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Training for the Summer
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24-01-2011 10:43pm#1I have one very specific plan for the Summer; cycle 1200 km through Switzerland and France, taking in the Col d'Iseran along the way. Well, I say specific, it's rather protracted and somewhat vague, really, but that's how it goes!
So, I'm going to log my efforts at attaining the required level of fitness here in the hope that somebody else might spot it when I'm doing something wrong/stupid/pointless. Also, it'd be cool to share notes with other people doing something similar
I have a rough idea of how hard it'll be, but I've never experienced anything like the Col, so that will require a lot of training. I know I'll need to get a lot of km in the saddle before July, and I have some plans laid out for that, which I'll detail in a separate post, so as to prevent this one from getting too long. I also have most of my kit sorted out from a previous trip, so I'll stick up details of that too.0
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So, a bit of background;
I did my first mini tour last November, from Munich to Salzburg and back. And you know when you do something new and cool? And you know how it always seems like a great idea to just dive in and go for something even cooler as soon as you can? That's kinda what I might have gone and done...
I've made plans (well, Captain Havoc made plans and I tagged along) to go cycling in France and Switzerland this summer. My total route is 1200 km, taking in the Col d'Iseran along the way;
Thu 07/07 - Munich-Freiburg (train) and Freiburg-Besancon (180 km)
Fri 08/07 - Besancon - Chalon sur Saone (115 km)
Sat 09/07 - Chalon sur Saone - Roanne (135 km) - meeting the Captain here.
Sun 10/07 - Roanne - Isle d'Abeau (120 km)
Mon 11/07 - Rest day, possibly watching the Alpe d'Huez finish of the Etape du Tour
Tue 12/07 - Isle d'Abeau - Saint jean de Maurienne (145 km)
Wed 13/07 - Saint Jean de Maurienne - Seez (130 km) - day of the Col.
Thu 14/07 - Seez - Geneva (135 km)
Fri 15/07 - Geneva - Bern (145 km)
Sat 16/07 - Bern - Zuerich (115 km)
Sun 17/07 - train back to Munich.
All this has been already booked and mostly paid for (apart from the trains, which I can't book until three months in advance) so there's no backing out now! I have five and a half months to whip myself into shape, and this log will hopefully serve as some sort of motivational tool to make sure I keep going 0 -
I was at home over Christmas and for the first three weeks of January, so I'm starting a little late with training, and I haven't been doing much in over a month. However, I've dug my mountainbike out from the cellar so I'm going to start some spins on that in the snow
So, the rough plan is to get up to around 200 km a week average on the bike. I'll be living in Munich city from about two weeks from now, which means a 15 km commute to work and back every day, giving me 150 km a week straight off. Adding in a weekend spin should bring up the distance nicely.
I'll also be doing some running for cross training/something different and hopefully some swimming to strengthen the upper body, specifically my back. It gets ruined from my crap posture on chairs and from shooting. I probably won't have time for too much of that during the week, however, maybe a couple of sessions total, at most. This is all very ambitious and I probably won't get half of it done, but I should get enough
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Week one of "training" down. Didn't get a lot done this week, still settling back into work and such, and the general nastiness of the weather isn't helping.
Running: one 7 km jog, just to ease the legs back into it. I'll hopefully do two next week, maybe up to three the week after.
Bike: various commuting bits, probably 25 km or so.
Also went out for a snowy forest spin today, just 35 km into the English Gardens and back out. It was nice, if a little cold. The drinking tube of my water froze within about 20 mins, so I had no water for the spin
It did look pretty, though...
I'll ramp it up again a bit next week, I'm trying not to overdo it for the moment. Or something. Hopefully the snow will clear off soon enough so I can get back on the road again. A lot of the bike paths are currently quite nasty with compacted and/or frozen snow. Soon, soon it will be warmer. Maybe.0 -
So I'm still more or less on track, the slow one that it is. I was aiming for 100 km last week, and ended up doing just over that Snow permitting, I'll get back on the road this week and start really ramping it up with longer weekend spins.
The main bit for last weekend was a spin on Sunday. I was planning on doing an offroad cyle along the Isar, but got a call at the train station asking to go for a road cycle. Which I accepted, with my MTB (road bikes are still in the cellar ). It was pretty tough going, keeping up with a roadie, and I really suffered on any gradients. That's an unusual feeling for me, as I'm normally one of the faster people up climbs! 3" tyres just suck all the energy out of you when out of the saddle.. Still, 55 km done, which is the main thing!
I've started a strava profile, cos it's the easiest way to keep track of longer spins and where I've been. At least I can actually see the data, unlike on Garmin Training Center. I do cringe a little at having an "athlete's profile", though. I need to get a hell of a lot faster to justify that! Anybody know what the power calculation is like on this? I presume it's pretty junk, but any idea how much?0 -
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So last week kinda bombed out a little bit. Searching for a new flat in Munich is a right pain. Kitchens: they should stay in the apartments they get installed in. Srsly.
Anyway, I finished the week on 60 km, all done on the MTB again. Still haven't gotten my road bikes out, which is hampering the whole training thing somewhat. I wasn't really in much of a mood for off roading in the pitch black last week. I know I could take the MTB on the road, but it's just not fun.
I did have a rather nice spin on Sunday, though. Around 30 km along the river on some nice singletrack. Proper stuff too, complete with tree roots, small streams and lots of rocks! (I know, I'm far too excited about that, but I thought it was great!)
Anyway, some pics:
Also, a new breakthrough for me: I managed to cycle without holding the handlebars for the first time ever. This was on the road, obviously. I have enough problems staying upright as it is offroad.. I know it's a silly little thing that every 5 y/o can do, but I've only been at this 2.5 years. I'm still getting over the fear of falling thing.
This week needs to really pick up the pace. Otherwise I'm gonna be so totally screwed for my trip. Ah, sure it'll be grand...0 -
This ended up not being a half bad week. I got my road bikes back out of the cellar (along with most of the rest of my stuff) so I got back into proper training, or my approximation of it, again.
The MTB saw a much reduced distance this week since all of my spins were done on the road. I wanted to go for an off-road cycle yesterday, but just didn't really have the time.
Had a pretty decent spin today on the road, though. I did a partially similar route to one that I had done two weeks ago on the MTB and it just went so much better. I could lash up the hills faster, felt better after them. The cold and wind ended up getting the better of me in the end, though. I lost all power after the first 50-60 km. Total distance was 90 km, which I covered in about four hours total, or 3.5 rolling. I tend to stop a lot to figure out where the hell I am/fix leg warmers.
I need to work on my flexibility more, I just don't have power when I'm in the drops at the moment. I put the spin on my strava profile here. It's somewhat annoying with the whole having to log in to see things, and only putting up 5 rides a month, but it's the best I've seen so far for mapping and presentation of performance (such as it is).
So, for the week:
Distances: fixie ~ 40 km
MTB ~ 20 km
P-X ~ 90 km
total ~ 150 km
Time: unkown (really shouldn't have deleted stuff) but something like 4 hrs (P-X) + 1.5 hrs (MTB) + 2 hrs (fixie)*
* these are mostly made up. I'm going on presumed average speeds...
No pics. My camera took a tumble going over a bump, so I decided to keep it safe in a zipped pocket all day. Seems to be fine now, though, despite a 40 km/hr collision with the ground
I should get something similar done again next week. Though possibly not, come to think of it, what with heading home for the election thingamijob at the weekend. Probably won't get in a long midweek spin, but we'll see!0 -
...and we gloss right over week ending 27th of February.. (got nothing done bar some commuting )
..and go into this week, which was much more successful. Friday night, I did some short hill intervals, 23 km total distance travelled. Kept a decent pace for the whole thing, hammered up the climb and was pretty happy with the lung busting effort it entailed.
Saturday, I was meant to go for a long group spin. This ended up getting cancelled as it was still quite frosty down by one of the lad's gafs. A windstopper jacket was bought that day. Now I just need some decent cold weather shorts or 3/4 lengths. Anybody got any suggestions? Only 15 km covered, but kept a high pace, leaving aside the annoying stopping at traffic lights in the city.
Today, I got a longer spin in, even if the quality was crap. Too much stop starting with the group so I wound up getting cold and freewheeling half the time. No major efforts bar sprinting with traffic in the city. I'd forgotten how much fun that is 67 km all in, bringing the weekly road bike total to 105 km. Add in another 33 km on the fixie for commuting and this makes it an alright week.
Total for the year so far is:
245 on the road bike
85 on the fixie
~300 on the MTB, but I need to check that...
So about 630 for the year so far. Not a lot, and I had been hoping to be a bit further, but it's a good start. I'm moving into the city next week, so I'll have a 30 km round trip commute daily from then on which should push the distance right up.
Also, I've come across one nice thing as regards my pedalling: focussing more on lifting my knees (something like running) seems to give me a much better pedal stroke. It's much more consistent with only a small bit of a dead spot. I had probably figured it out before, but forgot it due to a lack of clipless pedals. Anyway, feels much better and much faster. It may require a higher saddle position as it seems to encourage a more obtuse foot angle than I'm used to. Any thoughts on this? Good/bad/makes no odds so long as you're comfortable? I've read that Joe Friel suggests a more acute angle for better power output...0 -
Very quick update:
Just cleared 1000 km total distance yesterday Quite pleased with myself, though it's still only tiny. The 34 km daily round trip to work is going rather well, I must say.
I've done a few longer weekend spins as well, which are on strava and Garmin connect. I still prefer strava, but it's not as accessible, and I can toss anything onto Garmin connect as often as I'd like.
Highlights of that spin: (yes, shamelessly stealing from other Boardsies)
Keeping a pretty average HR and speed for the whole thing.
Actually doing the 120 odd km solo without dying.
Lowlights:
Two punctures. I haven't had any in 6 months, then POW!
Horrible weather. The rest of the week was great, just not that day. Windy and very wet.
Should be heading out again this weekend, get lots more in the legs. I'm intending on hitting about 1000 km a month, minimum for most of the rest of the year. 185 from commuting plus another 100 at the weekend should see that being no problem. I hope...0 -
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Had a pretty good one last week. 170 km commuting on the fixie and 165 km on the road bike Saturday ride is here and here. We won't speak of the Sunday spin, as it involved crashing while going uphill. Remind me not to do that again. It's not a lot of fun.
I recently got a Specialized toupe saddle, 130 mm. After a slight tweak to the position, it's now pretty much perfect. I can get into a great position, it's comfortable and supports my weight well. If anybody has any links to a good deal on them, or is selling one, I'll probably pick up one or two more for the other bikes. Next on the list: narrower handlebars.
This weekend, a longer day taking in a few passes over the Alps is planned with the group. It'll be my first day doing proper climbing, so I'm somewhat anxious about it, but we'll see how it goes. I'm gonna swap out the 11-25 cassette for a 12-27, if I can get my hands on one. Hopefully it'll be fine...
Highlights:
First time in a proper group and learning how to work in a paceline correctly.
Getting up most of the (small) hills first
Lowlights:
Crashing on Sunday, possibly wrecking a tyre in the process...0 -
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Oh. My. God. The Alps are incredibly beautiful. Like, really. No, seriously. Some nice climbing, some horrendous climbing (more later), amazing views and descents. The day helped, it was fabulous weather. Pics here.
So, overall stats: 125 km, average rolling speed of about 27. Apparently 1600 meters up, but that includes the little crappy rises in the road, rather than the trough to peaks of the four climbs. Strava and Garmin connect.
There were 7 of us in the group, though it was a little on the messy side. It was mostly triathletes out, one of which doesn't ever seem to have ridden in a group before. He was on the front, on aerobars, giving it socks. I was feeling hard pressed to keep the pace in the line, as were other people. It was pretty windy in the mountains, and mostly a crosswind, which the line gave no protection from. The easier climbs were actually something of a respite, especially since I was leading on the complete first one and part of the second one.
The main climb of the day, which I was told about 10 km before we hit it, was 4.5 km of 10% gradient pain. Strava puts it as a Cat2. I was pretty much totalled before we hit it from the lead up, so it was never going to go well, but it really was difficult. I'm damn glad I put on a 12-27 cassette the night before. I might not have been able to turn the pedals at 34/25. Well, I probably would, but this made it a lot easier. I need to pace a bit better on longer climbs, though. I was in 3rd place for most of it, 2nd from 1km left and then dropped two places in the last 500 m. 20 and 10 s from 2nd and 3rd, which I'm still kicking myself over.
Other than that, it was just a really nice trip. Very scenic, not a lot of traffic. Descending was amazing, really fast in a lot of places. It rounds off well a 14 day stretch without a break. Total distance in that of around 750 km or something, averaging to around 50 a day. I think I'm getting into fairly decent shape, though I need a lot more climbing practice.
Interestingly, looking at the trend of my maximum heart rate since February, it's been coming down week on week. It was well into the low 200s in February, yesterday was 195 on the climb. Most days it's around 190. I'm taking this as a sign of increasing fitness and strength, though I also need to measure my resting heart rate some morning. Also, the weight is lowering off at a much nicer rate than previous years. Down from 65 to 63 in a month, which I think is pretty decent. Should drop it another little bit before the Summer and then be in good shape for the tour
YTD so far:
road 750 km
fixie 500 km
MTB 300 km
total 1550 km
The yearly goal is 10,000 km, so I'm about a thousand off target, but accelerating quite a bit at the moment. I should get on track in the next few months, I think.
Highlights:
Pain
Scenery
Not collapsing on the hills
Lowlights:
Pain
Losing the hill with a few hundred meters to go0 -
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Well, that was an interesting week. It seems my elation at not being wrecked after Sunday's cycling and running may have been somewhat premature: I got through Monday fine, and got in on Tuesday morning fine. I started to, well, bonk, basically, during the day on Tuesday. Couldn't get enough food into me, got really tired, temperature climbed, etc. Happens every so often, and appears to be my body's way of resetting.
So kilometerage is down this week, but I still got a long spin, as well as 3 days of commuting. Unfortunately, strava and garmin connect will show about a 20 km shorter spin than I actually did. The Garmin decided that it also wanted a reset, so turned itself off part way through. When I turned it back on, it was still mapping as it had before, so I naturally assumed that the timer was also going. Not so much. So I lost out on one of the nicer sections of the ride before I noticed. I might take a look at the raw file and see what my average speed was there. If it was higher, I'll try to incorporate it; if it was lower, well, we'll let that slide :P
For the training spin yesterday, I was planning to basically do zone 3 intervals. I'm basing my zones on a max HR of 205, then 60,70,80,90% of that. Not the best way to go about it, I know, but I haven't done any 1 hour TTs to get a good basis for FTP HR yet. It's on the list for later in the Summer. The rest part of the interval didn't go so well. Next time I do it, I'm going to just have heart rate, cadence, and time of day on the screen. Speed is far too much of a distraction, and I can look at it later.
At the start, I tried not paying attention to cadence and pushing a little harder with my legs than normal. This was maybe not the best idea, as they felt tired for the rest of the day. Lesson learned there anyway. I think I just prefer higher cadence anyway, what with the low gearing on my fixie.
Back in Ireland for the weekend now anyway, so no more work to be done this week. A lowly 195 km, much down on previous weeks. But probably for the best if I can come back swinging next week 0 -
So it seems I may have had too good a time back home :P I had an annoying cough and cold all week that kept me off the bike. Everything seemed alright on Friday, though, so I got out for a 30 minute run to get me back into shape and then a nice spin today. Well, I say nice... Strava and Garmin connect.
I took the train down as far south as the main city lines would take me, then set off towards the mountains. Nothing too strenuous, I just wanted to get in some repeats of a longish climb. It's not terribly tough - 5% average gradient (though that's pretty consistent the whole way up), but has some length to it - 5km, so I thought it'd be good for a bit of confidence building and general practice. Three ascents, trying to keep the heart rate up a bit on the descent. It all seemed pretty decent, really. Nothing terribly impressive, but 800 m of climbing in an hour and a half isn't too bad. 20 mins up, 6 back down.
I need more work on more challenging up parts, and a LOT more work on the down part. I kept losing a lot of speed on the corners. This particular climb is nice for that kind of practice, lots of nice switchbacks The cycle back to the train was hell, there was a nasty headwind for a lot of it. That, and I was wrecked 
A chocolate milkshake there and a nap on the train helped out with that.
So, for the week:
Running: 30 mins.
Cycling: 95 km + to and from the train station (i.e. just keeping my head above 100 km)
Total for the year so far:
Road bike: 1010 km
Fixie: 780 km
MTB 300 km
Total: 2090 (woot, over 2 k km )
Average speed recorded by the Garmin is 23 km/hr, though that's lowered by February (20 km/hr) and has all the stops included. I have no idea what my average rolling speed is. I suspect my average on the fixie is about the same, if not a bit higher. It's normally 25 km/hr from a full week of commuting.0 -
I'm going to be away again this weekend (Manchester to see my girlfriend and go to a Hugh Laurie gig ) so I decided to try to get out during the week for once. I hate any of the variations I can put on my commute to make it longer, so I said I'd head out for something reasonably near, yet tough.
Reading through one of Lumen's old training logs, I decided to geek out a little and do some measurements. By some, I mean one. I wanted a rough idea of my Lactate Threshold Heart Rate (LTHR) because... well, just cos, really. So, following the method from Joe Friel, I set off to the forest where I thought I'd have enough of a stretch to go hard for 30 minutes. I'm not that fast :P
As it turns out (strava and garmin connect), my chosen route wasn't quite long enough so I had to make a few sharpish turns to get enough distance out of it. Lowered the HR a touch, but hopefully not too much. The average HR for the last 20 mins was 180 (lap 3), which is higher than I thought it would be. Distance covered in the full 30 mins was recorded at 16 km, which is somewhat pathetic. It should be a little higher, as I lost signal in the forest on the way back a few times. Also, I was slowed down towards the end (when I still had a minute to go) by a group of cyclists standing at the entrance to the forest, and by a car who beeped at me; I assumed I was on a one way street 'cos it was narrow, so I turned around, but on further reflection, she may just not have liked cyclists.
Thinking back over the run, it didn't seem that bad. I feel fine today and feel that I could have gone harder. Then I think back to how I felt on it and realise that I was going pretty hard (laboured breathing, snot on gloves). I could possibly have pushed harder on the way out, but I just didn't really have it in me. Long story short, I'm pretty slow, but I think I can go faster. Not harder, just faster.
After I get home this evening, I'll have clocked about 170 km this week. I've been lagging on the distance a bit the last few weeks, but it'll pick up again. And, let's face it, July will be a big month :P Next test: 1 hour TT. But not for a while. Maybe.0 -
The last two weeks (I know, I'm lazy for not updating) have been quite good overall. I've been back to commuting and out on the weekends as well, 80 last weekend with a friend, 120 solo this weekend. Plus 170 commuting both weeks brings me to 540 over the two weeks. Not a massive amount, but there was a lot of intensity packed into it. There's a good stretch of my commute that I'm putting down some decent speed on now. Well, decent for me, like.
Last Sunday was a nice easy spin with one of the lads, just spinning around, not really pushing it. This weekend I decided to be a bit more stupid and push from the get go. The results were rather promising though. And a good indication that I am getting fitter. I did the same spin two months ago with another of the lads, kept more or less the same average speed, but with a higher heart rate. Obviously this isn't directly comparable as I think I spent a lot more time above threshold on that spin, but faster (solo, in a pair I reckon we could get a lot more out) for a lower heart rate sounds good to me.
Distance stats so far for the year:
Fixie: 1300 km (as of today)
Road bike: 1250 km
MTB: 320km
Total: 2870 km. To hit 10k km I should be on 3850 or so, meaning I'm down about 25%. July will see a good chunk of a ramp, though, so I can probably make up most of the extra distance there. Also, I'm typically coming in above the weekly 220 required to make the target, so it should be fine. Next year, I'll buy a turbo or something...
I'll be at the 300 km mark by Friday evening, so yay! Also, I have a new saddle coming for the MTB this week some time, so I'll start to get out on that a bit more. It has a long way to go to catch up on the other two, but I'll make a bit of a stab at it. It does need to pay for itself in terms of euro:km. I have a maximum of 1 euro per km travelled per bike per year. The fixie is totally winning at a cost price of around 300 quid, and the road bike has just broken even for the year
Also, I was quite bold during the week and bought these. I have no idea why* as I don't need them and certainly am not fast enough to warrant them. But it has planted ideas for testing in my head. More after July, when I have time for testing :P
I think overall I'm in decent shape. A lot better than November, when I did my trip to Salzburg and back, so I should manage the trip with the Captain in one piece. I reckon I'll be grand, so long as I remember to pace myself. Which can sometimes be an issue, but I also reckon that even if I do tank myself after day two, I can take it handier afterwards. At 120 km a day average, it's two groups of 3 hours cycling, and that's if I'm really taking it easy. The Col will be the "fun" part. I'm looking forward to it
BTW, sorry for the rambling nature of the posts. To anybody who reads these regularly, I apologise, this is more or less stream of consciousness for 20 mins It'll hopefully get a bit more structured in the Summer when I work out what I want to do next year and start planning and building a plan towards that.
*I know why: I'm attracted to shiny pretty things, and they were massively discounted. I so don't care that they weigh 1890g, they'll look awesome I'm justifying the weight by planning to put something reasonably light like Ultremos on them and shaving off a few grams elsewhere on the bike. 0 -
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Apologies for double posting today, but I've got pretty graphs! Well, one pretty graph, one spreadsheet.
The spreadsheet is my list of stuff that I'm taking on the trip. It covers everything I think I'll need. So far. More may get added, I might take some stuff away. Total weight is 6.3 kg, with around 400 g of stuff that I don't class as necessary. I think the only real additions as such (i.e. stuff I don't take when out on the bike anyway) comes to 2.6 kg in the bag, plus 850 g for the bag itself. So it shouldn't be all that bad. Some more weight has come off me as well, so hopefully it won't slow me down too much.
The other thing is a graph of my progress since the start of the year.
I'm taking average speed over average heart rate (vaguely output over input) to be a good measure of how I'm progressing. The line has a positive slope. Yay! Also, as a measure of overall fitness, max heart rate is probably a decent one as well, which trends downwards. Yay! If I can ever remember to start taking resting heart rate measurements in the morning, it'll add a lot to the data set.0 -
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So... erm, it's sorta been a while since I updated this. I have good excuses reasons, though, so it's all good, right? Right. Good.
Since last time, things got a bit hectic over here, with people over to visit and conferences and conference prep and that thing I did in France and Switzerland. The details of that particular event are over on our specific thread for it (linked in my sig).
Just a quick status update (for now):
Distances:
Fixie: 18 commutes = 612 km (total now 2082 km)
MTB: nothing new apart from unrecorded hopping around town (total 320 km)
Road bike: 174 km pre-holiday + approx 800 km on holiday = 975 (new total 2275)
New grand total: 4677 km
I'm still short of where I need to be by a bit under a thousand km, so I'll need to do some more work. I might cycle to Prague or something, that should kick it up a little... Hitting 10,000 is really going to come down to the wire, I'm not sure if I'm going to make it I was hoping to be above target by this stage in the year, especially given that it's going to be hard to make distance come Winter, and the fact that I don't have a bike in Ireland.
I might get the files from my trip up, but my Garmin seems to not want to give them up. I have partial files downloaded, but short of trawling through them by hand, it may not work out... I shall see.0
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