April 23rd, 2008 Steve
Okay, so not all all Spinervals workout DVDs are created equal. Last night I did Spinervals 14.0, which is relatively old by now. To oversimplify it’s a warmup then four 15 min. intervals with 2-3 minutes rest between for a 90-minute workout. I usually spin for another ten minutes before starting each DVD. You’re supposed to be right around your lactate threshold for the first, or roughly 80%. You change gears pretty frequently to keep monotony to a minimum. One drove me nuts - each interval increased in intensity until by the 4th you were supposed to be at 95% max HR. I don’t know many people that can hold 95% for 15 minutes but I’m not one of them. The expression on the faces of the riders onscreen never changed from 80% to 85% to 90% to 95%, so I don’t think they were increasing their intensity to match what Troy (the onscreen coach) was saying. I was dying 3/4 through and they looked fine. Another thing was the gear shown onscreen didn’t always match what Troy said to use. Spinervals 22.0 is a much better TT workout in my opinion. That one has four progressively harder intervals of 20, 15, 10 & 5 minutes with 5 minutes between each.
My current schedule is:
- Sun: 3-4 hour road ride
- Mon: recovery spin or rest
- Tue: Spinervals 22 - TT intervals
- Wed: Gym - legs, abs/core, stretching
- Thu: Spinervals 16 - Big Gear strength
- Fri: rest day
- Sat: AM Gym session - legs; PM Spinervals 17 - Aero Base Builder II
Yes, I ride indoors a lot, especially for someone living in Southern California but there’s a reason for it. It’s outrageously hilly where I am. I either have to schlep the bike somewhere by car or finish each ride with a 3 mile climb of about 6-8%. I rarely feel like doing that except on weekends so I do all my structured rides indoors. I’m getting in 75-100 miles/week just on the trainer. I’ll be interested to see what my progress is a month from now. My Polar CS400 has a feature that guesstimates VO2. I’m hoping my number will go up 5-8 points or so. That says as much about how poor my condition is now as it does about my training. I’m also hoping to be down another 6-7 lbs.
Posted in Indoor Training | No Comments »
April 17th, 2008 Steve
I finally got a new stationary trainer. I spend so much time training indoors it was worth spending more to get one that would replicate the road more closely. It came down to a Cyclops Fluid2 or a Kurt Kinetic Pro Road Machine. I got the KK and this thing is great. It has a 6 lb flywheel built in with a removable 12 lb flywheel. It is MUCH better than my Performance Travel Trac Century, which really was not bad. I have a bunch of Spinervals DVD’s to go with it.
It was very easy to put together and heavy as heck, so you know it is constructed well. The base is nice and wide so there is no worry about tipping over. I really like the flywheel effect even more than I thought. It comes with a skewer that fits into the grooves well w/o scuffing up your good ones.
With the Perf trainer if you stopped pedaling your rear wheel would stop within a few seconds. Essentially, you were almost accelerating just to maintain your current speed. With the 18 lb flywheel, you have over a minute of coast down before it stops completely. Noise isn’t bad either. I live in a 3rd floor apt and there’s no issue at all with the 6 lb flywheel. I do have a rubber mat and carpeting underneath. With the 12 lb flywheel, there is more vibration in the floor but I don’t think the actual ear noise is much louder. I have ridden it at 9:30pm without any complaints so far. I’m sure if I wind the full 18 lbs up to 90rpm in a 50×12 there’d be a whole lotta shakin goin on. The racket cannot be too loud because my chickensh*t dog will come in and lie down while I’m riding now. He never did that when I rode the Perf trainer. I only use the 18 lb flywheel for LSD/temp anyway. Nevertheless, I think I will save the sprint sessions for weekends or weekdays off.
I also bought the Power Computer off Ebay so I can see my wattage. I can see why people get so excited about Powertaps now. I usually just watch the rpm’s during indoor intervals but seeing the watts is pretty cool too. I got it up to 1102 watts in the 50×15 last night. It has definitely caused me to ride more. I couldn’t stand to be on the Perf trainer much more than 45 minutes. Now I do a 15-20 minute warm up THEN start a Spinervals DVD. That’s another 60-90 minutes depending which one I do.
This definitely makes trainer easier for me since the terrain around here isn’t my liking. It’s either super steep hills or pancake flat (and crowded) beach paths. There is very little in between. A trainer is almost a necessity for doing sprints and intervals around here. At this point, I’m only outside for group rides and long slow distance and I could do that indoors too. I am actually considering getting Spinervals 26.0, which is the 5-hour century training DVD.
Posted in Gear, Indoor Training | No Comments »
April 17th, 2008 Steve
I forgot to mention I finally finished building my track bike, the third one. I previously had a Gitane about 15 years ago and a custom BREW a few years after that. Once I get in a little better shape I’m going to start doing the Saturday keirin school at Encino and maybe the Tues/Thurs night training at ADT.
Anyway, here is she is in both training and racing setups, not that I plan to actually race.
Posted in Track, Uncategorized | No Comments »
January 29th, 2008 Steve
I needed new brake pads if I was going to use the Zipps on the road. Normal pads eat carbon rims because they have metal shards embedded in them from use with alloy rims. I picked up some Swiss Stop Yellows from Competitive Cyclist, which was stupid since they’re $10 cheaper at Excel Sports and I would have gotten them faster to boot. With SRAM you pretty much have to take the front brake shoes off the bike to get to the pads. I’ll take the Zipps out for a long one this weekend, hopefully along one of the river trails so I can test the aerodynamics a bit.
Posted in Gear, Road | No Comments »
January 21st, 2008 Steve
This weekend I went to the UCI World Cup track cycling competition at ADT EVent Center. I try to volunteer every year so I can get in free to see the events I’m not working. It also gives me a chance to get up close to the racers and their bikes. I took some pictures but a lot of them didn’t turn out. The lighting isn’t ideal for autofocus cameras. At the very least I really need a tripod for these situations to hold the lense steady enough for the shutter speed.
There was an exhibit for Body Scanning CRM, a computerized bike fitting system. This is not supposed to be a highly customized race fit. It’s really for people fairly new to cycling. I have never been professionally measured for a bike. However I have always believed I have a long torso and short legs for my height. I was very curious to see how close the system would come to the numbers I’ve settled on for myself. I currently ride a 53cm sloping road frame with a 53.5cm top tube and 12cm stem. That’s longer than ideal for my leg length but necessary to get the proper reach w/o going to a ridiculous stem length.
The scanning process resulted in the following measurements:
- Functional height 67.5″
- Shoulder width 18.4″
- Shoulder height 57″
- Arm length 24.8″
- Pelvic bone height 39.5″
- Fist height 32.2″
- Leg length 31.6″
Next my Bike profile was determined:
- Category: Road/race
- Usage: Fitness recreation
- Material: Composite (not sure how this matters)
- Seat position: Sport
- Frame type: Diamond (vs sloping)
- Age: 31-45
The end result was the following recommendations:
SETTING TOLERANCE
- Saddle height: 71.03cm -3.21cm
- Saddle setback: 5.86cm +/-1.36cm
- Saddle - handlebar 54.48cm +/-1.59cm
- Stem rise: -6.42cm +/-2.41cm
- Frame height diamond: 50.57cm
- Frame height triangle: 47.36cm
- Shoulder width: 46.74cm
I have to say the whole thing was pretty spot on. I was using a saddle height of 68cm, although I vary it often between 68-70cm; right in the suggested range. I have now set it to 70cm. My previous saddle to handlebar distance was 54.5cm - dead on. My stem rise (drop) was previously 6.5cm. I have two 12cm Ritchey WCS stems that I use - one 73 degrees and one 84 degrees. According the Habanero Cycles stem chart the difference is 2cm height but it looks like 1cm to me. After raising my saddle I put the 84 degree stem on to put my drop at 5.5cm. I’ll probably go back to the 73 next Spring. This all leaves me with a 2.25″ (5.71cm) saddle setback, also within the suggested range. The biggest discrepancy was the frame size. My sloping Pedal Force RS is 49cm c-c and 53cm to the top of the seat clamp. I don’t like steeply sloping tubes anyway. My previous Flyte SR-3 was a 46 or 47 and I hated it.
This is my 5th road bike. I use 42cm (c-c) handlebars and plan to stay with that size, although I will probably switch to something with more wrist clearance.
Posted in Road | No Comments »
January 21st, 2008 Steve
Men’s Keirin Finals
Posted in Track | No Comments »
January 4th, 2008 Steve
The roadster is looking pretty snazzy with the Zipps. Someday I may have these rebuilt with black spokes and blue alloy nipples.
Posted in Gear, Road | No Comments »
December 30th, 2007 Steve
I have a hard time pulling myself away from the tv during bowl season. I’m a huge college football fan and I never miss a bowl. Since I couldn’t spare the time to get out today I did a Spinervals 17 aero base builder DVD. 80 minutes @ 162 average heart rate.
Posted in Indoor Training | No Comments »
December 29th, 2007 Steve
Three lightly used but custom-made Zipp 404’s - rims dimpled and de-badged.
- 24-hole front laced to Ultegra hub.
- 28-hole rear laced to Ultegra hub.
- 28-hole rear w/cassette body replaced with Surley fixer hub.
- Conti Sprinter Gatorskins on all three.
By swapping the front QR skewer with an Allen key axle this set works for the road or track. This is my reward to myself for getting down (yes, down) to 225 lbs. I’m not there yet but I probably won’t ride them at all until I’m at least 235.
I didn’t know they were going to be debadged when I bought them, although that would’ve been my preference. However, now that Zipp offers white decals I may get some of those. I just hated the red decals. I think my bike looks too stealthy with bare deep carbon rims.
Posted in Gear, Road, Track | No Comments »
December 26th, 2007 Steve
I’ve got two different saddle/post combos for the Fuji. For the off/early season training I’ll use a San Marco Rolls saddle on a Ritchey Comp post. Once I start getting some speed and a smoother spin I’ll switch to a Kashimax FG-8P/A saddle on a Nitto Jaguar SP72 post. The Kashimax brings new meaning to the phrase “ass hatchet”. I got the model with 30mm wide rails instead of the normal 44mm. Both parts are NJS-certified for Japanese keirin racers with large thighs. It feels like you’re sitting on a 2×4 but hopefully after a couple more months of heavy squatting my butt will be so hard I won’t notice……much.
Posted in Gear | No Comments »