bike Link guys, several Coast juniors/espoirs, and three guys from Landry's mixed in with a bunch of singles like me. The pace got pretty high now and then, but nothing stuck. It was hard to keep it going in the oppressive humidity, and the Coast kids killed every move with their silly antics of sprinting up to every attempted break, and then doing nothing. They would attack like a house of fire, and then go nowhere. I made a few moves, as evidenced by the speed/hr peaks on the left of the graph, but I felt very weak in the heat and wondered whether two bottles were even going to last me the 25 laps of the 2.1k course.
When we got to fifteen to go, I couldn't believe we'd only been racing for ten laps. There were a few attempts at pacemaking going on, but even though nobody ever mounted a real chase, every move died of natural causes. Everyone was feeling the heat. I saw several guys actually take the suspenders from their bibs down, letting them drape out from under their unzipped jerseys. This was a first for me. I was waiting to see a big takedown when one got caught in a rear wheel.
I conceded to just sitting in and letting the laps tick down. Things got pretty slow at some points, but I figured even a two lap effort at the end was going to force a meltdown, so I should just take the spinning time and be patient, waiting for another, cooler night to do some hard efforts. So much for plans, as with around nine laps to go, two guys, Rob Kramer from Bike Link, and a Boston Bike Club guy, were about ten seconds clear, and I found myself in a good position to bridge. I sprinted away, closing the gap in less then a kilometer, and immediately started pulling. Shortly after, Skip Foley powered across the gap to join us, and now we had a real break. Skip was taking monster pulls, probably about 300 meters. The other two guys were not as useful, but they didn't skip any turns, and didn't slow down when they came through. Not really expecting this to go the distance, I tried to match Skip's efforts as best as I could. The gap grew.
At first, the pace wasn't killing me, because with Skip's twenty second pulls, I was getting around thirty seconds or more of recovery in between each of my efforts. I couldn't see my HR (eyesight is not so good, and with sweaty glasses, the digits are too small), but I was only watching my speed anyway, making sure we never went below 40 kph. Of course, there wasn't much time to drink, and I didn't have much left anyway. The laps ticked down, and we held a nice gap. Six to go, five to go, four to go. Now I was feeling it. The familiar and scary sensation of heat building up under the helmet, pulse pounding in the back of the neck, severe headache coming on. This wasn't going to feel good later on. I took a small amount of my remaining water and squirted it on the back of my head and neck, down through the helmet vents. This brought me about a nanosecond of relief, and I also knew that water was needed inside me too.
Coming up on two to go, we were still a few hundred meters ahead of the field, but a glance back verified that they were now single file, trying hard to close it up. Going by the finish, I knew we had two to go, but the race organizer was fumbling with the lap cards and inadvertently made the bell ring a little bit, fooling Skip. He didn't care if he got fourth out of four, he wanted the break to stay away. I was weakening badly, and when Skip turned on the gas for a monster full-lap pull, he almost broke me. I was clinging to the back of the line, and the other two guys showed no sign of going around him either. When we completed the lap, and now the lap cards read one and Tom was ringing the bell for real, Skip was like, WTF? and he just yelled at us to go and make something of it as he sat up.
We tried, and the BBC guy took a good pull, then I came through, but I was just hanging on, forearms draped over the handlebar tops, faux-aero, on the slight downhill section, not much power left in the legs. We rotated through again, but at around 400 meters one of the Coast punks came bridging solo across the rapidly shrinking gap. I thought he'd go right through us, and I prepared to try to get on his wheel, but he just sat there, waiting for the sprint. Unbelievable. At 200 meters to go, we were winding it up, and the front of the bunch was right on us, and two guys lept out of the field, joining in on the sprint. I was totally gassed, but I didn't want to get run down in the stampede either, so I kept sprinting for all I was worth. At the line, the Coast guy, the BBC guy, and two others from the field crossed ahead of me, but I hung on for fifth.
We call this a training race because there are only small prizes, and it is not a "real" weekend event, doesn't count for upgrading, etc. In the past, I've done some of my best rides, my best efforts, in training races, leaving me flat for the "real" stuff on the weekend. I hope that is not what I did last night. For the break's 25 minute duration, we averaged 41.7 kph, and my average heart rate was 171 bpm. This is extraordinary, all red zone, just a few bpm less than my normal max of around 175. I hit 179 in the sprint. Obviously the heat was a factor, but I've only hit 180 twice in the past two years, also under extremely hot conditions both times. This was a huge effort, one that might have been better saved for Concord on Saturday, if I go.
Oh well, I only do this for fun anyway, right? I rolled back to my car at about 5 kph, stopping at the spring with my old mate Big Mig to fill the bottles. I hadn't packed any recovery fuels, so I just took one power gel to try and replenish some glycogen. I was in a haze as I drove home, stopped at the market, where the only bananas they had were so green that King Kong wouln't eat them. I got some Madhouse Mike's chips and ate half the bag, then had a container of potato salad, Amy's cheese enchiladas, and a half container of Stonyfield French Vanilla full-fat organic yogurt when I got home. This was on top of the steak tips over fettucine and asparagus I had for lunch in my employer's stylin' cafeteria. You have to fuel the engine... Thanks for reading.
When we got to fifteen to go, I couldn't believe we'd only been racing for ten laps. There were a few attempts at pacemaking going on, but even though nobody ever mounted a real chase, every move died of natural causes. Everyone was feeling the heat. I saw several guys actually take the suspenders from their bibs down, letting them drape out from under their unzipped jerseys. This was a first for me. I was waiting to see a big takedown when one got caught in a rear wheel.
I conceded to just sitting in and letting the laps tick down. Things got pretty slow at some points, but I figured even a two lap effort at the end was going to force a meltdown, so I should just take the spinning time and be patient, waiting for another, cooler night to do some hard efforts. So much for plans, as with around nine laps to go, two guys, Rob Kramer from Bike Link, and a Boston Bike Club guy, were about ten seconds clear, and I found myself in a good position to bridge. I sprinted away, closing the gap in less then a kilometer, and immediately started pulling. Shortly after, Skip Foley powered across the gap to join us, and now we had a real break. Skip was taking monster pulls, probably about 300 meters. The other two guys were not as useful, but they didn't skip any turns, and didn't slow down when they came through. Not really expecting this to go the distance, I tried to match Skip's efforts as best as I could. The gap grew.
At first, the pace wasn't killing me, because with Skip's twenty second pulls, I was getting around thirty seconds or more of recovery in between each of my efforts. I couldn't see my HR (eyesight is not so good, and with sweaty glasses, the digits are too small), but I was only watching my speed anyway, making sure we never went below 40 kph. Of course, there wasn't much time to drink, and I didn't have much left anyway. The laps ticked down, and we held a nice gap. Six to go, five to go, four to go. Now I was feeling it. The familiar and scary sensation of heat building up under the helmet, pulse pounding in the back of the neck, severe headache coming on. This wasn't going to feel good later on. I took a small amount of my remaining water and squirted it on the back of my head and neck, down through the helmet vents. This brought me about a nanosecond of relief, and I also knew that water was needed inside me too.
Coming up on two to go, we were still a few hundred meters ahead of the field, but a glance back verified that they were now single file, trying hard to close it up. Going by the finish, I knew we had two to go, but the race organizer was fumbling with the lap cards and inadvertently made the bell ring a little bit, fooling Skip. He didn't care if he got fourth out of four, he wanted the break to stay away. I was weakening badly, and when Skip turned on the gas for a monster full-lap pull, he almost broke me. I was clinging to the back of the line, and the other two guys showed no sign of going around him either. When we completed the lap, and now the lap cards read one and Tom was ringing the bell for real, Skip was like, WTF? and he just yelled at us to go and make something of it as he sat up.
We tried, and the BBC guy took a good pull, then I came through, but I was just hanging on, forearms draped over the handlebar tops, faux-aero, on the slight downhill section, not much power left in the legs. We rotated through again, but at around 400 meters one of the Coast punks came bridging solo across the rapidly shrinking gap. I thought he'd go right through us, and I prepared to try to get on his wheel, but he just sat there, waiting for the sprint. Unbelievable. At 200 meters to go, we were winding it up, and the front of the bunch was right on us, and two guys lept out of the field, joining in on the sprint. I was totally gassed, but I didn't want to get run down in the stampede either, so I kept sprinting for all I was worth. At the line, the Coast guy, the BBC guy, and two others from the field crossed ahead of me, but I hung on for fifth.
We call this a training race because there are only small prizes, and it is not a "real" weekend event, doesn't count for upgrading, etc. In the past, I've done some of my best rides, my best efforts, in training races, leaving me flat for the "real" stuff on the weekend. I hope that is not what I did last night. For the break's 25 minute duration, we averaged 41.7 kph, and my average heart rate was 171 bpm. This is extraordinary, all red zone, just a few bpm less than my normal max of around 175. I hit 179 in the sprint. Obviously the heat was a factor, but I've only hit 180 twice in the past two years, also under extremely hot conditions both times. This was a huge effort, one that might have been better saved for Concord on Saturday, if I go.
Oh well, I only do this for fun anyway, right? I rolled back to my car at about 5 kph, stopping at the spring with my old mate Big Mig to fill the bottles. I hadn't packed any recovery fuels, so I just took one power gel to try and replenish some glycogen. I was in a haze as I drove home, stopped at the market, where the only bananas they had were so green that King Kong wouln't eat them. I got some Madhouse Mike's chips and ate half the bag, then had a container of potato salad, Amy's cheese enchiladas, and a half container of Stonyfield French Vanilla full-fat organic yogurt when I got home. This was on top of the steak tips over fettucine and asparagus I had for lunch in my employer's stylin' cafeteria. You have to fuel the engine... Thanks for reading.
Tuesday, August 1, 2006
Summertime Blues
August arrived yesterday, right on schedule. Like the rest of the country, sweet New England finds itself hot as a mofo these days, but all in all our weather this summer has been quite favorable for training. Despite this, my totals reflect only moderate volume, with 226 hours on the bike so far this year. This month, available daylight will diminish at a rapid pace, and in about three more weeks, an after work spin will require some serious hustling.
The good news is my car problems were not as serious as I first thought, and $135 worth of ignition parts seems to have brought things back to normal. This could still end up being a down week for me. I have a massage appt. on Thursday night, and unless I reschedule I'll be unable to make the TT. I'm still undecided about the weekend. The Pan-Mass Challenge rolls through town this weekend, with thousands of recreational cyclists raising millions of dollars to help support cancer research programs at Dana-Farber. I know a few people riding this year, one who has never ridden over 40 miles before. He is in for a treat. This does create complications on some of my local training routes though, so maybe I'll go race after all.
Since I don't have much else, and I need to get into work, I'll leave you with a few links:
Laura Van Gilder at Altoona - WTF?
Sports Psychology
Free Coaching Articles
The Pinnacle Challenge
The Mount A TT
The Green Mountain Stage Race
That's it for now. I know it's not much, but you really don't feel like working, right? Thanks for reading.
The good news is my car problems were not as serious as I first thought, and $135 worth of ignition parts seems to have brought things back to normal. This could still end up being a down week for me. I have a massage appt. on Thursday night, and unless I reschedule I'll be unable to make the TT. I'm still undecided about the weekend. The Pan-Mass Challenge rolls through town this weekend, with thousands of recreational cyclists raising millions of dollars to help support cancer research programs at Dana-Farber. I know a few people riding this year, one who has never ridden over 40 miles before. He is in for a treat. This does create complications on some of my local training routes though, so maybe I'll go race after all.
Since I don't have much else, and I need to get into work, I'll leave you with a few links:
Laura Van Gilder at Altoona - WTF?
Sports Psychology
Free Coaching Articles
The Pinnacle Challenge
The Mount A TT
The Green Mountain Stage Race
That's it for now. I know it's not much, but you really don't feel like working, right? Thanks for reading.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)