Planet X Superlight Pro Carbon

At last, I managed to take my Planet X out for my first ride on it today. Only a quick blast covering 22.5km in 40 minutes but it was enough for me to find out that it is a very smooth ride, despite only wearing bottom of the range Shimano R500 wheels. It will be much more responsive and quicker when the Ksyriums go on. It's not massively stiff which means it is more suited to sportive type events which is exactly the type of riding I'm planning to do on it. It was a real bargain so I'm very happy.

Now where did I put the ...

It's almost August and I'm only just preparing for my first race of the year. I've done a few sportives that are fairly relaxed affairs but next week is The Outlaw long distance (for that read Ironman distance) event, a proper race if you like. And it's not just me I have to be responsible for either; as part of a relay team there are 2 team mates that mean I need to prepare properly and do the best I can on the day. It's also a practice run for my main event of the year, the Challenge Barcelona relay in October. I have therefore spent the past few days trying to find all the essential kit I will need, and buying bits and bobs to ensure I have everything. The obvious things: nutrition bars and gels, puncture repair kit and spare tub. And the not so obvious: the disk wheel adaptor for the gas cannister and essential 3rd hand (a cut down wine cork!), pliers (to ensure the valve extension is on tight - the front wheel needs an extension the disk doesn't, so the spare tub extension is only on finger tight) etc. And then there's the need to consider the weather; arm warmers, leg warmers, gloves and/or mitts. Where are they all? And then I had to fit the new visor to my aero helmet. Not too difficult and its another job ticked off and I can now ride without sunglasses which helps with my vision when down on the tribars.

I'm actually really looking forward to the race and hoping our team can put in a good performance and maybe even beat the RAF relay team's time from Barcelona last year - 9:54:36. Looking at the courses I suspect the Outlaw swim to be a faster course, although a 1000 athlete mass start will probably mean the MOPers and BOPers to be slower due to congestion. The Outlaw bike course has a lot more climbing than the Barcelona course (but let's be honest, the average flyover over the A1 has more climbing than the Barcelona course) and so should be slower. I managed 5:17:43 for the bike at Barcelona last year although I suffered from poor pacing and nutrition and had a very painful and slow period from about mile 85 to mile 100. The runs on both courses are flat so should be about equal for pace. I doubt that Nottingham will get close to the temperature we experienced in Barca last year, so that should be much more comfortable and make it less likely to suffer from dehydration issues. Will we beat 9:54:36? I actually believe we will. By how much? I don't know, perhaps 15 to 20 minutes, maybe 25. We shall see.

There are a number of RAF athletes racing so best of luck to you all.

Le Tour

How good is Mark Cavendish? I've thoroughly enjoyed Le Tour de France 2010 and to see Cav win so brilliantly on the Champs Elysees today was fantastic. The camera angle was brilliant, running alongside Hushovd as he started to sprint, only for Petacchi to ease by and then, on the far side, went Cav going like a rocket out of a cannon (as the commentator described it). He left them all for dead and on the overhead shot at the finish line there wasn't another cyclist in the picture. It was a brilliant display of sprinting at its absolute best, it's just a shame he took a week to get into his stride but 5 stage wins at Le Tour is not to be sniffed at. Just brilliant.

Oh yes, the rest of the tour was equally good and exciting - Schleck pushed Contador harder than anyone has before and if he can continue his progress, particularly in the individual time trial, then the 2011 tour should be on a knife edge. Wiggins and Sky were the biggest disappointments but I fully expect them to come back stronger next year. Something to look forwad to.

A New PB!

How do you test your progress?

As regular readers will know I test myself by doing a 40km turbo TT; my reasoning is that this test is within a controlled environment and is repeatable. The time is immaterial in itself as it doesn't correlate to a road TT time, but if I get quicker in this test then I know I am improving.

A quick recap; in Jan 10 I set the benchmark for the year with an unremarkable 61.34 mins for the test, but just a week later this came down to 57.46. Better, but still some way short of my overall PB of 50.33. Things progressed and on 13 May I recorded a 50.48 that I was very pleased with; almost at my PB level and nearly 5 months still to go to my 2010 A race. But I knew that the gains would now become harder to come by, and my move to a Primal Blueprint way of training meant I was heading into the unknown as far as improvements were concerned. Would the Primal way deliver the results?

With 2 weeks to go to The Outlaw I decided I needed to test myself, to give me the confidence that I was progressing and could head to The Outlaw assured that my legs were in good shape. To be honest, I didn't feel that fresh this morning, and as I started my warm up I wasn't sure I would be able to sustain the required effort for some 50 minutes. But I pressed on regardless.

I could bore you with the details, but I'll cut straight to the chase. Today I SMASHED my 40km turbo TT PB, and set the new level at 49.24 - that's 48.58kmh if you're wondering - beating my previous best by a whopping 1 minute and 9 seconds and showing an increase in average power of 6 watts. Pleased doesn't come close to expressing how I feel about this result; I am totally over the moon chuffed. Now add in the fact that I am now sub 70kg and I think it's fair to say that I am in the best shape of my life.

All I need to do now is get my nutrition and pacing strategies right - and how hard can that be?

All the best folks. Race hard, train smart and rest easy.

Short, Sharp Shock

Regular readers of this blog may recall details of a turbo session I use which I obtained from an article in Cycling Weekly, that of 30 seconds of flat out sprinting followed by 4 minutes of recovery at moderate cycling pace (about 32kmh for me as opposed to barely turning the pedals 'do nothing' type of recovery). The article suggested that the limited scientific research behind this session suggested it bought about the same improvements as a 2 hour Level 2 road ride, and yet it was completed in 47 minutes including warm up and warm down.

Well guess what? In the Research Corner of the 15 July issue of Cycling Weekly there is an article that compares a 7 x 30 second 'all out' sprint interval session with a 3 x 20 minute long duration aerobic interval session (carried out at 87% VO2max). Without boring you with the details (get hold of a copy of the magazine and read the whole article if you want the details), the scientists concluded that the short sprint intervals were just as effective as more traditional longer aerobic type intervals to develop aerobic performance. I'm quite pleased about this as this is the sort of training I have been doing this year - avoiding the 75-90% chronic cardio zone and working either below 75% of MHR or above 90% of MHR. I haven't done as many of the 30 seconds flat out intervals as maybe I should have but this will become a weekly staple in my training programme from now on.

Train smart folks.

It Rides

It needs fine tuning but my Planet X is up and running. Wheels are bottom of the range Shimano R500s at the moment so if this thing rides well with these wheels it will auger well for when the Ksyriums go on. The Ksyriums can't go on just yet as they are being used as training wheels on PoD at the moment. I swapped the wheels on PoD today, along with the brake blocks - what a faff! I might just leave these on for The Outlaw.

All the best.

Bikes in Bits!

I spent yesterday getting the Planet X up and running; the new stem arrived on Friday so that was fitted, brake and gear cables cut to size, brakes set up, gears cabled up (setting up gears is one thing I have never mastered), chainset 'borrowed' from my Litespeed and fitted, chain cleaned and fitted. And with a suitable gear selected I took it for a spin round the block. Seems OK; will need a hard run before I draw any proper conclusions though.

So the Planet X is almost roadworthy. The Litespeed is 'sans chainset' so not roadworthy. PoD is set up and ready to ride but I need to put some training wheels on and swap the brake blocks so I can rack up some mileage over the next 3 weeks before The Outlaw. The turbo bike is still in good order though!

My trusty Scott frameset will soon be ready to go on ebay; this bike has many good memories for me as it was the first proper bike I bought when I decided to take up triathlon some 9 years ago, and it has seen me through my first sprint, standard and middle distance races as well as many miles of training. It's proved itself fast and comfortable for an all alloy bike although I did swap the forks for some carbon ITM Millenium ones that certainly helped. But there is no place for sentimentality. I need the space so it has to go.

Today the sporting focus shifts to Mrs TM and our daughter, as they are participating in the Portsmsouth Race for Life 5km event. I'm acting as driver, bottle holder and photographer (and most likely Chief Ice Cream Eater!). I'm looking forward to it.

All the best.

MISSION ACCOMPLISHED!

Well one of them. On the scales today I weighed 10 stone 13.4 pounds, thereby achieving my target of being sub 11-stone by The Outlaw. To put this into perspective, in 2006 I raced IM Germany at 11 4, in 2009 the lowest I managed was 11 6, whilst at the beginning of 2010 I was 11 12. Add to this my increase in FTP and my power-to-weight ratio will have improved significantly.

Happy Days!

Busy, Busy

It's all go Chez Turbo Man this week.

I've upped the power for my 6 min sessions; I'm finding it hard to believe the figures I'm seeing on the turbo at the moment (and yes, I calibrate the turbo before every session!). I've never been anywhere near them before and I really hope that I can translate these figures into some really quick times at The Outlaw and, more importanly, Barcelona. I'm also doing core, stretch and flex sessions twice a week now; these are usually the first sessions I drop once the race season gets going but as I'm not racing anymore on a regular basis I have worked them into my programme and it seems to be working very well.

Talking of The Outlaw, it's only 3 weeks away on Sunday and I've only ridden PoD for about 20 minutes since Barcelona last October - best I get out on him this weekend.

The PX is coming on nicely, I'm waiting for a new stem to be delivered before I can trim the cables and finish everything off. The new carbon seatpost has arrived and is a thing of beauty. I'm getting quite excited about riding a carbon frame as I've never had the pleasure before.

Mrs Turbo is away in Glasgow for a couple of days; she works for BAe shipbuilding and they are launching one of their Patrol Boats. We celebrated out 20th Wedding Anniversary this week. I know; I don't look old enough to have been married for 20 years!

Over the past 2 weekends I've spent an afternoon watching my daughter at the ballet, and another watching her perform in her drama group. I'm terrified of standing up in front of an audience but she seems to take it all in her stride. Kids really can be amazing.

Tonight I paid £5 for my eldest son to get beaten up! In a good way. Honest! He does Ju Jitsu and so I took him along to the local club. It seems this club is for adults and is rather more 'full on' than his usual club that is aimed more at schoolchildren. He seemed to enjoy it though.

And I'm still losing weight, which is really good.

Anyway, what with all this training and running around, I'm very tired and so must away to bed. Rest well folks.

Week 3 Speed & Power

This week was Week 3 of my speed and power phase and I do believe the positive effects of my training are beginning to reveal themselves. The main session I'm using in this phase is based around 6 minute intervals at 105% of FTP; at my current FTP 105% equates to approx 51kmh. In Week 1 I managed 2 and then 3 intervals during the week, and in Week 3 I managed 4 and then 4 + 2 minutes of a 5th, so my legs are definitely getting stronger. On my long road ride today I felt strong on all the hills, and am regularly riding up hills in the big ring when only a few weeks ago I would drop down into the granny ring. I also managed to sprint up one hill and hit 40kmh on a significant incline (with my HR doing it's best to catch up!). Overall, just under 10 hours of training and almost 280km of bike miles this week. I am VERY pleased with my cycling progress and am really looking forward to The Outlaw. I do, though, need to spend more time out on the road on my TT bike, getting used to the handling characteristics of the TT position and the deep front wheel.

Rest well folks (go and read Frank's blog if you haven't already!).

Well it's new to me...

Ignore the wheels, they're not included, just the frameset. A nice shade of blue, looks fantastic in the sunlight.

So I now have a dilemma. Do I build this up with 9-speed 105 as a winter trainer? Or is it too good for that and I should build it up with Ultegra 10-speed as my sportive weapon of choice? And relegate my beautiful Litespeed to winter hack duties? What do you think?

And I've just ordered one of these as well (the visor, not the helmet!):

Something old ...

... something new, something borrowed, something blue.

No, I'm not getting married again, but there is a new arrival expected in my Turbo Dungeon!

More details to follow.

Speed and Power

I'm now in to Week 3 of my speed and power phase and I've found the change of emphasis mentally stimulating. The specific speed/power sessions themselves are tough, and I did cross the vomit threshold last Thursday (only a very small mouthful but yuk nonetheless!), but the change from long, steady distance into this new phase is somewhat refreshing. I need to mix it up some more but I also need to make sure I don't lose sight of my main aim, that of being fast over 112 miles, not 10 or 25. I was expecting the mileage to drop off as the intensity increased and whilst this has been true, it has not been as marked as I expected, notching up 306km in the 1st week and 284km last week.

We had a minor crisis last weekend, when the swimmer in our Outlaw relay team had to withdraw due to work commitments preventing any worthwhile training. Best of luck Mike with everything. Fortunately, I didn't have to look far for a replacement and Cavegirl Kelda has stepped forward to fill the void, so we're still in The Race.

And of course there is Le Tour. My family will have to get used to me disappearing at 1900 every evening to watch the highlights. Been a lot of broken carbon fibre in the first couple of stages but fingers crossed that Cav can pull it all together and start knocking up some stage victories.

I'm sure I have plenty more I could write but am tired. Train smart folks.