Exciting Times!

Two weeks from now the team will be in Italy on the eve of the main event!  All of the training is finished having completed the Dragon ride so the bikes will see a little less use during the final run in.

The nerves feel fairly settled now, but it was a different story after the first major climb on the Dragon ride.  I think I went at it a bit too hard on the Black Mountain and there was a stint during the middle of the ride when I was questioning how well prepared I was for the Maratona.  Stomach cramps and heavy legs were getting me down, but it's funny how things work out, because I was able to get back into a good rhythm and make a strong finish.  I posted a silver standard time which did not align with how I was feeling during the ride and I was quite shocked by the result to be honest!  In my view it reinforces the training methods and advice that Dr. Garry Palmer at Sportstest has been guiding the team with.  Thank you Garry!

I still have one or two things to iron out over the next couple of weeks.  The main one being the return of my Trek (or a Trek!).  Unfortunately my TCT5000 was letting the seat post slip - something I noticed a few weeks back.  Having been returned to Trek for inspection it was determined that a crack had developed in the frame :-(    Trek stood by the lifetime warranty they provide for frames and sent out a Madone 4.7 as a replacement.  I was hoping it would be ready for the Dragon, but it wasn't to be.  I picked up the rebuilt bike last Thursday and am looking forward to getting a few miles done before we head out to the mountains!

The second one is 'seating'.  Either my shorts or saddle (or both) are not quite up to scratch for the several hours required on the bike and this became pretty clear about two thirds of the way around the Dragon route.  My saddle is nothing special, so I have invested in a Specialized Romin Comp and will see how this goes with my current shorts over the next few rides before I try anything else.  I know it is a bit close to the event to be meddling with 'contact' points, but I figured the way things were on the Dragon, I have nothing to lose by trying something else.  I'll let you know how it goes later this week and post some pics of the 'born again' Trek too.

All the gear...

...but do I have any idea of what's in store?  Hopefully a little bit as I have certainly been putting the miles in.

As you can see the team shirts have arrived and I have to say I am very impressed with how they have turned out.  The team colours will get the first showing on Sunday for the Dragon ride through Brecon Beacons in Wales this coming Sunday.  The Dragon ride is the final event that I will be riding prior to the main event in Italy.  There are several decent climbs on this event and while not so severe as those on the Maratona, the overall distance is greater at 120 miles, so it will give me a good idea of how I'm going to fair come July 1st.

Last week I met up with Dr. Garry Palmer from Sportstest for my follow assessment to see the hard facts and figures behind all of my training effort.  The results were positive, if somewhat surprising.  While I have seen significant power increase (some 40 watts!), high load efficiency improvements, increased max heart rate as well as weight loss, I have only made minor improvements to my low load efficiency levels.  While on balance this reads very well, with many significant improvements, it is surprising because the main focus of may training has been to improve low load efficiency as this is the area of riding that is so important on endurance events.  It is not clear why this has happened, but it is a shame that I did not have the follow up session with Garry sooner as this could have been picked up and my schedule adjusted to suit.  Garry is not greatly concerned as I have exceeded the golden 4 watts per kg ratio, so with a careful feeding pattern I should be good for the Maratona,  I have my fingers crossed and will be using the Dragon ride to practise the feed schedule.

The forecast for Sunday is wet and windy, but I'm still looking forward to the event.  Check back next week to see how we do!

Piling on the miles

So now I know what the guys at Kilotogo have to go through to organise a sportive!  Well not exactly, the test track cycle ride wasn't quite on the same scale, but took some organising none the less.  As a result I have a new found respect for anyone involved in the organisation of cycling events for us all to enjoy.

Waiting to get started

We had a beautiful day for it and a good turn out too, but we were all suprsised to raise over £400 for Birmingham Children's Hospital!  That pushes our grand total up to £1,472 - well over half way to our target of £2,000.

Four of the team in action (L-R: Steve, Al, Gav & Simon)

I managed 64 miles during the three and a half hours I was cycling for and need to tally up the grand total mileage in order to figure out who has won the prize for guessing the grand total.  I will update you on that later this week along with a link to the photos from Fridays track ride.  Here are a couple of preview pic in the mean time.

Now I can cycle to work!

Finally I have found time to log onto the blog and make a post!  I promise not to leave such a long gap to the next one!  I could make 100 excuses for not posting, the best being that I have been busy preparing for an epic cycle ride in July (aka the Maratona!) oh and I've been moving house too.

Anyway, enough of that, I need to bring you up to speed on my progress.  I will start with the photo on the right, this is a rare occasion where the Lowroader riders are in the same place at the same time.  This was our attempt at making 'happy faces' after the grueling ride that was the Mad March Hare.  It was certainly MAD as you have probably read in previous blogs, with relentless rain and even snow along the 70 odd mile route.  We were all riding with our late friend Nick in mind.  The loss of Nick came as a huge shock.  I only got to know Nick through the Lowroader Team, but he had a striking personality that left an impression.  I am glad that I got to meet Nick, experience his sense of humour and infectious enthusiasm.  He left too soon and is sadly missed.

I mentioned that I had moved house and I am now within cycling distance of work.  This is great and means that I can combine my commute with my training - win win!!  In order to preserve the Trek TCT (AKA Derek) I have bought a new bike.  Epic Cycles hooked me up with a Genesis Aether (AKA Phil Collins) which is happily munching miles to and from work.  I bought this via cycle-to-work which left a little budget for some upgrades to the Trek in the form of some lighter wheels and a lighter, compact crankset.  I also have some trick Schwalbe tyres courtesy of SkateHut and I'm looking forward to trying out the new bits to see if I notice the reduced weight.

While the Mad March Hare ride was wet wet wet, my next ride at the Kilotogo Cheshire Cat sportive could not have been more different.  Glorious sunshine for every one of the 102 miles.  The ride went really well, I posted a silver standard finish time and was in great shape for the entire ride.  I was waiting for the energy to run out during the final miles of the ride, but the legs stayed strong to the line.  I think it's a testament to the training schedule and advice that I have been following from Dr. Garry Palmer at SportsTest.  I was hoping to get a measure of the improvements last Friday when Garry came to Land Rover for testing.  Unfortunately there was only time for three test slots so my comparison will have to wait.  Mark went through a retest, so I will let him post an update on his progress.  There was time to check some of my basic information and it looks like following Garry's advice has made a dramatic improvement to my body fat percentage with an improvement of 3.5%!

The next ride I have planned is the Little Mountain Time Trial in Worcester, followed by a mileathon to raise some funds for Birmingham Children's Hospital.  The finishing touches are being made to our team jerseys and with less than 90 days to the big ride anticipation is mounting - bring it on!!

Post Chrimbo Training

So far so good. I am coming towards the end of my base endurance training and am very much enjoying spending time in the saddle. While most of my rides have been on the turbo trainer, the festive holiday gave me much more opportunity to get out for a ride during the hours of daylight. Also, the better half gave me a Garmin Edge for Christmas and I am now totally hooked on Strava. If this is all gibberish to you, take a look at http://app.strava.com/clubs/lowroaders and you can see all of the ride data (map trace, elevation, speed, heart rate) from the teams training. I've uploaded all of my ride info since Christmas which even includes a few rides from a recent trip to the USA (I didn't take my bike over, just the Garmin which I hooked up to a bike loaned to me by the in laws).

Now that the holidays are over, I will be doing most of my riding on the turbo until the nights get a little lighter. The picture on the left shows the 'Oag Training Camp' set up ready for action (what you can't quite see is the TV just out of shot keeping me entertained with back episodes of Nitro Circus and Moto GP season review shows!). I plan to get out at the weekend whenever possible and also make the journey home from work by cycle on a Friday when it fits.

Oag blog

The training is going well on my side. I've built up towards 6hrs endurance zone pedal time a week, which is way more than I have ever done at this time of year before. My only grip is that it is all indoors. I invested in some mudguards, but the thought of lugging a grubby bike in and out of the house for the turbo trainer is not appealing and neither is thought of the guards rubbing into my 'blue steel' paintwork! So I need to pull my finger out and get a winter hack. I've been looking at some Genesis models and need to track one down at the right price.

Other news: riding position adjustments are much easier to do with a fellow cyclist on hand. Some of the team lowroader's got together last night for a lesson in cycling geometry from Steve. I thought I had got it nailed, but have been a bit eager in jacking up the seat post. All is well now, so my torso/arm and inner leg angles are all sorted. Big thanks to Steve.

I have entered the Mad March Hare and Cheshire Cat sportives, which gives me something to look forward to - hopefully I get lucky in the Dragon Ride lottery. I've joined Epic Cycles cycle team and will be having a crack at some racing in 2012. No racing targets will be set, I just want to see how I get on.

That's all for now, I'll add some more photo's in my next post.

Gav Oag's 1st blog

So I'm 4 weeks into my preparation for the Maratona and I have finally found some time to post my first blog – better late then never! It's been going really well since I saw physiologist Dr. Garry Palmer in October, which was a huge eye opener. Despite my best efforts to prepare for sportive's and rides of distance in the past, it would appear that my training has been pretty inefficient and a lot of the time I have spent on the bike has been wasted. Well that's all changed now and I am currently working through the 'base endurance' section of my training. I'm learning to love the turbo trainer – almost as much as wiggle are learning to love me again. They sent me a bag of sweets last week J