TMonk

^ @Hermes I'm jealous of the piano intervals. I have some friends (guitar, bass, tenor sax) coming tonight to play so at least they will get some work, but not the classical I seem to always be lacking in.

I took advantage of the forecast as well and asked my mgr. if I could take a half-day today. About 80 miles with some time on Soledad and Fiesta in 4.5 hrs.

Enthalpic

Whatever you are doing to your chains is weakening them.

Ttoc6

3x3x2minutes at 115%. Then I finished up the alpe de zwift climb. Skipped a zwift race because I've been neglecting my intervals, need to get back in the habit.

Also signed up for my first xc ski race up in Jackson hole this weekend. 15k and I'm probably gonna get lapped by the 30k skiers lol.

Hermes

Classical, jazz, blues, pop...it is all good. Have a great session!

Hermes

Classic or skate skiing?

Ttoc6

Skate is all I know. Classic looks too form intensive for me lol

Hermes

Ha ha. I am just the opposite. I learned classic and I suck at skate. Of course, I do not practice skate so what do I expect.

mike868y

that or it was installed improperly.

furiousferret

I get that you're pretending to help, but no one here thinks you're actually trying to help.

Ttoc6

I was told the learning curve are inverse of each other. Skate levels off after you get the basics but it is hard to get there. Classic is relatively easy to pick up but to race it is very difficult.

That's what I'm told, but I'm a bad case study. I dont classic ski except to skin up mtns in my back country gear.

Ygduf

Don't think it's too out of line to remark that it's either maintenance or installation? You using quick links or the replace-the-pin type chains, and is that where they are breaking. When you look at the pin after the chain comes apart, is the wear groove on the roller exceptionally deep or anything?

furiousferret

I don't think he's necessarily out of line, its just that in the 5 years I've posted on the 33, he goes out of his way to take digs at me (which used to be a daily occurrence). If there was an occasional compliment (outside of the 2-3 times I've tried to reach out to him) it wouldn't have been a big deal. I get there is a low key hazing of racers that fit into a certain category here (which I may or may not fit) but at some point a line gets crossed. Its obvious the guy has zero respect for me and at this point the feeling is mutual.

I'm not angry about it, but if I didn't respond his replies to me would end up getting more and more childish.

Back to the chain. Its definitely possible since both failures were a day or two after taking off and cleaning the chain. The first one was an SRAM chain and I changed it out 2-3 times (which they're only supposed to be changed once) and snapped it going 1300-1600 watts. This time it was a Connex link which snapped on the pin. I did have over 10k miles on it which is double its rating and riding in a few storms that month may not have helped. Ultimately both times fall on not following maintenance guidelines.

Hermes

2xMount Soledad z4 climbing efforts.

Later...Did some piano intervals. I started on Carl Czerny's school of velocity. . Czerny, 1791-1857, was Austrian composer and teacher. He developed the Czerny School of Velocity - pages and pages of drills designed to increase dexterity, accuracy and of course speed.

I think bike racers need a book of drills called the school of velocity. I sure needed it on Soledad today - more speed.

Hermes

Looks like I am the only one training these days. I finally got my mojo back. 2 hour endurance ride with 3 x Torrey Pines climbing efforts. The first two were over under 3/2 and the last was a threshold effort. All the rest of the ride was tempo. Nice day with temps in the low 60s and a lot of cyclists on the road.

TheKillerPenguin

I've been doing 3-4 day vo2 blocks with some days having 2x workouts. ~20min per workout in zone, interval duration and rest periods vary but the goal is to keep breathing haggard and dig deep holes. It is entirely unpleasant.

hubcyclist

i've finished 11 weeks of Trainerroad's sweet spot base high volume plans (just have a recovery week this week). Went from training at 275w at the beginning of base 1 to 285w at base 2, and my initial hunch based on my seeing HR/RPE change lately is that I could bump up to 290-295 for build, which would be a whole other level of hurt compared to just doing sweet spot, which is my milieu.
If I do go to 295 and somehow manage to get 5w more during build, that would put me around 4.3w/kg, which is just mind blowing to me that I would even potentially sniff that level. Despite "racing" since 2014 I'm still a Cat 5, so if things shake out I may be a lot more motivated to do road events, or at least join in some faster pace group rides instead of being solo.

mike868y

impressive gains man. there's a lot you can learn from racing that you don't necessarily get just from training, though. plenty of people go into races with big numbers and can't necessarily capitalize on that because they lack race smarts. in other words...get out there and race!

hubcyclist

Well I had convinced myself I was going to be just full time CX after my "success" this season (basically bringing crossresults points from the mid 600's to 506, but I see even better things for next season now that I've brought myself out of mediocrity) and maybe just do Harvard RR since it's a club event, but I'm definitely thinking of trying to get out there for some more and seeing if I can get a bit better at road and having fun with faster people.

burnthesheep

I've held off using gels for workouts, well forever.

I'd only ever gobble such a thing for an actual event. Not even for hammer rides.

The USAC email discount "free" SiS gel stuff hit my inbox. I thought, meh, $7 for free shipping plus two free packs. Alright. $7 basically for over 20 gels.

I had my usual banana and coffee, my beet juice, then I took 1/2 one just before today's workout and the rest after the first few 4min repeats...........and I'll be darned.

It's like the ole "matchbox" grew in size to fit a lot more matches. I don't feel it necessary for SS or something gentler. But it sure helped with doing 6x4min at 105% all back to back to back. With a couple 1:1 hits at the end. I even did the "rest" part at about 30 to 40w more than usual. Usually I spin a rest interval at like 110 to 120w. Today did 150w.

I even felt if I had another one to gobble I probably could have done a few more repeats. But could feel the energy at end of the hour starting to wane a bit.

https://www.strava.com/activities/2158221724

TheKillerPenguin

Yeah dude, having instant access to all that sugar makes a difference with over threshy stuff. I tend to prefer shot blocks cuz you're not obligated to eat the whole sleeve at once, so I'll eat like a block or two (33-66cal) between each interval depending on the length and how awful I feel. Cytomax/Skratch is similarly helpful, though for like vo2 repeats I find sports drink a little harsh on my stomach..

Nice work!

Hermes

I use the gels and they agree with my stomach. I take a liquid shot about 30 minutes before the first effort and then switch to solid blocks and do a block or two between intervals.

burnthesheep

Great idea on the solid blocks that are lower calorie commitment per "hit". Thanks! I've been riding now 2 1/2 years but still learning a lot.

I should order some and save the bigger gels for hammer rides and races and stuff.

Now, if I get this figured out, I need to do a better job in the evenings with my compensation eating "treats". That stuff at 8:30 at night ain't doing anything but going to fat store. Maybe I should drink some decaf tea and do some stretching/yoga while the wife and I watch our Netflix show to forget the "snack" desire.

Enthalpic

Half a gel? Sounds messy and not worth much.

revchuck 

Nope, I just haven't been posting about it.

I finally got through with running for a while. I had wanted to do a half marathon under two hours - yeah, I'm old and slow - and accomplished that a couple of weeks ago. I'll be doing my recovery days on foot going forward, 2-4 miles a couple of time a week to maintain a minimum of running form and add some impact for my bones.

I'm preparing for the Texas RAAM Challenge, about 210 miles and 10k of climbing, at the end of March. It's a B race, my main goal event is the Tour de Georgia gran fondo at the end of April. My coach has me doing longish rides (2-1/2 to 3-1/2 hours) with a target IF of .80 and other rides with shortish threshold interval sets (5x8' is the longest so far) to get my legs used to cycling again, and it's been working. I just emailed her yesterday to tell her to quit taking it easy on me. I may live to regret that. I'm enjoying the work, though.

On bike stuff, I've had two Powertap hubs and two bottom brackets die on me in the last month or so. Thankfully I have another functional bike that I put together from mothballed stuff. It's good to have spares. A new BB is due in Thursday and one of the PTs is back from the mothership, so that'll get me fully back in business.

It's good to be back.

rubiksoval

I've gotten a few hours in here and there. CTL is hovering in the mid 50s for the last week. TSB finally went positive after dropping to -85 when I just started back. mFTP is up to 298 and even managed an hour long fartlek today at 322 np. Coming back slowly, but I'm struggling to perform any structured intervals. From 5x5 at 390 this time last year to barely 5x5 at 320 a couple of weeks ago, and three failures at even getting beyond the second interval since.

Eh. The weather sucks. So rainy. We're going to break our all time February rainfall this week already. Doing lots of zwifting which isn't boosting the fitness that quickly since I rarely go over threshold for more than a minute or two andI'm barely hitting 5 hours a week.

There's not a single race on our calendar in April, though, so that may bode well for the fitness. Of course, Sunny King crit is in April... Still got some work to do I guess.