Tale of the tape

No training today - not even my regular commute - as Monday of my work week is an official 'rest day'.

However, Monday is also officially the day I check my weight and body composition stats, so here they are - along with the comparisons to last week.

The notable thing is that, for the first time, they all seem to be going in the right direction. That's obviously what I'd been hoping for, after a full week of focussed training

Weight: 11 stone 9 (down exactly a pound from last week, which is what I'm aiming at)

Body Fat Percentage: 18.4% (down 2.3%)

Visceral Fat Rating: 6 (down 1)

Basal Metabolic Rate: 7271 kJ / 1738 kCal (up from last week - which is good)

Muscle Mass: 8 stone 13 pounds 4 ounces (up almost 3 pounds)

Water: 56.3% (Up 1.3%, again that's good)

That's all really encouraging, because I'd been starting to feel like my training hadn't been having much of an effect on my body composition. Hopefully it reflects the slightly increased rigour (both in physical and scientific terms) of my training.

My only concern is that I will be discouraged next week when I don't get as much of an improvement, because I won't have trained as much. However, we'll cross that bridge when we come to it.

Katy from Face Partnership also sent out a really useful diet/nutrition information pack today. I had already got a fair bit of information from the books and stuff I've been reading - but the information pack but all that and more in an easily digestible (sorry I couldn't resist) format. I think I'm going in pretty much the right direction, but it made clear that because we need to be taking on a lot of carbohydrates, we need to cut out as much fat as possible...you can't have both. It also really emphasised eating as much fruit and veg (unprocessed) as possible.

An instant change to my diet will be cutting out nuts - because I hadn't realised they can have a high fat content. I generally take a big bag of raisins and mixed nuts to work with me, because I thought that was a bit more healthy than other snacks. So, it's out with the nuts and in with the rice cakes I think. My sister recently put me onto some Marmite flavoured ones which I really like, so that won't be too much of a hardship.

Weekend Roundup

Weekend Training Stats:

Threshold Intervals: 12 mins at Threshold followed by 6 mins Recovery - x3

Twickenham CC: Sunday Morning Club Ride

NB: IF YOU'RE AT ALL INTERESTED IN TRAINING STATS/CHARTS/GRAPHS ETC. - I'M FULLY AWARE THAT IT MIGHT JUST BE ME! - THEN I'VE POPPED A LINK TO THE GORY DETAILS OF ALL MY WORKOUTS ON 'MOTION BASED' IN THE 'LINKS' SECTION ON THE LEFT HAND SIDE OF THE BLOG. ENJOY...OR NOT!

Saturday's allotted task was a Threshold Session - with the aim being to work in my heart rate zone between 162 and 172 bpm. I guess this replicates a bit of reasonably tough climbing. Obviously, you can't necessarily keep this going indefinitely, so I did it in interval sessions. I chose to do 12 mins at Threshold level followed by 6 mins at easy 'recovery' pace' - all repeated 3 times, giving a total workout time of about an hour, after you factor in warm up and warm down times.

My legs were reasonably sore, but I wasn't completely shattered by the end of it. Also, once I was in the required zone, I found it fairly easy to stay there. I don't know whether this has something to do with my physiological testing stats which suggested that I'm actually more efficient at higher heart rates.

This morning - despite a late night, AND the clocks going forward - I managed to scrape myself out of bed for the Twickenham Cycling Club Sunday club run. It was cold, but dry and not too windy, so in the end I figured that if I wasn't going to go out on days like this then I'd never get out.

Interestingly, it's also a fairly strong motivator knowing that I've got to update this blog - so if I hadn't gone out, even the fairly limited readership here would know just how lazy I'd been.

As with the first time I went out on a club run, once we were out and riding I was really glad that I had got out, as the weather tried it's best to get a bit better, and I felt a bit more comfortable and relaxed riding in a group. I even had the legs and the confidence to take an occasional turn at the front and didn't struggle at all.

It was also 'nice' to take on a couple of fairly steep inclines - which had me out of breath, but again not out on my feet. 

For the first time it's worth me popping an elevation profile graph in the blog! For some reason it feels more like 'proper' training if you're really struggling, but I recovered reasonably quickly, and it does feel like my training is beginning to have some effect. 

Overall, I'm really happy with what I've achieved with my training this week. I've stuck to my training programme pretty much to the letter - despite plenty of inclement weather, and have ended up doing a total of 10 focussed hours of work, which is exactly what I was looking for. As this coming week is my 'work' week, I'll have less opportunity to get out this week, but it should at least give my body a chance to recover properly.

Tricky Training

Today's training stats: Endurance: 2 Laps of Richmond Park and errands

Today's task was 60-120 minutes of Endurance level (HR: 142-152bpm) riding. I had to be in East Sheen for a doctor's appointment at 5 anyway, so although it wasn't very adventurous, I thought I could work this into my training with a couple of laps of Richmond Park.

I had a bit more difficulty today with keeping my heart rate in the required zone. I figure it just happens some days that your heart rate will react in a more volatile fashion. I found that sometimes I actually had to go pretty slowly to get my heart rate back into the zone, because any significant effort was pushing me up into the mixed muscle zone (it's called this because you're using - and therefore fatiguing - two different kinds of muscle fibre, making it more difficult to train each type of fibre specifically).

Having said that, I think it's probably best to be philosophical about it, and not worry too much about sliding out of the Endurance zone, because it's just going to happen when you're on the road and you have to deal with hills, wind etc. The key is just to try to do as much as possible of your work in the target zone.

Apart from that, the ride was fairly uneventful. I'm definitely feeling the benefit of riding at higher cadences...definitely gives you more of a feeling that you could ride indefinitely, because your legs are getting so tired and sore.

When I got back, I had my next week's training programme from British Cycling. I think this is where I get to see the benefit of having had my chat with Garry Palmer last week about training, because in my 'work' weeks, I'm just not going to have the time to do as much as is suggested. Garry just reassured me that those weeks I can take relatively easy, as long as I keep my legs ticking over. If it hadn't been for that chat I would have been more concerned that I wasn't doing enough.

Finally, I read an interesting column in The Times this morning - "A joyous celebration of pain", tagged to the Boat Race, but really about the 'point' of taking part in any painful sporting endeavour. I don't agree with all of it, but a lot of it makes sense.

If you don't have the time to read the whole article, the final paragraph is the one that really struck a chord with me. Some of you may know that I've had a pretty rough time over the last year, and just getting through each day has often been unbelieveably difficult. This last paragraph of the article is subtitled, 'Anti Death' and I guess sums up a lot of the things I've been trying to do to make life a little easier...

"All the guff about dreams and challenges and honour and glory come down to this: the seeking out and accepting of an opportunity to live life more intensely. It's about being alive, about knowing you're alive, about celebrating being alive.

Look at the losers in their agony - they look as if they're dying, the feel as if they're dying, but they have never been more alive. So don't sneer. Don't pity. Envy."

A night in with my turbo...

Wednesday's Training Stats: Endurance: 90 min Turbo at Conditioning Level

The weather was pretty miserable - wet and windy - yesterday, so I ended up having to do my endurance session on the turbo trainer. It was supposed to be a slightly longer ride if it had been on the road, but 90 mins is probably my limit, in boredom terms, on the turbo.

I was aiming to work at heart rates up to 152 bpm - working in the BASE/ENDURANCE zones, and I managed that perfectly as you can see from today's graph. My legs are a bit sore today

(Thursday), but I think that's as much from my regular Wednesday morning Yoga class as much as the cycling. Thankfully it's been a day off today to recover.

I've also been trying to increase my cadence (pedalling speed) from a 'default' position of about 75-80, up to a cadence of nearer 90 - the theory being that a higher cadence reduces the load/fatigue on the legs. Again, I'm doing pretty well on that too I think, with an average cadence of 89. 

It's not much fun spending an hour and half on the turbo, but it did give me a chance to try out my new Flip Mino video camera last night, and you can see the results below.

It's a bit ragged, but obviously I did each of the three separate bits in one take (not much point in worrying too much about it), and without reading any instructions, (I'm pretty sure it's deliberately designed so that you shouldn't have to). But despite that, I managed to edit it all together in under 5 minutes, thanks to the very easy and intuitive editing software included in the camera, so I think it's gonna prove pretty handy.

I was going to leave out the little bit at the begining - with Molly nosing around the bike - but as it's her birthday today, I thought she deserved a little treat!

Ridiculous to Sublime

Today's training stats: Threshold Strength: TT 1 lap of Richmond Park

After yesterday's horrible weather, I was a bit apprehensive about training when I woke up - although I did have the fallback position that if it was really horrid I could always do some intervals on the turbo.

However, when I pulled back the curtains, it was absolutely lovely outside - sunny and not too windy. After doing a few jobs in the morning, I popped out on the bike around lunchtime. The wind was behind me as I headed through Twickenham up to Richmond Park, so I was averaging 19-20 mph without really pushing myself at all, which was a nice feeling. It takes me about 15 mins to get up to the park, so it's a nice warmup. After grabbing a quick drink, I set out on my 1 lap "Time Trial". In today's training I was aiming at 'Threshold' level - which for me is a heart rate in the zone 162-172 bpm.

Here's the science bit..."This level of effort involves the fast-twitch oxidative (type 2a) muscle fibres, which require large amounts of oxygen to function properly".

This compares with the 'Endurance' level training which I was doing yesterday, which "uses the slow twitch (type 1) aerobic muscle fibre that it's vital to train for improved endurance. (NB: This is a fat-burning fibre - just one more reason why I need to be doing more training at this level!).

The reason why it was important for me to stay in the Endurance zone yesterday was that if I did that, I wasn't using any of the fast-twitch fibres - meaning they weren't fatigued, and I could get more out of training them today.

Anyway, I really caught the best of the weather in the park - although the northerly wind was still quite stiff. Doing my best to push myself quite hard, while keeping in the Threshold zone, I felt exactly how I think I should have - out of breath, but not completely flat out and 'ruined'.

This is a photo of me after I got back. I took it for my Etape 'memories' book, which Katy at Face Partnership is putting together. I'm gonna put the ludicrous 'belly' down to the fact that I'd just drunk almost a litre and a half of SiS 'Go' and 'Rego' energy drinks, but it should make the difference between my 'before' and 'after photos look a bit more impressive. I thought black was supposed to be slimming, anyway! 

As you'll see from the stats above, I finished with a time of 23.24 - an average speed of exactly 17mph. I'm aware this isn't particularly great, as decent club cyclists aim at doing 3 laps in an hour. However, I'm also aware that I'm just doing my best to train myself and I won't be racing anyone in the Etape.

The key thing again today was making sure that I did as much of my training in the required threshold zone, and again I think I achieved that pretty well. As you can see from today's graph, the vast majority (84%) of my ride was in the Threshold

 zone, so I was training exactly the right types of muscle. This way, I should be able to alternate my Endurance and Threshold training, without my muscles ever getting too fatigued. It should mean that I get more training in total, and also that whatever training I do is more effective. 

Despite yesterday's grim weather, I'm pretty

pleased with how this week's going so far, and hopefully it'll continue. Tomorrow should be another Endurance ride - weather permitting, and then I've got a rest day to look forward to on Thursday.

Moist Monday

I'll get onto today's dramatic training activities in a bit, but Monday is body composition stats day, so here they are:

Weight: 11 stone 10 pounds (same as last week)

Body Fat: 20.7% (up marginally)

Visceral Fat Rating: 7 (same as last week)

Basal Metabolic Rate: 7192 kJ/1719 kcal (up a bit - that's good I think)

Muscle Mass: 8 stone 11 pounds 6 ounces (same)

Water: 55.5%

There aren't actually many conclusions to be drawn, as I didn't actually do much in the way of training last week, so nothing's really changed. I'll be doing a lot more training this week, so I'll be hoping to see a much bigger difference.

Conditioning: Cobham and back - END (HR 142-152)

Annoyingly, the weather has been great the last ten days or so, but it's supposed to take a distinct turn for the worse this week. I'm going to have to work my training very much around that.

Today, for most of the morning, it was very windy, but not actually too cold. I knew the wind would be pretty hard work, but I thought that it would still be worth giving it a go. I'd downloaded a few routes from Bikely to my Garmin, and thought I'd give one of those a whirl. I decided on a route down to Cobham/Leatherhead and back.

After my physiological testing last week, I'd worked out a training programme tailored to my work schedule. The suggested training for today was a 60-120 minute ride at "Endurance" Heart Rate - ie. 142-152 bpm. I set my Garmin to give me me alerts whenever my heart rate stepped outside of that zone and then set off.

Unfortunately, the route finding side of my Garmin started going a bit haywire - I think because I hadn't started from the exact starting point of the downloaded route, so I eventually decided to just ride wherever my wheels took me. As the point of the training was just to keep my heart rate in the Endurance zone, then it didn't really matter exactly where I went. I also knew that I had the safety net of the "Go Home" function on my Garmin to get me back too.

As I'd expected, the wind was pretty stiff, but as I was only worried about my heart rate rather than absolute speed, that wasn't a problem. It was actually quite hard to keep myself in the right HR zone, because it didn't always feel like I was putting "enough" effort in. With training, you 

always feel like you should be pushing yourself to your limits, but I know now that that's not necessarily all that useful in the long run. Having said that, you can see from the graph that I did ok...most of the stuff in the lower heart rate zone was on my way home, when I was wet and miserable and it was difficult to get much speed up because the roads were wet. The really key thing is to keep out of the upper "mixed muscle" zone too much, and I achieved that pretty well. The beeping of my heart rate alerts definitely helped. 

I ended up taking a fairly similar route to the one I'd planned anyway, and ended up in Stoke d'Abernon. I stopped for 5 minutes and had a Go Bar and something to drink, but as I did the weather started closing in a bit. I thought I'd better head home as soon as I could, but after I'd been back on my bike for a couple of minutes, suddenly the wind whipped up and hail started flying into my face. I was instantly soaked, but luckily I quickly came across a petrol station, and I pulled in to shelter under their awning. 

I had to wait 15 mins or so, and the rain hadn't even got close to stopping, but I was getting cold and I figured the important thing was just to get home. It was a pretty miserable 10 or 15 miles home...my legs were cold, and my feet were wet and freezing...but I got home eventually.

In the end, I'm glad I went out, cos it was a couple of hours training that I wouldn't otherwise have got and it was reassuring that I managed to get through it all right.

The weather's supposed to be a bit better tomorrow, so I'll try and do my threshold training tomorrow up in Richmond Park. I'm supposed to do a 15-20 minute Time Trial session at higher heart rates, so one lap of the park is probably a good way of doing it. It'll be important to get out tomorrow, because it might not be possible for the rest of the week.

Sportstest Physiological Assessment

So, today I had my cycling-specific physiological assessment at Sportstest, the company run by Dr Garry Palmer, who co-wrote the book which I've already mentioned several times in this blog - "Elite Cycling: Successful Sportives".

I was keen to have this done, so that I could correctly identify (rather than estimating) my training heart rate zones etc., to ensure that I make the most of my training time. I also wanted to have my 'baseline' stats to hopefully compare with my improved fitness come July.

The actual testing consisted of two sessions on a Kingcycle computerised turbo trainer. In the first one - the "Sub-maximal exercise test" - I gradually worked up to a power output of 150 watts, stayed there for 5 minutes, then worked up to a power output of 200 watts and stayed there for another 5 minutes. This test helps you work out your oxygen uptake and 'efficiency'.

In the second - "Maximal exercise test" - you have to increase your power output at a rate of around 25 watts per minute, until you've got nowhere else to go, and have to give up - not much fun. This test is designed to work out your maximum power output, heart rate and oxygen uptake (VO2 max).

Throughout, you're wired up to a heart rate monitor obviously, but also a mask over your nose and mouth, which measures compositon of the gases you're breathing in and out.

The tests are bookended by a couple of chats with Garry. Initially he got some background on my training history and goals, and also took basic measurements of height, weight, body fat etc. Then, following the tests, there was a full run through of the results and their significance and then a look at optimal training strategies in the light of these results.

I'll try and give you the headline figures - but more interestingly for both you and me hopefully - the conclusions that Garry drew about how best to proceed from here on in.

Garry's measurement of my weight and height tallied with mine - 5 foot 8 and a half and currently 11 stone 10 pounds. However, his measurement of my body fat came out at 14.1% - significantly lower than that of my Tanita scales. However, as he then went on to say, while my body fat is in the 'ideal' range for the normal population, it's a bit high for athletic performance - particularly given the climbs in the Etape. His first recommendation was to aim at a body fat percentage of 8-10%.

From my sub-maximal exercise test, the interesting figures were that my Efficiency was at 18.86% at 150 watts, but actually increased to 19.11% at 200 watts. This has interesting repurcussions for my training strategy, which I'll come to later, but broadly it means that I need to work on improving my efficiency at this lower level - ideally towards 22+%.

From the maximal exercise tests:

Maximum power was 277 watts (need to be aiming at more like 300).

Maximum heart rate 183bpm

Maximum power/weight ratio was 3.71 watts/kg (need to be aiming at 4-4.5 with weight decreasing and power increasing obviously).

Measured VO2 max was 50.3 ml/kg/min (Garry suggested this is a pretty good level given my limited training time so far).

From this, Garry also calculated my target heart rate zones as:

Recovery/Base - Up to 141bpm

Endurance - 142-152 bpm

Mixed Muscle Zone - 153-161bpm

Threshold - 162-172 bpm

Speed/Power - Over 173bpm

Garry and I then worked at putting together an individualised training programme, to take account of my rather 'eccentric' work pattern.

In my alternate week 'off' it basically alternates endurance training with threshold sessions, and works in an unstructured group ride.

My 'work' week is of necessity a bit easier, my days off being used for longer endurance sessions, and my work days being used just as commute/recovery days.

Anyway, I don't want to blind you with too much science, but overall I found the session really interesting, and useful, and I'm very glad I've done it. I already knew from the book that Garry's approach was one that would really suit me, and that proved to be true. He was really helpful and encouraging, and even managed to make the less impressive stats seem not quite so depressing. His assertion that I could probably manage the Etape next week (although it wouldn't be much fun!) was worth the money on its own.

I shouldn't leave this entry without mentioning that on Tuesday we had a meeting with Fran and Katy from Face Partnership - who are organising the Sky Etape team. Again it was really useful to meet them, and particularly to hear Fran's experiences of doing the Etape. All the other guys on the team were really friendly and interesting too - although I'm slightly concerned that I'm the most 'beginnerish' - I'm starting to feel more confident day by day though, and I think if I can stick to my training schedule I should hopefully be ok.

Monday Fat Stats

I kinda forgot (conveniently some might say), that Monday is of course fatness (as opposed to fitness) stats day.

So, here they are - with a quick comparison to last week's:

Weight: 11 stone 10 pounds (down 1 pound)
Body Fat Percentage: 20.4% (up 0.6%)
Visceral Fat Rating: 7 (same)
Basal Metabolic Rate: 7189kJ/1718 kcal (down a bit)
Muscle Mass: 8 stone 11 pounds 6 oz (down about 3 pounds - eh?!)
Body Water Percentage: 55% (down 0.5%)

Well, let's start with the positives. I've lost a pound, which doesn't seem like a lot, but is actually exactly the amount that my training bible suggests you aim at. I guess I'm aiming at being 11 stone or maybe a tiny bit less by the time of the Etape, and so I'm still on schedule for that.

Body fat percentage up a bit, but not a significant amount. Basal metabolic rate and muscle mass are a bit disappointing really. They should both be up after a good week of training, but I guess these are the ones that are probably most susceptible to measurement error, because the Tanita body compostion monitor I'm using is having to make a number of assupmptions to work these out. I almost believed that myself when I wrote it....hopefully it sounded convincing.

Weekend Catchup

It's been a busy few days, so here are the training stats from this weekend's activities. Unfortunately, I forgot to press 'start' on my Edge when setting out this morning on the Twickenham Cycling Club Sunday ride (of which more later), so the stats for that only cover the second 2/3rds of the ride.

Strength: 5 min Intervals (Cadence 50/90) (Friday night)

Skills: Bike Handling + High Cadence + Out of Saddle (Saturday afternoon)

Conditioning: Twickenham Cycling Club Sunday Morning Ride - 50 miles (umm...Sunday morning)

Just as a recap, the three categories - Strength/Skills/Conditioning - relate to the three types of session recommended in my training programme. At the moment, I'm supposed to be doing a minimum of 3 conditioning sessions, 1 strength session and 1 skills session per week, which I've managed to keep to so far.

I'd targeted doing 8 hours of work this week, and a couple of 2+ hour rides, but I reassessed that a little bit this week, in light of more information about 'over-training', and also being a bit more realistice. As it was, I did 7 hours, and managed to do the recommended number of sessions in each group.

The 30 minute skills session I did on Saturday was actually surprisingly useful. Because I'm so new to riding a road bike, I really needed to get a bit more experience of cornering and adjusting my cadence to suit wind/gradient etc., and although it was only a short session, I learnt a lot.

Prior to this, on Friday night, I'd done a strength interval session to try and build up my power production. The format was: 5 minutes, in a high gear, at a cadence of around 50, followed by 5 minutes in a low gear at a cadence of around 90. The whole thing was repeated 3 times, giving a total of 30 minutes plus warmup/warmdown. I think I got the intensity about right - hard, but not flat out, and although the strength sessions don't seem to be much fun, I'm hoping I'll reap the benefits on Ventoux in July.

Anyway - back to today and the Twickenham Cycling Club Sunday ride. I know that I need to get some experience of riding in a group, holding a wheel etc., and I guess joining a club is probably the best way to do it. It's also a more sociable way of getting the miles in. My big concern was that my fitness levels wouldn't be up to it, and I'd end up being disheartened rather than energised by the experience. I was still in two minds when I got up, but the weather was so lovely that I figured if I didn't go out today, then I would never go out - which would be a bad thing.

So -being careful to wear my least-branded, least-garish gear (The cycling branch of the fashion police are notoriously strict), I headed down to Twickenham Green, to the meeting point.

Everyone was immediately really friendly and welcoming, and I definitely felt 'looked after'. When we set out, Des - who was leading the group - cycled alongside me and gave me some friendly and really helpful advice about the do's and don'ts of group riding and the whole process was neatly demystified for me.

The friendliness of the group was reinforced for me, when after 5 or 6 miles I heard the telltale hiss of air escaping from my tyre, as I got my first puncture on my new bike. Everyone immediately stopped, and it was if a Ferrari pit-crew had sprung into action - I had barely come to a standstill before the back wheel (initial misdiagnosis) and then the front wheel were off, and my inner tube was replaced - the whole process taking no more than 2 or 3 minutes. Again, it made everything much less stressful for me, 'cos I wasn't fiddling around amateurishly, feeling like I was holding everyone up.


Once we got going again, it became clear to me that the most difficult thing about group riding is having the confidence (in yourself as much as the other riders) to sit 6 inches behind the back wheel of the cyclist in front of you and maintain that position without braking or accelerating suddenly. Having said that, once you can do it, the efficiency gains are enormous. I read somewhere that you can use up to 40% less oxygen if you're 'drafting' another rider and whilst I probably wasn't saving quite that much, your cycling just feels a hell of a lot easier.

Partly as a result, the pace of the group never felt uncomfortable, and overall, I felt less tired after this 50 miles than I did after my 40 mile solo ride earlier in the week. The 'hills' also felt a lot more comfortable, but as the benefits from drafting are not so extreme when climbing, I'm hoping this was more a mark of my improving fitness.

The most important discovery was that I'm going to have to get a bit more handy at clipping into my new pedals. Today it was really slowing me up in pulling away from traffic lights and roundabouts, and although I won't have to do that much clipping and unclipping in the Etape, I definitely need to get better at it in the short-term to make training a bit less stressful

Because I've only got partial stats from my Garmin, it might be useful to say here that the ride was just a smidge under a round 50 miles, and it was probably 3 1/2 hours in the saddle.

It was a good start to the training week anyway, and I'm going to need to get ahead of myself in my 'work' weeks. At the moment, I'm working part-time, and the way my shifts works is that one week (eg. this coming week), I work Mon/Tue then Fri/Sat/Sun. The flip side is that I don't work at all in the alternate weeks, so have a bit more time available for training, once my other course commitments are dealt with.

I will have 40 minutes per day of bike commuting time to keep me ticking over, so generally I'll just have to do a long ride and maybe a bigger strength session on the Wed/Thur of my work weeks. This is slightly complicated this week by the fact that I have my physiological testing at Sportstest on Thursday, and you're supposed to be well rested before it, so I'll have to try and fit in some evening turbo sessions after work.

Will let you know how I get on anyway, and there'll be an update after Sportstest on Thursday.

First 'Long' Ride

I know...it's all relative. I had a really nice morning anyway, doing a quick zip down to Chobham and back to Twickenham, all using my Edge 705 to give me "bike sat-nav" for the first time, as well as logging all my stats.

I've popped both the Motion Based and the (now working again) Garmin Connect stats below, as they give you slightly different analysis of the information, and it can't hurt.

Twickenham-Chobham-Twickenham Stats (Motion Based)

Conditioning: Twickenham - Chobham - Twickenham 40 Miles (Garmin Connect)

So those are the basic facts and figures. The reality was that I had a good morning. I guess in my heart of hearts, I felt like I wanted to do a ride with a good chunk of mileage so that I felt like the Etape would at least be a possibility.

I'd planned to do the ride at a quite leisurely pace, because I was also getting to grips with the sat-nav side of my Edge 705. I chose the route by doing a quick search on Bikely - a site which enables riders to share their routes. Once I'd found a route that looked promising, in terms of mileage and scenery, I used the option to download it as a GPX file. It's then a simple matter of copying the file to the GPS folder on the Edge by dragging and dropping - the route then turns up in the list of "Saved Routes" on the unit.

After fitting my newly arrived Look Keo Sprint pedals, and attaching the cleats to my new Pearl Izumi Attack Road Shoes, I was ready to go. At first, I wasn't very confident about the routing the Edge was taking - I didn't seem to be going in the right direction at all, and this meant that I spent more time looking at the mapping screen than I did at the road at some points. However, about 15 mins of winding around the back roads of Hampton, I figured out what the problem was.

The route was a big loop, and without thinking, I'd just assumed that the loop went in a clockwise direction, and had started out. What became clear was that the route was actually plotted anti-clockwise, and so the Edge was doing its best to get me back "on track". Once I'd worked that out, it became clear that the Edge had actually done a really good job of getting me back to the proper route, by using cyclist-friendly roads with very little traffic.

It works almost exactly like a car sat-nav, giving you a warning (in both time and distance), of your next turning, and then giving you a reminder of the turning when you're just about to reach it - counting down from ten seconds on a few occasions.

Having said that, there were a couple of points on the ride when the Edge did get lost without any rider assistance.On one of these occasions it got me back to the proper route after a bit of thinking, but the second time I had to figure it out myself. The best way of doing this is to zoom out the map display, so that you can see the pink line marking your route, and then work your way back towards that line, until eventually the Edge picks it up.

Overall though, it was clearly a much better solution than constantly pulling a sweaty map out of my back pocket, and meant I could concentrate on my cycling, rather than always being worried about where I was.

The jury's still out on the pedals I think. I'm used to double sided Shimano SPD cleats/pedals for commuting, so I think it's going to take me a little while to get used to the engagement process for these Look single-sided ones. When they're engaged, the connection feels very secure, and there seems to be just the right amount of 'play' so that your knees don't feel like they're waggling around all the time, but they never get sore from being in the same position too much.

The shoes felt good though. They seem to fit well, and although there was an occasional twinge around the instep area, I think that's just a natural part of the adjustment process. Again, they felt secure without ever feeling tight and restrictive.

On the way 'out' the blustery wind was pretty much dead against me all the way, but I still managed to keep up a 17-18mph pace, without feeling tired. In fact, that was the encouraging thing about the ride as a whole. My legs and lungs never felt particularly stressed, which is a good sign on the endurance side of things. The ride was pretty flat, but on what 'hills' there were, I managed generally to keep it on the big chainring.

I had a 5 minute stop at a pub in Chobham, to refuel with drinks and an energy bar, but again I was encouraged that I didn't feel like I needed more of a rest. I did need to stretch out my back though, because it was starting to feel a bit sore from bending over in the 'tuck' position. In fact, whenever I felt a bit 'tired' I could generally narrow it down to my back feeling a bit sore, but again I'm hoping this is just part of the adjustment process.

Something that'll be easier to adjust to is feeling part of the camaraderie of the road. It's a small thing I know, but it was nice to exchange a nod and a smile with other cyclists out on the road training. Just makes you feel that you're not out there suffering on your own, and I guess on a deeper level it reminds you that you're a part of a a self-selecting group of slightly twisted loners. For some that might seem depressing - I find it strangely liberating!

By the time I got home, my quads were starting to feel slightly achey, but I had enough energy to manage a sprint to the doorway. I still need to refine my saddle position I think, as that obviously has an effect on which muscles you use. I've gradually been raising the saddle over the last week or so, in an effort to get a more 'powerful' position, but now that I've got my new pedals, I think I might need to move the saddle back slightly on the fore/aft plane, to get the most out of my legs. Will have a go at that the next time I get back on the turbo I think.

As far as the overall training plan's going, I've done almost six hours this week, which is the recommended amount according to my training plan. Although at the beginning of this week I think I said I'd like to try and get eight hours in, the more I read the more I think I should try and stick to the recommendations, in order to avoid 'overtraining', particularly at the start.

I also feel slightly guilty, because although I'd planned to do today's ride mostly in the "endurance" heart rate zone, (Zone 3, in yellow, on the chart) my Motion Based stats show me that I did a significant proportion in the Mixed Muscle Zone ( Zone 4, in orange, on the chart) above that.

This is pretty firmly discouraged in my training book, because it's not particularly useful in conditioning, and stresses two different types of muscle fibre, meaning that it's more difficult to target an individual kind of fibre on your next day of training.

I'm going to put that down as a learning experience though, and remember to drop my gearing and raise my cadence on uphill sections, so that my heart rate doesn't get too high.

I still need to do a 'strength' session from my menu of training activities, and also practice some of my 'skills', so I think I'll do an interval session on the turbo trainer on Friday, and then maybe a short, easy skills ride on Saturday.

I'm going to try myself out on the Twickenham Cycling Club Sunday morning run this weekend, because I need to get some experience of cycling in groups, and that'll give me a big jump on my training requirements for next week.

On the Road

(At the moment (2330 on Tuesday) The Garmin Connect site isn't allowing me to post my training details from today, but will add them as soon as I can)


Update Wed 1700: The Garmin Connect site still seems to be having a few problems, so I've managed to upload my training stats from yesterday onto the MotionBased website, which you should be able to find here: Tue Training Stats - 2 Laps of Richmond Park.


Despite the title, I'm not going to deliver today's entry in Beatnik style - mainly because I'm a bit poetry'd out after last Friday's late night writing session. What the title actually refers to is that today I finally got out and about on my new road bike, and did a proper road training session. Nothing overly strenuous - just a trip up to Richmond Park for 2 laps.

That only tells half the story though, because although the weather was grey but fine when I left, it was already quite blustery. On my way up to the park, the wind got stronger, and about half way through lap one, the rain started whipping in horizontally. I hope you'll bear that in mind when perusing the stats above. (While I'm on the subject, can I heartily recommend the "player" function on my stats page. It rather cleverly displays all the major readings - heart rate, cadence etc., against my map location during the ride. Kinda fun).


Lots of positives to come out of the day - the bike felt (no pun intended) really good on the road, and as a road-bike novice, it was good to get a bit of practice at shifting up and down the gears and controlling the drop handlebars. My hand position on the brake hoods also felt a lot more comfortable than it did on the turbo. I've figured out now that because the back wheel is raised slightly when its attached to the turbo, there's more pressure on your hands than there is when the bike's on the flat.


On the flat, as hoped, my cruising speed was 2 or 3 mph up on what I can do on my Sirrus Comp. Travelling at 17-18 mph was pretty comfortable and didn't feel like I was putting in much effort at all.


I also got to try out some energy food - A Sis Gel and an Energy Bar. The gels are a very strange gloopy consistency. They taste ok, but the 'feel' of them could take a bit of getting used to. I really liked the Energy Bar though. It had a sticky, toffee-like consistency. I think it was an Apple and Blackcurrant flavour one that I had, but there was a nice overtone of dried apricot too.


The bad news was that I'm clearly going to have to work hard on my climbing. As you'll see from the gradient map in the stats, the little bits of climbing in my circuit were really very short, but my heart rate and breathing shot up slightly alarmingly. I'm hoping this was at least partly the effect of the wind, but I think even without the wind I would have been pretty uncomfortable.


At least I know now though, and it's not too late to work on it. I think I've earned my 'rest' day tomorrow, although I'll do a couple of hours in the gym in the morning on Yoga and a few weights - so not really 'wasting' any training time I don't think.

Fatter but fitter?!

Today's training stats: Conditioning: Turbo Conditioning Volume 60mins

I'm trialling a new feature today. As you can see above, I'm going to try putting each day's training stats - as downloaded from my Garmin Edge 705 - at the top of the day's blog entry. I just think that, frankly, it's the most interesting bit, and it's the bit I'd want to click on if I was reading somebody else's training blog.

I also have an ulterior motive, because I'm hoping it'll deflect attention from the other stats that I'm going to put in today's blog entry. Every Monday,

I'm going to try and record my weight, body fat percentage, muscle mass etc - that I've got from my Tanita Innerscan body composition scales - in an effort to track the changes. The thing is, I was kinda hoping that my weight and body fat percentage would magically decrease, thereby making me seem like a much more worthwhile person (oops, I think I must have been reading too much 'Heat' magazine again). Unfortunately, that hasn't quite proved to be the case - at least not in this first week. Anyway, without further ado, here's the newly-christened "Tale of the Tanita".

Weight: 11 stone 11 pounds

Body Fat Percentage: 19.8%

Body Water Percentage: 55.5%

Muscle Mass: 8 stone 14 pounds

Basal Metabolic Rate: 7300kJ/1745kcal

Visceral Fat Rating: 7

Basically, all of those seem to be a bit worse than last week's readings, which is disappointing to say the least. My body fat percentage in particular is starting to look a bit worrying, but I'm not entirely sure what I can do about it, because I eat pretty healthily anyway and don't really like a lot of fatty stuff anyway.

Inspired (or depressed..kinda depends how you look at it..I'm gonna go with inspired for now) by this, I've booked myself to have a full physiological assessment at Sportstest. This is a company run by Dr Garry Palmer, who co-wrote Elite Performance: Cycling: Succesful Sportives, which I raved about yesterday. As I said, I was very impressed by the detailed, but clear way in which the book goes into the science of training for Sportives and as I was looking to get a detailed

assessment anyway, I thought I'd look them up. It turns out that although they're based in the Midlands, they also do testing in Hampton, which is just round the corner from me. So, to cut a long story short, I'm booked in for 1 o'clock next Thursday.

They promise assessment of peak power output. VO2 max, power to weight ratio, maximum heart rate, endurance capacity and threshold determination. The key thing is that these figures aren't just to show off to your friends (and frankly I know I'm not going to have anything to show off about anyway), but from your maximum heart rate and your training thresholds, you can accurately work out your individual heart rate training zones, enabling you to train "smarter" as they say. Just to clarify, I would NEVER say that.

It's starting to feel like with all my cycling-related expenditure at the moment, I'm single-handedly administering a fiscal stimulus to the British economy, but I figure it really is a once in a lifetime experience and I want to get to the start line knowing I've done everything I can to be fit enough to finish the etape.

As far as today's actual training goes, I was out all day in town, so my only real opportunity was more work on the turbo tonight. I wanted to push myself a little bit harder today, so I thought I'd have a crack at riding at "Conditioning" volume. This is riding at a level where you have "difficulty" holding a conversation for long periods - a heart rate of 145-155 bpm. I thought I'd just see how I felt on the bike once I got going to determine how long I cycled for, and I ended up doing an hour. I'm just looking at my training sheet now, and it turns out that's the time recommended for "Advanced" cyclists, which I'm pleased about - although slightly concerned that I might have pushed it too far.

Actually, I'm not that concerned, because I felt good on the bike - and my legs again weren't particularly fatigued. I settled on a gear that gave me an equilibrium between my Heart Rate and pedalling Cadence - 150 and 80 respectively. Again, the slight limiting factor was a bit of saddle soreness - you can see this on the training stats where I had to hop off the bike for 20 seconds or so, to readjust my shorts - but there was definitely less soreness than yesterday, and I felt much more comfortable with the riding position.

'Cycling Successful Sportives' recommended loading up with carbs for this activity, as a lot of carbohydrate is apparently used at this intensity. Taking this to heart, I filled one of my water bottles with Science in Sport's PSP22 drink, and one of my bottles with their Go Electrolyte. It's

difficult to tell how much of an effect this had, because obviously I don't know how I would have felt if I hadn't taken them. However, I definitely felt much more comfortable at this intensity than I would have expected, so that's got to be a good thing. As a footnote, I also had a bottle of Sis's Rego afterwards. Chocolate flavour today, which had a slightly malty flavour, but I still preferred it to the Strawberry. I'm running out of the drinks from my SiS starter pack, so hopefully my order from Wiggle will arrive tomorrow. Molly's looking forward to that as she's hoping it'll give her more opportunities to build up her part.

I'm going to try and finally get out on the road tomorrow, so maybe I'll try some of the bars and gels on that ride and see what they're like. The weather's forecast to be 'mixed' and a bit rainy, but I think I should get out anyway. I've got a rest day planned for Wednesday, so I need to do something to have deserved it.

Training proper and Proper training

My training's been slightly delayed by an assignment for the Creative Writing course I'm doing,which I finally got in at 2330 on Friday night. I then had a dayschool in town for that course and then finally I could sit down and relax for the first time in about a month. Except I didn't.

Feeling the clock ticking down towards the Etape, I felt a certain amount of internal pressure to get on the bike and blow some cobwebs out. In practice, this meant me unboxing my new turbo trainer, the Tacx Sirius Soft Gel Turbo, and spending 20 minutes or so putting it all together. I then got the bike out, fixed her on the spindle, and wound her up. You can hopefully see the results in the photos - along with my attention seeking kitten, Molly.

Just to try her out, I did half an hour at what I guess was "Conditioning Volume" - the level where I would have difficulty holding a conversation for long periods and my heart rate would have been between 145 and 155 bpm.

I didn't feel too fatigued, and in fact the main problem appears to be that without the effects of wind, which you get outside, you just get very, very sweaty quite quickly. It was the sweatiness rather than the work that was making me uncomfortable by the end - but at least it felt like I'd got some work done.

It also meant that I could try out my Science in Sport "Go" Electrolyte drink. As I'm clearly going to need every bit of help that I can get, I'm going to try and take the hydration/energy/nutrition side of things quite seriously. I've occasionally used other Science in Sport products before, and I've heard good things about their cycling stuff before, so they seem like a good place to start. With the free measuring/drinking bottle they give you with their starter pack it's very easy to just pour in the "Go" powder up to the relevant mark and then top up with water. I've gone for the Lemon and Lime flavour, and it seems basically palatable, albeit with a slightly artificial, metallic tang.

I was already on a bit of a science kick, because a couple of books that I'd ordered to help me with my preparation had arrived in the morning, and I'd got a chance to start on one of them (Elite Performance Cycling - Succesful Sportives) on the train up to my dayschool. I'm already enjoying it becase a) It seems to be specifically designed for relative novices preparing for the Etape and b) Because it takes a very science based approach to training, which my analytical mind finds attractive.

The training methods the book suggests also seem to tie in with the British Cycling/Sky training programme which I've been given, so everyone's literally on the same page. What the book adds to that though, is a clear explanation of how the body works and responds to training, with particular regard to the importance of carbohydrate intake and processing for the long distance cyclist. It also gives clear advice on what to eat/drink in relation to your training - eg. 2+ hours before training a carb-based mean - In the 2 hours before training drink a reasonable amount of fluid in combination with some carbs in a sports drink etc...

Anyway, after doing my quick spin on the turbo, I realised that it was going to be important for me to be able to accurately monitor my heart rate. As my bike was already on the trainer - I thought this would be a good time to use it to double as a workstand so that I could attach my Garmin Edge 705 GPS/HRM.

This meant attaching a mount to the stem, and cadence and speed sensors to the rear stay, one of the pedal cranks and a spoke. I'm useless at anything DIY, so I initially made a couple of schoolboy errors, but after half an hour or so, I had everything working.

I'm not sure you can quite see on the photo, but on this screen you can have a number of readings - I've got overall time, time of day, heart rate, cadence, speed etc...but you can customise this screen however you want. On another screen, you have the mapping side of things - essentially a bike sat-nav. This means that you can program in the route that you want to cycle, and it will give you turn by turn directions - meaning you don't have to have an OS map in your back pocket and stop every five minutes to work out why you're not where you should be.

The best bit, of course, is the way that these two functions combine - when you cycle a route, and you then have your speed, HR, cadence etc. cross-referenced with your position. All the info from your training sessions can be downloaded to a computer and Garmin's "Connect" website then collates all the data into charts and graphs, and indeed anything the mildly obsessive gadget geek/cyclist could want.

This afternoon, I'd intended to nip up to Richmond Park, and do 2 or 3 laps at "Steady Volume" (fairly low intensity - the level where you have little difficulty holding a conversation) to get a bit of proper on-road time. Typically, it was a beautiful day, right up until the moment I detached my bike from the turbo - at which point it started lashing down with rain and got very windy. I still really wanted to go out - but it soon became obvious that it would have been pointless, and might have been so discouraging that it would have been counter-productive.

Instead, I popped the bike back on the turbo and did a 45 minute steady volume stint - but this time with the Edge set up to give me audible alerts when my heart rate slipped out of a preset target range. This proved really useful, because it meant I could concentrate on the telly - rather than my heart rate - which obviously makes the time go quicker.

This is the first time I've tried this out - but I think if you're lucky, if you click on the link below you should be able to see all the data from my workout today, which I downloaded from my Garmin Edge. Let me know if it works/doesn't work...but if it does, it's kinda cool!

Conditioning: Turbo Steady Volume 45 mins

As this is relatively low intensity stuff, my legs didn't really feel fatigued at all, and I didn't get anywhere near as sweaty as I had yesterday. Today the limiting factor was a bit of saddle soreness, which was making sitting quite uncomfortable. Hopefully this is just part of the adjustment process to a new bike and riding position which will pass reasonably quickly.

Being on the turbo has been a good way to get used to the riding position with my hands on the hoods of the brake levers, as I've never had a road bike before. It also get me used to using the gear changers which are combined with the brake levers. For those of you who don't know - which would have included me up until about 3 weeks ago - you actually used the brake levers to change gear as well as to brake. To change gear, you simply flick the brake lever inwards, towards the centre of the handlebars. As I've said before, I'm trying to be very positive about all my training - so I'm looking at today as an example of what a good idea it was to buy a turbo trainer, because otherwise I wouldn't have got any training done over the last couple of days - rather than a missed opportunity to get on the road.

Going back to the science stuff - as part of my rehydration routine today I also tried SiS's "Rego" recovery drink. I was a bit concerned, because I'd got the Strawberry flavour in my randomised starter pack, and normally I hate anything Strawberry "flavoured". It actually turned out to be not too unpleasant, and in conjunction with my fastidious drinking during my training, has definitely made a huge difference to how I felt after the exercise. Often if I go to the gym and do a reasonably hard workout, I'll feel very tired and lethargic when I get home. Today though, I've felt very energised and managed to get lots of things done after training, which might not have happened normally. I'll be interested to see how much of a difference it'll make to how I feel tomorrow.

For various boring, practical reasons, I'm not sure if I'll manage to get much training done tomorrow - but as I'm off this week, I want to try and get as much done as possible - preferably on real roads - to feel like I've really got into the swing of things. All the books and forums I've read tell you how important it is to have a target for each week - so I guess I should start here.

My target for this weeks is to do eight hours training, with at least two 2+ hour rides. Here's hoping the weather plays ball.

The Honeymoon's Over

There's been a small hiatus, in both blog and training terms, because my sister got married last weekend. Despite my best efforts, I didn't get a chance to throw in any gym sessions, because there was lots going on, but lots of fun things happened anyway.

First and foremost, my new bike (Felt F55 2008) arrived last week. I had an inkling that it was going to be good when I helped the delivery driver take it round to the back of the house, because even in the box it was much lighter than I expected it to be.

When I finally got it open, I was even more thrilled. She (for she's definitely a 'she') looks absolutely beautiful and is stunningly light. You really can lift her up with one finger, and every extra bit of weight I can trim will make a massive difference over the distance of the etape.

I also took delivery of a new Garmin Edge 705 - the GPS/heart rate monitor that I mentioned in a previous post. The kind people at Garmin have let me have one for review purposes, and I intend to make full use of it to track my training in as much detail as possible.

Unfortunately, I haven't yet had a chance to take the bike out, because I've been so busy, and indeed will be for the rest of the week. I've got an assignment for the Creative Writing Course I'm doing at the moment, which has to be handed in on Friday, and I've not got very far with it yet. Hopefully, I'll finally get out on Sunday and have a decent ride.

I did go to my usual Wednesday morning Yoga class this morning, and after that I did a solid 30 minutes on one of the exercise bikes. I basically did 8 minutes at effort level 6, followed by a couple of minutes recovery at effort level and then repeated that.

From now on, I'm going to try and take as many positives out of my training as possible, and the nice thing was that my legs didn't really feel tired during any of this stint - I just got very sweaty - which made me feel uncomfortable, rather than particularly fatigued. I also got a second wind after about 15 minutes, and managed to put out more power, at a higher cadence, over the second half of the session. That's reasonably encouraging I think.

I popped into work this evening, to check if there were any more details from Sky about the Etape, and indeed there were. The most important thing was the first month of our training programme, which has been put together with some of the coaches from British Cycling.

The headlines are that in the next month, I should be aiming at 6 hours of bike work in week 1, 6 again in week 2, 8 in week 3 and then down to 4 in week 4.

The work is split up into three key areas - Conditioning, Strength and Technique - with the initial focus being on Conditioning. Within each area, there are a number of different exercises. It's all very clearly set out, and all seems to make sense. At the moment, I've been placed at the "beginner" level, which suits me just fine I think, although because I have a bit more time off than most people, I think I will aim to do a bit more time on the bike than is suggested.

It did remind me that I probably need to get hold of a turbo trainer so that I can do work at home without going to the trouble of going out, particularly when the weather's bad, and I can also measure my performance a bit more accurately. More gadgets...mmmm.

On the science front, I took delivery of a Science in Sport starter pack of energy bars/gels/electrolytes/recovery drinks etc. which I wanted to try out, in order to see which flavours I like. Will be interesting to see if I can feel the difference, particularly with the electrolytes and stuff that are for drinking when you're doing exercise. Anything to help with the endurance side of things will be very useful.

Last but not least, I managed to get "starting point" figures for my weight, water percentage, muscle mass etc. from my Tanita scales on Monday, under reasonably controlled conditions. I'll try and get those details every week so that we can hopefully track the improvements.

Here they are anyway:

Weight: 11 stone 10 pounds

Body Fat Percentage: 18.4%

Visceral Fat Rating: 6

Basal Metabolic Rate: 7380KJ/1764Kcal

Muscle Mass: 9 stone 1 pound

The Visceral Fat rating is basically that fat that is in the internal abdominal cavity, surrounding the vital organs. Men tend to "lay down" more fat in this area, particlarly as they get older, hence the "beer belly".

The Basal Metabolic Rate is the minimum level of energy your body needs when at rest, to function effectively. The higher the rate, the more calories you burn - so I think it's better to have a higher BMR, although I'm not sure as yet how much this can be altered by training. We'll see I guess.

Encouragingly, all those readings seem to be pretty much slap bang in the middle of the "healthy" ranges. The only one that's a little out of kilter is the body fat percentage, which is towards the top of "healthy", but there's plenty of time to work on that.