Last Hard Ride Before Barca

A week today I will be testing my legs on the Barcelona tarmac so today was my last hard ride. I met up with my local group and we did a hard and hilly 43 miles in 2 hours 20 minutes. We did lots of hills, some of which seemed to go on for ages, and I felt good all the way to the end. With no hills on the Barca course it will be a completely different ride next week but, as I've said a few times already, I feel ready for the challenge.

I know it's getting close now because ...

Kelda picked my bike up today to take it to Barcelona; next time I see it will be next Friday just 2 days before the race.

I did another 45 minutes on PoD today and managed a slightly faster average speed of 33.8kmh; the wind was slightly up which meant the first half was slower but I more than made up for that on the return leg. The bike is certainly fast although as an aluminium frame it is fairly unforgiving; and went through a bump today and it bounced me right off the saddle.

Anyway, it's nearly time.

It's All Coming Together Nicely...

Weighed myself this morning - 76kg. Just 1kg off my target race weight when I set out on this particular event journey so I suppose I shouldn't be too unhappy. Very pleased with my preparation even though it hasn't been perfect.

I took PoD out on the road today for 45 minutes in race mode (everything but only 1 water bottle instead of 2); it was easy to maintain 36kmh and there were no handling issues despite the coastal breeze. PoD is, quite simply, a much faster bike on the flat than my Litespeed. I averaged 33.5kmh for the 45 minutes that included lunchtime traffic, roundabouts, traffic lights and some poor road surfaces; I have absolute confidence that on closed roads with a super smooth road surface it will be OK to average 36kmh.

I fly out a week today and am getting quite excited about it all.

Taper

I always struggle with tapering towards an event, mainly because I can quite happily reduce my training volume but am completely unable to reduce my calorie intake as well. Consequently, a 2-week taper usually results in half a stone overweight come race day! So I try and limit taper to a maximum of one week.

Am also beginning to think of what to do in 2010. Thoughts of selling the TT kit have resurfaced so it might still be an option. Watch this space.

Southdowns Challenge Sportive

What a great day for cycling it was today. There was a bit of wind that proved problematic on top of the Downs but the temperature was just about perfect. I rode with a group of local cyclists I had met recently and the target was a gold standard ride, but just to make it a little more challenging we were targetting the gold standard for the youngsters age group.

I arrived early and took advantage of the bike mechanic to set up my gears properly. I'm not a complete dummy with the spanners but have always struggled to set up gears and after half an hour yesterday they still weren't perfect. This guy had them sorted in less than 2 minutes - how did he do that? We set off and within a few kms had lost one of our group; he was behind a caravan that decided to take a very slow left turn and by the time he got passed we were gone. To be honest the early pace was higher than I would have liked - the guys were charging up the hills and working hard on the flats. I thought to myself that maybe everyone else was just doing the 50-mile route and I would be left to struggle round the 80-miler myself! But I sat in and span easily up the hills and closed the gaps that appeared easily once over the top. I was practising my Barca feeding regime and all was good, the only thing that caused a little bit of stomach uneasiness was wolfing down a whole banana at each feed stations; should have just had a half me thinks. 2 hours 20 minutes into the ride and we hit the biggest hill of the day - 1.5 miles of upward cycling. At the bottom I was left behind but settled into my rhythm and started to overtake others who had perhaps misjudged the pace. Halfway up and I was off the front on my own and just kept pulling away; I felt really comfortable climbing (which is most unlike me!) and both lungs and legs were comfortable at my chosen pace. One or 2 of the team were having problems on the hills and the re-grouping at the top obviously slowed the average speed down a bit. Towards the end and I was keen to up the pace - 4:19 was touch and go but it needed a big effort to do it. And so I led the train and upped the pace; unfortunately I had to keep slowing down to keep the group together, and when I pulled over to let someone else have a go the pace dropped so after a short rest is was back on the front and pushing hard. We got to the finish line in 4:20, missing our ambitious target by just 1 minute; not too bad for a bunch of over-40s!

The post-race tea and food was very enjoyable and we received our certificates very shortly afterwards - excellent. Overall this was a really good, hard and enjoyable ride and I feel reasonably well prepared for Barca.

So what now for my Litespeed? It is clear that the groupset is tired and in need of replacement (it has done about 6 seasons!) and I am very tempted by the new Dura Ace and Ultegra, especially as the gear cables run under the bar tape (aesthetically it is much nicer). But no, I will be upgrading to 10-speed Ultegra SL for next year. A bit of internet surfing last night discovered huge bargains to be had on Ultegra SL now that the new Ultegra is about to hit the shops. I ordered a brand new groupset at over £500 off the retail price (and for less than you could separately buy the STIs and a chainset). Very happy with that. I know what wheels I want but these will have to wait until the New Year. It won't be the uber-light bike I was hoping for but 16 pounds isn't exactly heavy.

Roll on Barca and then some well earned rest, pies, beer and cream cakes.

It's been a pants week so far ...

Things were ticking along nicely until I woke up on Thursday with a sore throat. This close to Barcelona I decided to take the rest option so have clocked up very little mileage this week. I'm feeling better now and have the Southdowns Challenge sportive tomorrow; 80 miles around the western end of the South Downs, some of which goes over my regular training rides. I'm in a group of 8 who are looking for gold standard but as many of the group are under 40 the target is to achieve gold standard for that age group - 4 hours 19 minutes. Should be a good workout and hopefully this old man will still be around at the end to show some of these young pups the way home. Am looking forward to it.

Southern Sportive - Perhaps I should've stayed in bed?

Today was the Southern Sportive - 97 miles criss-crossing the South Downs. The weather started bright but clouded over, unlike my day that started cloudy but got brighter towards the end. Are you sitting comfortably? Then I'll begin.

I missed my alarm so was half an hour late getting up. This wasn't the end of the world but it was just a precurser to a bad start to the day. I arrived in Petersfield and found the start location but was directed on to one of the other car parks, but I couldn't find it! I eventually found a car park and put my bike together and then went to pump the tyres up. We'ver all heard that horrible "pssshhhhhh" sound before and the tyre goes immediately flat - bugger. Anyway, I changed the inner tube (the old one had split alongside the valve) and rode up to register and get to the start line. It was quite windy that would be a pain throughout the day, but it was the same for everyone.

So I had been late - Strike 1 - had to change an inner tube - Strike 2 - and we all know bad things come in 3s; so what was waiting for me? Well I didn't have to wait long. 3km into the ride and we headed up the first hill - I stood on the pedals and "Bang!" (or whatever sound a chain makes when it breaks). Oh ****! Fortunately a good Samaritan stopped; he didn't have a new link but he did have a chain tool and we removed another link and put the chain together and I was on my way again. We had had to re-use the chain pin so it was only ever going to be a temporary repair, but I was hoping for more than 4km! Yep, the next big hill and "Bang!", it happened again. The temporary repair was just not up to the power. :-) This time the good Samaritan had a quick link and this time I was properly back in business. I had, though, lost a whole bunch of time and my hoped for gold standard ride had gone out of the window with barely 7 km under my wheels. Shortly after I came across a straggler by the side of the road and after all my dramas I couldn't just ride by, so stopped and helped him out. All in all, these stops had cost me about 25 minutes and I covered a pathetic 19km in the first hour. But from this point on things were good.

The Southern Sportive is one tough ride, there are some steep hills but in the main the hills are long. And steep. Duncton (spelling?) Hill just seems to go on and on and on. But I was making progress and my average speed was increasing from its Hour 1 low. I was spinning steadily up the hills, working hard on the flats and pushing my comfort zone on the descents. The drop from Goodwood Racecourse was a real thrill; about halfway down I grabbed a look at my speedo that was saying 75kmh - I didn't dare look again! Anyway, the miles were steadily ticked off and after the final feed stop there were just 30km to go and I decided I would make an effort and see what happened. I continued to ride steadily up the hills but on the flats I worked very hard and was overtaking a lot of people. With about 5km to go I caught a chaingang and just rode straight passed them at about 45kmh! I was feeling really strong and just went for it. The legs were good (don't get me wrong, they were sore, but they responded brilliantly) and I finished with a flourish clocking up 158km. Excellent. Not sure what my official finish time was but my riding time was 5:34:35, so I had the pace for a gold standard finish.

After the dramas at the start I could have quite easily just thrown in the towel, but I'm really glad I didn't. It was a great ride and I would like to go back next year and ride a good ride from start to finish, without any mechanical issues. I think it's fair to say that the groupset on my Litespeed is somewhat tired and needs replacing so that will be my winter project. I'm happy that I have the endurance for Barcelona although whether I have sufficient time in the TT position on my Dolan we shall ahve to wait and see.

And finally, it looks like we may have a team member change for Barcelona, but this post is long enough already so that will have to wait for another day

Who is this person?

Is this the figure of a sub 3-hour marathon man?

Or a 3 Marathons (formerly known as Snickers formerly known as ... er ... Marathons) a day man?

Recovery Week

After the BIG Fortnight this week was programmed to be a recovery week. I perhaps should have done more than I did but it was nice to have some time off the bike but it never fails to surprise me how many aches and pains appear when you're doing very little, that never seem to materialise when you're training hard.

Today though, I met up with the guys I met for the first time a few weeks ago and rode a number of kms with at the recent sportive. I rode out some 14km and we then did approx 47km before I rode home for a very enjoyable 75km ride. It was quite a lumpy route including (for those that know it) Portsdown Hill and the last 10km together were ridden very hard. My legs certainly felt it afterwards. One of the guys also had a fairly spectacular crash, high-siding it into a comfortable bed of stinging nettles after attempting a tightening right hander too quickly. One of the guys is currently the GB Olympic Team sailing coach and knows Dave Brailsford, which is where their Sky bibshorts came from. Interesting.

So, 4 weeks to Barcelona. Next Sunday I ride the 155km Southern Sportive and the following weekend I have entered the 128km Southdowns Challenge. I should have my endurance legs by then and will look to hit gold standard at both of them. Hard turbo sessions will also be included over the next 2 weeks before reducing the quantity with 2 weeks to go and then tapering properly in the last week.

Train smart folks.