revchuck 

Yup. I habitually get up around 5:00 but sometimes I'll wake around 2-3 and my brain switches on even when my body wants to go back to sleep.

topflightpro

Went out to the mountains yesterday. Despite being rather lean, I'm not much of a climber. It was a tough ride made tougher by lots of wind. I barely made it up the final climb - which I had no choice, the car was parked at the top.

I'm feeling pretty wrecked today.

Also, my buddy's car died on the drive back. We barely got off the highway and into a gas station parking lot. It was a 20+ year old Ford Explorer. He was bragging about how long the car had lasted and how reliable it was when it started making a noise. Then smoke started pouring out the exhaust. Them more smoke out of the hood. Power steering went out as we were pulling off the highway and into the gas station. Left a bunch of anti-freeze on the ground. Car wouldn't restart, so we had to push it out of the way to leave it there.

Fortunately, another guy on the trip was just a couple miles ahead of us and turned around to come get us.

dz_nuzz

I feel like I / you jinxed myself all of a sudden. My car is up at 330k and has never given me trouble (Family car passed down to me) I feel like the next time I get in it the thing might explode. Especially because I love to brag about how long it has lasted.

grolby

Just did two consecutive days with one hour on the trainer. Nothing special, only about 150w average for each one. But my fitness is so low that it still feels like work. Still, things are really starting to turn around for me as far as my hip goes. Beginning to think about how I want to plan my season.

TexMac

Last week was an awesome week. 13 hrs…6x3 at 115% Tuesday and 20 & 10 min ftp intervals on Thursday plus Saturday 5.5 hr tempo ride. Looking forward to the next two weeks road races

TexMac

Best luck with recovery/training. After some hip flexors, I had a sore hip for a day and walking was hard, i can imagine having to deal with hip injuries

echappist

best of wishes in your recovery

grolby

Thanks!

mattm

+1 - recovery is no fun, at least until you actually recover!

Then it feels great to have gone through xyz and come out ok. Maybe even stronger than you were before.

ancker

Today(Tuesday): 3x8 at 95%, 100%, and 105%
Wednesday: 90m Z2 with sprints
Thursday: Recovery Ride
Friday: 2x12 at 100% with 30s of 115% every 2:30

Ouch.

TMonk

^
That F workout is killer!

Today I rode down to Fiesta and did:

1x30' at 96%
1x20' at 100%, then
1x5' at 118%,
and felt great.

My FTP may be set slightly low right now, which could explain why I felt so good...

aaronmcd

It was way too nice out this morning to get to work at a decent time, so I did a Mt Tam climb to make up for not riding on Sunday.

3.5 hours with 54' sweet spot, a few hill sprints, a couple stoplight sprints, and a bus sprint

caloso

How much did your rest between?

TMonk

5', close to 6' between the last two.

Wylde06

After a week off being sick and having a sinus infection, and a week recovering/on antibiotics...

My workouts just got harder

Up a few watts..

Hermes

Yesterday, Fiesta Island 3 lap time trial sort of effort. I tried something different in the way I paced the 3 laps. I did 2 minutes tempo then 2 minutes threshold and kept raising the min and max power targets each interval such that I was doing high threshold and VO2 max at the finish.

Is this an effective training protocol? Don't know but it made a cool looking graph in Cycling Analytics.

On one of the laps, I saw a guy on the side of the road with a Felt TK2 track bike set up with pursuit bars. He later passes me and he is riding fixed gear no brakes in the TT position - okay.

For those unfamiliar with Fiesta Island it is one way traffic and bikes can take the lane or ride on the side and there is ample room for cars to pass. However, the trickier issue is when bikes overtake cars.

So we approach a couple of cars and this is where Fiesta is less than perfect for TTs. I start to slow down and time the cars hoping they speed up and try to stay out of the draft. The TK2 guy passes the cars underneath - gutsy move on a fixed gear no brakes.

The problem is that slow cars generally indicate that the driver is thinking about pulling off the road to the right to park otherwise they would be going faster.

wktmeow

Oh hey, I was out there yesterday around lunch time.

I had to pass a few cars, I usually just go on whichever side there is more room if it doesn't look like they're about to pull off.

It's fun passing on the tailwind stretch when I'm cruising at 30+

Anyway, I rode the disc wheel yesterday and an old skinsuit (not quite as well fitted as the current one), and aero helmet, and shaved legs this time. Efforts felt a bit less difficult than before, and the power numbers were good, but speed wasn't as high as I hoped... I averaged 27 mph for 15 mins @ 296 watts. Not sure what the relationship is between where I start and stop the effort though, as I've been sort of picking at random based on when I'm recovered from the previous effort. The disc wheel has an older 22mm GP4000 (non 's' designation) tubular on it, and I'm wondering if the rolling resistance just isn't that good on it? The front is a zipp 404 with a 24mm Schwalbe One. Winning speed last year looks like it was about 27.4 mph, so it looks like I may be a little off the pace currently considering it's about a 1% false flat out and back. Maybe it's less windy than Fiesta though? My target wattage will be a little higher though, and I'll try to do the climb portion a bit harder than the return leg. Fingers crossed.

echappist

this suggests you are quite aero, perhaps in the low 0.2x range.

now take off that GP4000 and glue on something with a latex tube in it (Vittoria). Conti somehow can't make a tubular with good Crr.

TheKillerPenguin

Yeah that is really aero. Pretty neat.

I start vo2 work today. Unstructured for now, 3hrs with 25min on the lower end of the zone in 3-5min snips. Kinda happy, endless z2 is a zen exercise but it can also get pretty dull.

Hermes

@wktmeow I was there around 11AM. I am 20 minutes away via bike.

I developed a speed, power and time calculator and validated it at Velo Sports Center. At 296 watts and 27 mph, your CdA is about .236 based upon an Rho of 119, Crr of .004 and chain loss of 2% and body weight of 150 pounds.

If you can improve the Crr to .003 your new power for the same speed is 285 watts or hold 296 and your speed increases to 27.3 mph.

grolby

Slowly ramping it up. 1:15 today. More of the same tomorrow. Tonight, core, upper body and PT exercises.

Conti insists on using butyl tubes in their tubulars for some idiotic reason. Like, what's the point of that??

mattm

Got in about 3 hours before work today, it was nice.

Not as warm/sunny as yesterday, but not wet like tomorrow and the next few days are supposed to be, so I'll take it!

TheKillerPenguin

I got in ~14min of vo2 before sleet that wasn't on the forecast blew in, and I was super underdressed and wound up soaked and totally freezing. Tried more vo2 but my legs wouldn't respond well and I got nauseous and light headed instead, and rode home and didn't start shivering til I started warming up under a blanket. I hate hate hate hate hate hate winter. Hate. HATE. hate.

echappist

well, they do last longer, but rather pointless when you are giving away watts. I guess they make for good training tires?

i'm not sure how supple is the casing of the Conti Comp LTD tubular, but if it's merely a swap of latex tube for butyl, one would still be giving away watts on that tire. At least the GP 4000 tires are more supple...

For the longest time i was wondering why my position seemed to be bad: it turned out that a shot derailleur bearing and a Conti Comp tire were probably costing me 20 watts or so.

scheibo

Agreed. And I still hate it even when winter means slightly chillier mornings and the occasional drizzle. Whoever it was that though winter is a good idea clearly wasn't a cyclist.

GJ on getting in the VO2 work in those conditions!