Tuesday 7 August 2012

All sorts of Training

Training over the past couple weeks has bee going pretty good for me.
I think i have been hitting my 100 miles a week possibly more but i havent actually counted yet.
Im not going to go into much detail at all about any of my routes, but i will post the links to my garmin recorder rides just so you can see what sort of distances i have done and if you live in the area, what sort of routes you can take if you want to try some new routes. or try and beat my times..

Just a simple, easy ride, mainly downhill.

Smashed out a big 82 mile ride. Was pretty difficult but kept a 15.5mph avg. Also a high top speed that was very scary!

fairly fast shortish blast.

went out with the yogi cycling club to spin my legs in prep for the time trial.

Warm up ride to get to the time trial event. was further away than i was remembered which was a bit annoying. Felt like it was too long.

and again my TT race.

I have missed some rides out here as they were before i got the Garmin edge200 gps. so not much i can do as i cant remember.

I have tried to make sure that i keep things intersting by mixing things up. On the days that i havent done any rode cycling, i have been riding my cyclocross course ( will put up images and map of that soon), practicing cyclocross riding technique i.e bunnyhoping logs, doing turns on grass as fast as i can untill i fall off to find the limits, running with the bike, mounting and dismounts and steep decents. This again i  might post some videos of me doing it or something if i can find someone bored enough to come with me and film/photo it. Just so it gives you guys a better feel of this bike handleing training.  
Talking of finding my limits, i definitely found it last Friday night. I was practising my cyclocross course, hit a concrete wet corner at a good speed, forgetting it gets slippery when wet and greasy. Went to sprint out and the rear wheel-span, lost the front wheel at hit the floor whilst spanking the floor with my hand and slid across on my front into the muddy bank on the side. I thought it was quite funny at the time because it came out of nowhere. Only realised it wasn't so funny when i saw that my new bar tape had ripped...dam it. I then decided that this could be a fun corner so I went back did it a couple times getting a big DH style drift through the corner. didn't fall this time. : )

I have also been doing some circuit training with my friends. This is a good bit of fun and is a good test for fitness. We did it a couple of time on the beach which has proved to be the hardest for sure. doing Shuttles/ sprints on sand is just straight up ridiculous. This is the circuit:
- 1mile high intensity cycling   or  10 sprint shuttles
- 8 chin ups
- 30 crunches
- 15 burpees
- 15 press ups
- 30 squats
- 1 mile ride   or  10 sprint shuttles
- 10 chest press'
- 20 sit-ups
- 10 feet elevated press ups
- 15 lunges each leg
- 15 tricep dips
- 1 mile ride or  10 sprints
we try to have about at least a 20 sec rest in-between each thing and do the circuit 2-3 times with a minute or two rest between each circuit.
Cant remember how long this takes all together. But, i think im allergic to it as i get really warm, sweaty, short of breath and have aches and pains over my body... Sometimes i question why anyone works out..

So this has pretty much what i have been upto since i last blogged.
Ill get my course map and images up soon.
catch you peoples then..

also, Sorry for the lack of images, i know they make it more interesting, but i have none. The next post will be full of them which will keep you all happy!


Monday 6 August 2012

Time Trialling on my Cross Bike

Soo i havent blogged anything in what feels like ages, and i have done quite a bit of cycling and fitness stuff over the past couple weeks to report on. I just havent found the time to write anything, what with trying to make the most of the british summer consisting of 10 days of brilliant sunshine.
  I wasnt too sure with what i shall start with as most of it seems like old news. Im going to put it up anyway but i will start with the latest news.

Last Thursday 2nd Aug i decided to take part in the local 13mile time trial held by Plymouth Triathlon Club. The course is a fairly challenging 13 mile loop with a fair bit of uphill followed by a hopefully nice run downhill to the finish (i say hopefully for a reason ill explain in a bit)
The reason why i wanted to do this, is to see where my fitness is after a couple weeks of training, to see if iv achieved anything and what i need to focus on in the next few coming weeks.

Here is how the course looks from an elevation view.







This shows just how hilly it is  and shows the long downhill to finish. You would think this downhill was easy but there is apparently always a headwind and this time around it was a very strong headwind. I found this quite difficult and just felt like i couldnt get in a decent aero position to make the most of it... probably because im on a cross bike with no TT extension bars.
Heres the map of the course.
Erminton s3/13s TT course



The info that i have here is all from my garmin Edge bike GPS that i got from koo-bikes

Im pretty happy with how the ride went, i wanted to be under 40mins and i did that fairly easily. Also i didnt quite know how to pace my self as i didnt know the course so i think i can still get a fair bit out of that time today as i know where i can push it that little bit more.
The next one is the first thursday of september so im going to do that one. With a bit of luck, ill drop my time by a minute.