Biscotti Madness

WFH ride today:
http://trail.motionbased.com/trail/activity/8380426

Rain

Woke up and it was raining. An hour later it was raining. Got on the bike and it rained for 3 hours. Whatever, I was fine. My bike may look like hell tomorrow but hey, this is life. I've said it before, motivation is easy when you start to see good results. I wonder if the guy who won Tymor rode today :hmmm:

HR Training

So I took the LTHR and defined my tempo/L3 zone. 137-153. Then I set the HRM to beep below 137 and above 153. Jesus what a mistake. Do you have any idea how hard it is to ride exactly in a 16 BPM range? It's hard, which shows when the numbers tell me I spent 1:05 out of zone. At the very least I need to make those numbers 135-155, if not more. I ended up with a HR average of 145, which is exactly in the middle.

I don't know if I like this. On the hills I had to go slower than I'm used to and on the flats I had to go faster than I'm used to. This forces me into a more consistent HR/power output. I don't know if it matters so much that I try to stay in such a rigid zone.

Pushing Up

The one thing I remembered quickly about HR training is that your low points go up in order to stay above the low end of the zone so your average speed gets a boost right away. S while I don't particularly love this ride today, it's probably good to maintain a constant effort throughout.

As the ride wore on, I started to fade towards the end, which probably does suggest I need to work on being consistent for that full 3 hours.

Tomorrow

MD TM. If I'm feeling really saucy I may wake up ultra early and get an hour of recovery in. I have 7.5 hours on the week of more or less solid work, with another 3+ coming Sunday with the team road ride. So an hour easy may do me some good.
 
You know, I actually enjoy it. It's refreshing. If my legs didn't scream so much today it would have even been better.

My bike is not even dry from yesterday. 😀 It was fun....for like an hour. Then I was happy to have Larry with me. Just dont race your SS anymore:getsome:
 
Maurice stopped by today and he said I should race it everywhere. No worries, if I do I'll still race the geared class.

If you choose to race the SS, you should do it in the SS Class. The geared guys will shift up and ride away from you early. You may have the fitness to keep up but will spin out during that early rush to the first single-track.

Your lap times in training may be the same between the two bikes. Place an entire field of racers in front of you and you will be slower on the SS.

I have often considered racing in the geared class and mind-fvcked this. Only a course that went uphill right away would work. Basically, gravity would restrict the geared guys from shifting up and going faster.
 
It's an interesting discussion. I think at LM I'm going to race the SS for sure. At Waway TJ toasted the field on his SS but he had also ridden that course 20 times so he kinda had it dialed. Stewart may also be fit for the SS with the start up the fire road.

What surprised me was that Maurice suggested KVSP was a good place for the SS. I would think that it would be better for gears.

Here's the question. What if my training laps are minutes faster on the SS? I'll go up to Stewart with the geared bike and do a lap of the SS course to see what kind of time I can turn. But it's not race so I can't expect to ride a race pace lap.

Now you're making me mind-fuck it. As if I don't do that enough myself.
 
i get your logic but ben is right. it's sorta the "a knife to a gun fight" kinda thing. unless it's an uphill start as the SS was, you probably won't get your hole shot and have to pick your way through the crowd. kiss number one on ben's list goodbye at that point.
 
Well now you're just daring me to do it. Maurice told me about his Ringwood expert race on the SS. He was last to start, passed everyone on that fire road climb, and won the race.

I find the start of the race tip less important now that I've got more fitness. I can make up more places faster because I'm getting better and better at tip #2.

Honestly I don't really think it's going to matter what bike I choose.

I'd love to see a PM comparison on something like this.
 
So being busy and then vacation, I am finally caught up on your thread. Congrats on killing it at stewart, I am glad to see that the huge amount of miles your are logging is paying off.

So what turned you on to the HR training? I seem to remember a few weeks ago you mentioning that you didn't plan on using on anytime soon. Was this just natural progression for your training, a way to take it to the next level? I could probably find the answers if I read back, but I am lazy.

Great job on the race!
 
Thanks!

I think it started to make sense again when I went on a "recovery" ride and just found myself kinda hammering up a hill at some point. I said to myself that HR might be good at keeping me on the low end when I need to have low-end days.

So then I started wearing it to get an idea of where my HR was. And then I would see that my calories burned according to that were lower than the estimated calories in another chart I use. So then I just left it on a few rides and then figure if I'm going to wear it, I need to do the LTHR test to see where my LT is.

Today was the first official training with HR. I don't know how much of this I will do. Maybe on longer days to stay in a certain area, or recovery days. Not sure yet. But I already can see how it's easy to get zoned out by the numbers and the beeping HRM and lose sight of why you're out there at all.

As I said to Maurice today, structure like that is better on shit days like today when the weather blows. It gives you something concrete to aim for. Otherwise how do you just go and have a nice 2-3 hour ride when it's pissing and 55 degrees in rush hour?
 
I don't know if I like this. On the hills I had to go slower than I'm used to and on the flats I had to go faster than I'm used to. This forces me into a more consistent HR/power output. I don't know if it matters so much that I try to stay in such a rigid zone.

I will normally ignore my HR/Power during climbs and try to maintain speed instead, the efforts are usually so short they don't have any impact on your overall ride:hmmm:

-Jim.
 
Otherwise how do you just go and have a nice 2-3 hour ride when it's pissing and 55 degrees in rush hour?

True dat. I guess my rides are short enough that an hour in the rain (yesterday) on my way to work did seem bad, but it was just an hour so....
 
I will normally ignore my HR/Power during climbs and try to maintain speed instead, the efforts are usually so short they don't have any impact on your overall ride:hmmm:

-Jim.

I think this makes sense. Because I also find myself hammering on downhills to keep this HR number above 137, which is freaking impossible.
 
Well now you're just daring me to do it. Maurice told me about his Ringwood expert race on the SS. He was last to start, passed everyone on that fire road climb, and won the race.

I find the start of the race tip less important now that I've got more fitness. I can make up more places faster because I'm getting better and better at tip #2.

Honestly I don't really think it's going to matter what bike I choose.

I'd love to see a PM comparison on something like this.

i'm not daring you dude. if you think you can do it, go for it. i just want to make sure you think about it. ok, poor choice of words but you get it. if the start isn't going to make or break you and you're faster on the SS i guess the question is 'why the fawk not?'.
 
Did a light 45 minutes at 6:00am this morning.

Then did 4 hours of TM at MD.

Then installed 3 faucets for my in-laws.

Then ate mad food at Chengdu 23 in Wayne.

Now I feel like a cow.

Tomorrow team road ride, 3-4 hours in the hills.
 
Did a light 45 minutes at 6:00am this morning.

Then did 4 hours of TM at MD.

Then installed 3 faucets for my in-laws.

Then ate mad food at Chengdu 23 in Wayne.

Now I feel like a cow.

Tomorrow team road ride, 3-4 hours in the hills.

Every time I see team and hills it makes me cringe.
 
Back
Top Bottom