hobkirk

I had become frustrated by how slow my riding is. A 15 mph average ride (30 miles, 50' ascent per mile average) was good. There is a radar speed display on one of my routes - it follows a 1/2 mile slow ascent, but the final 1/10 mile is flat. My Garmin displays my speed, of course, but the radar display was a nice spur to crank it up. How fast? 18 MPH. ARGH!

I started riding 5 years ago. I've ridden 20K miles despite New England winters and hospital stays for two cancers and two new leg joints. Many years back, I was a decent runner (4:40 mile in high school, all marathons around age 40 under 3 hours).

How could I be so slow? Could I improve my speed potential?

After two months of intervals, when I hit the same radar display on the same route, my speed was 21 MPH. My effort seemed less, my "lead out" effort shorter. Hot damn!

So maybe there's hope, even for old geezers! Obviously I am bragging, but I hope that this anecdote might help someone.

Details:

• My intervals are 4x8. That means four 8-minute "as hard as I can push" efforts, with 2-3 minute recoveries in-between.
  • I average about 17.8 mph, my average HR is 145, max HR is 150, and I am working damn hard the whole way
  • I do "4x8" because that's what the study I read suggested.
    I would consider suicide during the intervals if I knew I had to do six! So I am really glad it's only four...
  • For the last 3 weeks, a friend (72, much more experience, much faster) has joined me. We reinforce each other. He's about 2 mph faster than I am. It makes it more interesting.
• I turn 70 in 10 days. Hooray!
  • I will celebrate by leading a club ride (Wednesday Wheelers, a sub-group of Charles River Wheelmen) on my annual "Bonsai Ride."
    • After a gorgeous 32 or 45 mile ride, lunch (pre-ordered sandwiches) is eaten in the courtyard of New England's most spectacular bonsai center, Bonsai West. I've adored the place and the owner for 20 years.
    • Two years ago, there were 70 riders!

bobbyl1966

You are fast rider. My average speed in hilly trail 10 miles ride one way is 12 miles. same average speed i have do with different bikes. Elevation in that bike trail is 700 feet to 900 feet. I use 53/39 crank and 9 speeds cassette 12-25. My bikes weight around 26 pounds. Now i put in one old steel bike 50/40 crank and 8 speeds casssete 12-30. i want go for ride in the same bike trail and see if is go improve my average speed. But i know too i not ride as i used to do. i work full time job i fix bikes too that no give me much free time for go and ride.

2manybikes

Excellent !!!

I'm just now getting my fitness where I want. That probably means 1' of snow tomorrow.

Ravenwing

Good work! Quite hilly around here, and 17 mph average is the best I've been able to do, and for sure not on every ride. Googled Bonsai West, looks like a really cool place. An early happy birthday, and enjoy the ride!

volosong

Congratulations. Thanks for the explanation on how you ride intervals. I assume you 'warm up' first. How long is your warm-up?

bobbyl1966

what size crank and cassette you have in your bike

Damien09

Nice man pretty fast speed for an older guy. I am many years younger and run about 17-18mph avg with 50-70'/mile. Those big hills destroy my average.i Haven't been riding bikes for to long maybe a year or so with some big brakes. I was a long distance runner so i had some cardio endurance to help.but like you found out that didn't help much in the beginning. Thanks for the write up on your interval training,i was thinking of trying some out myself.
I hope we both can continue to go faster

qcpmsame 

Excellent, great to read a positive report, on a member's improvement yet. Well done, and thanks for posting your interval plan, looks worth trying out.

Bill

OldTryGuy

Outstanding improvement and an early Happy Birthday!

You older guys simple work too hard for my liking.

trainsktg

I just started doing intervals a few weeks ago and I agree, they work.

Congrats on your accomplishment!

Keith

fthomas

Thanks for sharing your success and training regimen!

Have a great Birthday ride.

bowzette

As you've found out the secret to getting faster are intervals. I've been doing HIIT for the past 12 weeks (switched from LTHR intervals). Lately I also have been doing the 4x8 with 3 min recovery. I find Trainerroad useful and created my interval program on it. Just be sure you're getting plenty of recovery. Ride really, really easy a lot and really, really hard some.

Jim from Boston

Hi hobkirk,

Dittoes to the above congratulations, especially in view of your medical hurdles. We are both Metro Bostonians and made acquaintance on a thread you started this summer. Similarly this summer after years of mileage-based training I decided to emphasize intensity/speed, partly based on intervals, with this premise,

My training program is pretty homespun, using Relative Perceived Exertion as my guage of intensity, and as noted above pretty modest. Basically, on a scale of 0 to 100, with 50% my usual riding pace,

• warmup of 6 miles at RPE=50
  
  
• training pace=60%; about 15-20 miles on weekdays, as much as I can find time for; weekend ride of at least 40 miles
  
  
• Hills (and beyond) at 70% for at least two minutes.

ADDENDUM: The verbal descriptions of the relative perceived exertion for my 0 to 100% scale:

• resting...10 to 20
  
• very, very light...20 to 30
  
• very light...30 to 40
  
• fairly light...50 (my usual happy-go-lucky pace / exertion)
  
• somewhat hard...60
  
• hard...70
  
• very hard (lactate threshold; breakpoint between hard but steady breathing and labored with gasping)...80 (my max HR)
  
• very, very hard...90 to 100.

I use these sporadic intervals because I found on my commute the terrain did not conform with a schedule of intervals, e.g. downhills on the intervals, uphills on the rest periods, and interspersed traffic lights. I actually now look forward to the uphills.

An adage I once read on BF is “My 15 mph (40 mile ride) is to me, as your 23 mph (double century) is to you." Nonetheless I am enjoying the virtually intoxicating “thrill” of increased speed and crave my rides more than ever.

One other point of reference, @hobkirk. This summer you also posted to a thread from a Pennsylvania roadie requesting routes around Boston. I too had replied, and even showed that roadie around, and wrote,

FYA, one ride was from Beacon Hill to Great Blue Hill. You had posted,

I think you were referring to the hill on Brush Hill Road, but we inadvertently turned on Neponset Valley Parkway, and he was not impressed.

hobkirk

Warm-up is 4-5 miles. My new knee is gimpy, so I've done some stretching before I get on the bike.

hobkirk

"Crank"? or crank chain rings? Well, 172.5 mm with 53/43/30 rings. I ride in the 43 ring.

Cassette = 11-34. I'd guess I use all 10 gears.

hobkirk

That's spectacular! Way to go, I'm happy for both of you.

I don't know if the hill is called Brush Hill, but it's got a gate so it's only for cyclists and walkers, IIRC. AFAIK, it is THE road in the Boston area to do repeats if you are prepping for the Mount Washington Road race.

Speed: I've always been a speed freak. I've owned most of the "fastest motorcycle made" from age 19 to 40. I absolutely love the speed of downhill skiing. And I've always driven fast - it was a rare week I didn't top 100 mph during the course of routine driving ("oh darn, I'm late getting back from lunch, I'd better drive fast!"). I've gone cross-country on a motorcycle and in a car, cruising whenever possible around 100. Locally I'd always be about 30-50% above the speed limit with no conscious effort.

IRONY: At age 55 I was diagnosed with rampant ADD, attention deficit. They drugged me with speed. The result was I'd need to take a nap and my driving automatically slowed down without any effort. I simply started noticing I was going slower. The speed stopped controlling the ADD, but my driving has stayed slower.

bobbyl1966

i am sorry for my mistake. i mean chain rings. I use 53/39 crank and 9 speeds cassete 12-25. In flats is okay that setup i have but in hills is hard to pedal i want go with more wide cassette. In my other road bike i put crank 50/40 and 8 speeds cassette 12-30 i not know yet how is ride in hills no have go in the bike trail. 11/34 cassette is sounds good.

Gerryattrick

I sometimes feel a bit sorry for myself at the way injuries have curtailed my riding this year.

Reading your post gives me a reality check. When I see people with serious medical problems work hard to get over them I realise how lucky I am.

Congratulations - your post is a real inspiration!

Jim from Boston

After re-reading your route map, I realize that you were indeed referring to Great Blue Hill itself, which was the destination of my roadie companion. I brought him there on my morning commute, and then rode off to work.

vic303

Intervals work...my speed went up some too, with quality weight training, and some interval work.

Jim from Boston

When I did my first year of serious training for a century, I happened to note at what mileage I spontaneously realized I felt completely warmed up, without conscientiously looking for it. For about 20 observations I found it occurred at about 6 -8 miles, so that’s the basis for my warm-up.

I similarly noted at what point I felt the first “burn” in my thighs, occurring on about 10 observations at about 25-30 miles. (“Feel the burn.” as Jane Fonda used to say on her workout videos. )

Carbonfiberboy 

Way to go! Yes, you can get faster because you started late. You've probably got another 2 years of that. Keep at it. OTOH, at our age keeping our speed the same year-to-year actually means we're getting faster. My wife and I did a 24 mile loop on our tandem yesterday that we've done many, many times. Out of 13 Strava segments, we PRed 7. We only tried for it on one, missing a cup by one second. We're 136 y.o.

We can't train harder, so we have to train smarter, which is what you did.

bobbyl1966

I used to ride for about two years almost every day if not rain general in good days i used do 20 miles the day. In hilly trail with elevation from 700 feet to 900 feet. The 10 miles i do in around 50 minutes. Now i have stop to ride much i be bussy but i try to go for ride when i can. last time i go i used road bike steel around 26 pounds. I have crank 53/39 and 9 speeds cassette 12-25. with that combination hills is hard but i put in one other road bike i have crank 50/40 and 8 speeds cassette 12-30. the bike is weight almost 26 pounds. next time i go for ride i use this bike i want see if i can do the 10 miles faster.

MikeD1

Totally agree with this and the other positive info on this thread regarding intervals. The keys for me have been * adequate rest and recover * going hard enough during the intervals * doing a variety of intervals over time such as 8 min X 4 with 3 min rest, on another day 10 X 3, another one might be 2 min X 8, and other intervals might be all out hill climbs of 2- 8 min.

OldsCOOL

Faster. Uh-oh. You know what this means? A never ending pursuit of getting faster. This can only mean the death of mediocrity and the start of wondering just how fast you really can be.