Training Log Archive: k3n!f

My part for Team Tummy in the winter challenge. I had quite a good race, though some drive train issues plagued me after the epic mud on the climb. I felt like shite for the first 20 mintues, but as soon as we got proper off road I started catching the people that got me on the inital road section. I really enjoyed the downhill though. 8km of muddy, slippery, off camber goodness to keep us on our toes. I managed to hit 63kmph on the gravel road back down the hill!

Overall I'm pretty happy with my time. I heard it was muddier than previous years so I did around what I was expecting in the wet. Great ride!

*UPDATE* We came fourth in the mixed four's, pretty good I feel considering the competition. We were only six minutes back on cyclingo, an improvement on the summer survival. I am pretty happy with my time of 1:04:47, ~11 minutes faster than Tummy's time from last year. From the results it seems the course was around 3 minutes slower this year for the mtb as well.

Congratulations to Tummy for beating Ryanie's time! Also a big thanks to Ryanie who ran for us and stuffed his ankle in the process. Maybe next year Ryanie could do the roadie and beat Tummy's time.....

Also a massive thanks to Rosie, who paddled like the wind to bring us home, and also bought us a ticket of entry into the mixed category....

I would also like to point out that the overall standings mirrored the times for the mountain bike stage, conclusively proving that mtb is superior and the most important stage. I thus take full responsibility for taking us to fourth place, and will train harder to next year so we can win!

C • Thanks kenif 2

Headed out with Miss Quayle for a quick spin and bike check before the race tomorrow. We went down Mt. Nelson then back up to the Signal Station just to get the blood flowing. We too it pretty cruisy though, 13kmph for a road ride is almost going backwards....

Cyclingo group ride. I was right, my legs are tired and stiff after yesterday....

I kept it pretty cool, calm and collected and rode at the back just to spin my legs out. I even headed home early instead of going down skyline and then having to go back up Mt. Nelson.

John Clingo enquired about our team. Hopefully this time we can try to get a bit closer to them then the Summer Survival, though there team is still sounding pretty strong.

The rivalry continues!

Karate session. Going to have sore legs tomorrow after the squat kicks et al. Did some cool throws too....

Quick check of fitness prior to resting for the remainder of the week. I got home quite late so I only had time to sprint to the signal station and back. I was pretty pleased though:

Top shop 5:56
Signal station 11:48
Round trip back to home 18:02

The best time I could find in my log was 11:36 to the signal station which was done prior to wildside so I must be in reasonable shape. I reckon I would have been pretty close if I bothered with some sneaky magic and changed tire pressure and locked my forks out.

Fantastic ride! I forgot how much more fun riding is when the weather is really nice! Best ride for ages!

Headed all around the OG tracks, including pinning the tight twisty fun downhill bit, then over the Tolman's Hill tracks to the dam, back down the rocky quarry track and a quick College loop before heading home.

I was focusing on pedaling smooth circles and felt really good today, though my legs are fried now (just in time to head off to karate).

C • all ready kenif?!? 2

Standard issue Saturday karate session. There weren't many people there so we finished early. Lucky, because my legs were pretty much toast....

Headed out for a nice casual ride because the weather was nice, but ended up pushing reasonably hard considering I was just out for a cruise. I thought I would check my time to the signal station, a slight variation on my old 20MP route. I ended up getting 20:06, three and a half minutes slower than my best. Granted I added a little bit of track, maybe thirty seconds, and it was wet as hell, but I was still a bit disappointed with my time.

Maybe I was just tired from the ride yesterday, or maybe I'm just fat and slow like tummy.

Rain coat testing.....

Intervals 30, 60, 90, 120 with the same recovery. I thought as I finished work with day light left I really should go riding, despite the rain. I think off road would have been a bit slippy so I pansied out and hit the road.

New rain coat gets two thumbs up!

C • A nice roadie.... 3

Today's ride was a massive exercise in wishful thinking. I thought, despite the rain, I would head out to smash some intervals and then do some suspension testing on the way home with some tweaked settings. Unfortunately the pissing rain turned my suspension experiment into an investigation probably more relevant to the vast topic of "how to steer a bike down a river, without being able to steer".

Still some intervals hopefully made the trip worthwhile, 30 seconds, 60 seconds, 90 seconds and then 120 seconds with the same rest afterward. I still only managed to get my heart rate to 185, despite spending most of the ride in the 170's. I wouldn't mind trying another heart rate monitor to see if dad's cheapie is causing an artifact...

Good ride still, though the only thing I really achieved was excessive wear on break pads and drive train.

A nice lazy weekend ride filled with hills....

I rode from my house to Fern Tree over Tolmans' Hill, smashing the climbs as much as I possibly could. I felt really good climbing, seem to be getting into shape after slacking for a few months. Time to the Fern Tree shop 39 minutes flat.

Then headed up to Silver Falls, down the track that Timmy loves and back down S56 before heading home over Tolmans' Hill in the reverse direction. Average speed for the ride 17.2kmph.

I dropped my tire pressure even lower to 22psi front and 26psi rear and really liked the extra traction and comfort, but I think that will be about as low as I'm willing to go. That's pretty loooooowwwwwwwwwww.

Overall a fantastic ride. I'm starting to get some confidence back in the mud with these new tires which is making the descents really fun!

C • 39 minutes 11

Great birthday ride! Did a fairly hard route today, so an average speed around 15.8kmph was pretty tidy I feel.

I let some pressure out of the tires and really liked the increase in traction and ride comfort. Hopefully letting more pressure out will make them even better!

Legs were still a bit tired after the group ride the other day, but otherwise I felt quite good.

Currently 24 psi front, 28 psi rear.

Oh that's loooooooooowwwwwwww!

Cylcingo group ride. Was a fantastic ride, heading up to Junction Cabin and then bombing back down the mountain in the dark and in the mud. I am still really impressed with these tires, hopefully they will last a long time.

The new stem seems to have done the job. A 2 hour ride with almost no back pain is certainly an improvement on before! The new saddle still needs some more hours to break in, currently the only thing thats breaking is my arse.

I rode really well tonight, smashed the climbs really well and actually managed to lead the pack along north south track to junction cabin. I was a little reserved on the downhills though, a combination of running out of energy, crashing last group ride and testing the new tires meant I didn't really push as hard as I could have.

End of essay.

Nice right shortly after the epic morning rain. I started off with 4 x 30 second intervals and then a 1 minute sprint to finish off. I felt like I struggled a bit with these today so I must still be recovering from the plague.

I borrowed dad's heart rate monitor for fun and was consistently in the 170-180 range. Unfortunately, the maximum heart rate I could get to was 185bpm. Maybe I'll have another go later in the week because theoretically I should be pushing 200ish.

It was muddy as hell and slippery as fark and the new tires loved it! I have a bit of experimenting to do to get the right pressure but otherwise I am really really impressed with their performance.

Great ride today, ride it like it's dry!

Good training session tonight. Pretty tired from this mornings ride though!

Back by popular demand (thanks timmy and rhyno), considering I'm on holidays for the week and trying to get fit before the winter challenge I thought I should log.

First ride back after a week of the plague. Just went for a cruisy ride with dad to see how I was recovering and to try out the new tires, stem and saddle. So far so good, tires were particularly good compared with their predecessors. Saddle is still quite hard so might need some breaking in and the stem will take some getting used to with the snappier steering.

Great to be out riding again!

C • new bits 5