Training Log Archive: veinbuster

Another beautiful dawn ride. A few degrees warmer than yesterday and much more wind, but it didn't really get gusty until the last 7 or so km so I didn't mind.

I wore my distance prescription today and was very surprised how many nuts, bolts, nails and other metal bit were on the road. It's no wonder I've been getting so many flats. I might have to reconsider questioning the race tires.

I did notice that the last few weeks my routes are consistently coming up short time wise by 5-10 minutes. The loop I tacked on today resulted in a surprising sub 10 interval. Good pace all weekend, but I'm particularly happy about the heart rate containment. I should give a shout out to Bent for reminding me that it is ok to spin up a hill in a low gear - if someone as strong as him can do it, I certainly can.

C • Spinning up hills 2

Cool dawn ride on mostly open road. At 7C is took a long time for the legs to warm up with just one layer. They felt chill for 20km and didn't really feel warmed up until almost 30 km. I did turn a couple of nice intervals after that before getting back to the red light district.

Distance might be a bit short because I forgot to write it down.

I did remember to unclip heel out all day and my right knee appreciates it.

Snack note: best combination all year with a Thunderbird cashew, fig carrot bar combined with the very last (expired) Pocket Fuel chocolate smackaroon).

It was a perfect day for a ride in the country. I took the single speed for a couple of reasons, even though it was a longer ride than I would normally consider it for. First, it was quite windy and I thought that would matter less on the single speed. It is very stable and it moves at a pace that discourage caring about your speed. Second, it needed a test ride after fixing the front disc - replacing a spring that had broken after being compromised in a traffic incident earlier in the year. I hadn't noticed until I put new tires on and was putting the bike back together. It turns out there was another benefit it that in this part of PA people pile their leaves on the side of the road. Those piles were typically knee high, 1 1/2 metres wide and 10-15 metres long - not well suited to a 24mm tire.

Almost 20C. Clear blue sky. Perfect.

Lesson relearned: I took a free soy based energy bar with me. My stomach reacted much the same way it did when I last did that some years ago. Quite unpleasant. I guess my stomach knows I shouldn't be ingesting that stuff anyway.

Day 2 free weights, pushups, abs

Another arms test in part to warm up my heart and in part to compare the arms power:heart rate to that for the legs.
I just took one data point today for 100 watts. This is about the most I think is sustainable with my arms. Now that I have the setup right I'll take a longer session one day to see, but it is just curiosity - at least until I have enough leisure time to get my kayak/canoe out more.
The legs give that power at a heart rate 15-20 bpm lower.

Another test of the trainer, this time with the heart monitor on so I could start to map power to heart rate. I did it by the book with a nice long warm up, ramping up the power every 5 minutes for 30 minutes before testing some limits. Today I did everything with slope set to 0
In the tighter part of the cassette each gear added about 15 watts.
Upping the cadence was less linear, but at moderate effort 10 rpm (from 80 baseline) added about 20 watts.
100-110 watts felt like a recreational ride - heart rate < 100
120-130 watts seems like a good early warmup/cool down - heart rate < 120
150 watts was good for recovery from a higher effort - heart rate drops from 160s to 120s
160-170 watts felt sustainable for quite a long time - I expect this will work out to be my steady state rate; i.e. one I could manage for 100km - heart rate low 140s
200-250 watts will need some testing to see how long I can hold it - another day for that - heart rate 150s

After a good warm up I knocked it into the top gear and eased into a progressive cadence increase.
512 watts on first run
second run, I couldn't hit 500, but I realized I had been so focused on the trainer numbers that I had neglected my breathing, so I took a recovery to get that in order
550 watts on the third run - I don't think I can beat this without increasing the slope. The cadence is about as high as I can go in my top gear. Another day, I'll see if I have enough power in my legs to beat that reading on a modest slope.
My heart rate peaked at 168 on each run, so there is certainly potential to hit a bigger number.

Other observations:
It will be a nuisance to overlay my Garmin chart with the Tacx chart to see how the heart rate moves with power. I got such a good deal on the trainer, I can't really complain. I may look for a USB ANT to use with the Garmin strap.

I'll have to break down and get a front wheel support to replace the phone book I've used for years. I'll set it to hold the wheel slightly right to give my left knee more clearance from the bar mounted controller.

The Bacchetta seat is not very comfortable in the seating position I had to set to clear the handle bar hardware - enough so that I stopped short of the planned hour.

C • So much fun! 5

The extra loop checking in case the Monte Blanc pen someone borrowed from my desk while I was on the stairs had in fact fallen out of my pocket. No such luck. Maybe they will recognize that the pen they are using is too nice for them and send it back.

My right knee was pretty good until the extra loop.

Day 1 free weights

Day 3 resistance bands and push ups.