Day 564\ Back on the wagon....again

Right it has been a while since i wrote anything and that pretty sums up my volume of cycling between January and the middle of March. Since then i've been back on the bike and up to 2hrs 45min after a couple of weeks. This has been interrupted the last 2 weeks by what can only be described as really pish weather. It has highlighted 2 key flaws in my manly lycra collection. 1 is only suitable for hot weather the other for cold however i shall not yeild and my kit collection shall remain relatively basic.

A wagon upon which i am beleived to be on....

I'm still to heavy but am on a push to get back to my pre winter (carbs) weight of 99.5kg and on the plus side banging out 3x3 @ 97.5kg for the clean, 3x4 @90kg for the bench and 3x4 @102.5 for the front squat. Will be of F-all use in 35degrees wit ha 20 degree incline in front of me.

Have entered Lapinarello, the long course seems a bit friendlier than last year and also entered the Granfondo di Marostica at the start of next month!!! Better get out with a group of people and soon.

Day 475\ It's Been a While....

It is fair to it's been a while since i last posted anything but the cold weather has brought about a substantial reduction in cycling activity particularly given how easy it is to go to the gym. But i'm making it out about once a fortnight. This is been assisted by the fact i dropped €240 on cold weather gear before christmas involving a slightly embarrassing faux pas in the Pinarelllo shop in Treviso. The long and short of it is i seem to have circulatory problems to my broken fingers that no pair of gloves will fix and Castelli do some brilliantly warm and comfortable wear.

it's been a while...but this is actually high speed photography

I also picked up a winter Jacket by Sportful which is excellent. The lady in the looked at me like i was off my head when i told her that it wasn't important that the bib was the same brand as the jacket or the clothes didn't match my Bike!!!! Warm, comfortable and reasonably price don't seem to be criterea that Trevisan cyclists use apparently.......


On the cycling front need to start getting out once a week and doing a few intervals in the gym. Also get on top of the weight situation. I lasted about a week at 99.6kg before the change in seasons resulted in cake coffee carb fest. Hey Ho.

Day 407\ Numbers, numbers, numbers....

From below it's easy to see how far ahead i am from last year. In september i did 1022 minutes on the bike, 2475m of dislivello, 381km, 475mins in the gym and no recovery work. Last September i completed 392minutes on the bike, 86km and 152 minutes in the gym.

some more numbers.......

In october this year 614minutes on the bike, 1650m dislivello, 238km and 430 minutes in the Gym. Last year 575mins, 184km, 220 mins in the gym, 13min recovery, 140 other activity. Again AHEAD OF THE GAME.

Day 401/New stuff is obviously the answer...

Right on the weight front i made it down to 99.6kg. The cold weather and a large volume of cakes and carbohydrates, they are separate food groups, later and i'm back to 101.6kg. So need a couple of weeks of vegaramma.

Work in the gym is cranking along being back to what i would consider no longer totally embarrassing, 3x4 @ 90kg power clean, 3x6 @ 90kg front squat, 3x4 @ 150kg deadlift. So after a couple of months i'm probably only now at a decent starting point. Also my O/H squat has improved alot managing 3x6 @ 45kg so if i keep going i might be able to stick on a couple 20's by the spring.

the answer to my climbing....or just lose some terry

Went out on monday for the first time in a couple of weeks due to bad weather and felt like i'd never cycled before. Part of that was the pause the other the gym work. I had a crack at Pirio a couple of weeks ago and didn't quite manage it but wasn't too far from the break where the climb eases off.

My goal is to do Monte Madonna, Pirio and Rocolon in one cycle of about 3hrs, it's only 60km but it's about 1200m of climbing. I did pirio with one stop then Rocolon up the back road got to Via Monte Madonna and turned round because i could feel my legs were empty. Breakfast and some carbs the day before could of helped but probably not enough.

Also stopped the fat burners and am going to try and get in a couple of threshold runs @ 100rpm, did 2x20mins with 10min break and felt pretty good although 5 min from the head HR was starting to creep up.

Next summers wheels have been chosen the Pro-Lite Bracciano. €300 1482g hopefully they will help me sail up the hills. Would quite like to offload my polar cs200 which is doing my dome in and splash out on a Garmin 500 but we will see. Still best advice is to loose weight and lift more.

Day 387\ Bad weather .....

It's been a pretty constructive month all round and obviously when i compare it to this time last year i'm well ahead of the game.

vineyards in the autumn

will get round to publishing some numbers. But on a nice day it is beautiful out cycling with the vinyards changing colour and the farmers out working the land before the winter hits.

As a total fairweather cyclist it's not looking good for getting out so we'll just have to wait and see, do what i can get done. When i can get out will probably take the opportunity to go long and keep it in my legs.

Day 358\ Back to the numbers...

Here are my totals and averages for the last training year....

Weekly Averages By Month

Monthly Totals

Day 355\ back in the game....and the challenge of via pirio

Haven't written anything for a while but july in essence till about the 22nd of August i did very little kept ticking over on the bike but nothing particularly long or intense. Since the 22 of my main objective has been weight loss. I've been eating loads of salad and cold cuts and almost eliminated all carbs, in general i've managed about 5 days each week like this. The good news is that after about 2 weeks of nothing i'm now on the brink of getting under 100kg for the first time since 1996!!!!

last time i was less than 100kg donovan bailey was the 'cock of town'

This has been assisted by my return to the gym. I really missed the core and back work i had been doing when i wasn't able to get to the gym. I now have better access to facilities and will not only be able to do  the pre-hab and core work i want but also just work at getting strong again.

Goals

Current Weight 100.2kg Goal 97kg

Gym Goals
Front Squat 120kg
Deadlift      180kg
Pull Ups       20
Chins            12
DB Bench      55 ea


All things being equal strength is the difference plus if you consider last year i was 103.5kg when i did Lapinarello if i can get to 97 or a bit less plus maybe change the wheels on the bike that'll make a massive difference. I'm already miles ahead of where i was this time last year.

THE CHALLENGE OF VIA PIRIO
When i did Lapinarello i did feel a touch disappointed that i didn't do the long course because i felt so good. However this was dispelled when i had to get off my bike and take a break during a climb up Via Pirio. This is a climb of about 250 and about 20% climbing much shorter and less than the Salta Di Capra. Goal is to do it on my longer run before the bad weather sets in.

Training at the moment, is 2 sessions in the gym of about 40mins, 2 fat burners of about 1hr 20mins and a longer cycle of about 2hrs with some hills.

Day 293\ Lapinarello done....not quite

Right well yesterday i did 'Lapinarello' after 292 days of thinking about it.....well not quite. I did the medium course of 132km and 1350m of climbing, missing the mighty 'Monte Grappa' and another 72km. Therefore the challenge is still on 364 days to go till 'Lapinarello'....

Waiting in the streets of Treviso with 3208 other punters, il sogno di stefan, i was doing it for the kids, and the feeding station in Valdobiaddene.

As a challenge i have to say it was teh first i really enjoyed. The weather was perfect and i felt good. I'd learnt my lessons from the granfondo colli euganei and eat better in the days leading up to the race. Rather than trying to 'Carbo Load' i just basically had a cake at breakfast and a small bowl of pasta with lunch from about 4 days out so i wasn't altering to greatly my normal eating. Added to this i eat more moderately the morning of and the night before. My eating and drinking during was much better also. Consciously drinking every 15-20mins and eating from about 20mins in. The Bikefood bars really were worth the trouble.

The 2 week taper also went well. My last big cycle was 14 days before and 6 cycles all flat, minimal climbing. And the day before did 2x30mins flat with cake and coffee in the middle. I would change it only by including some hills on the 1st taper week and some short intense sprints in the second week, just to open the lungs up.

The trip did give a taste of what it's like to be in the peleton for about 30mins at least, with lots of support vehicles and graffiti on the road. On the down side it didn't have that, 'look inside an see what your made of' factor. Which is why i need to do the Monte Grappa next year.....

Day 290\ 2 days to go......& some numbers

2 days to go and i'm actually looking forward to it. last 2 weeks i've really throttled back on the riding and today i woke up feeling pretty fresh!!!!! I've had my shirt printed with the ilsognodistefanologo logo and we're all bike fooded up. The team now only Scherrit arrives this afternoon. Tomorrow we'll probably go for a final ride into the colli before heading to Treviso for registration. Sunday 06:45 we head off into the hills.

sweater and bike...all ready to go

Here are some numbers....

Of an original 13 positive responses, 1 have made it to the start line.

I have lost 3kgs

I have cycles a total of 3420km

Spending a total of 9156 minutes in the saddle and

climbing 11470 meters, 2630 more than Everest.

I have breathed 659, 232 litres of air

My legs have rotated 677, 544 times and

my heart has beaten 1,208,592 and i've burnt 105, 294,000 Calories

All this to cycle for 134km and climb 1400m!!!! 

Day 282\ Hypoxic Update....

Right finished my loading phase of hypoxia and i can't say i'm sorry about that by the end it is a bit of a pain in the knackers, but if you lay it out as an equation i.e. knacker pain v worthwhile. The worthwhilelyness of doing the whole thing far out weights the knackerpain and it is far more convenient than driving up to 6,500m for and hour or so. in the end the last 6 days of the protocol i did following the more conventional protocol of 6mins on 4mins off x 6 and i did 3 days on day off 2 days on day off day on. Which contributed to the knacker pain as it dragged it out a bit.

on track...

Certainly my weekend ride on sunday and the climb up the monte madonna suggest that training and the hypoxic stress are on track.

Day 279\ 13 days to go...

13 days to go. Yesterday was very pleasing. I managed 101km alone in 4hrs and 20mins with plenty of climbing maybe a bit less than 1000m and finished strong feeling good, speed of about 32km/h, 90rpm and a hr of about 132bpm. That is a significant improvement over previous rides, it is certainly the best ride i have done by myself. The weather was absoulutely beutiful, no clouds cool air and a light breeze. Magic. Could of bottled doing the last big climb but chose to do it and reaped the rewards. Don't even feel too tired today as i did after my previous two long rides, i may almost be looking forward to Lapinarello?

this is where i go cycling, Fontanafreddo

Day 276\ Heart rate down....

I have just completed a 45km ride with about 12km in town and a climb of about 520m, it's a fairly tough climb up the monte madonna above Teolo south west of Padova. The first climb into teolo, about 200m, i went really strongly without dropping down onto the small front ring and my HR didn't go above 154bpm plus my time to teolo was only 41mins and i didn't go above about 120bpm on the ride to the start of the climb.

heart rate.....

The climb from from teolo to the tope of monte madonna is quite tough and the last time i did it my heart rate was at 174 for most of the ride to the picnic area and for pretty much all of teh ride to the top. This time it didn't exceed 164 on the way to the pic nic area and didn't exceed 168 on the way to the top. What makes this more impressive is i still have 3 days of Hypoxic work to do and my body won't have fully adapted to it for at least 7 days after finishing. What makes it more impressive is i had quite a late night last night with some friends so my HR would of been elevated as a result of the alcohol intake. NICE.

Day271 \ Homemade Hypoxia.......

Right not long to go now infact 3 weeks today i will be pedaling round the Veneto in a state of exhaustion.... The pedalling has been a mix since i did the Granfondo Collieuganei and two weeks i managed to rattle out a big week of training although it probably has lost a bit of variety in my attempt to ramp up the Km's.

Last week i was off at summer camp by the beach and the roads were perfectly flat. Managed to rattle out 3 runs with the longest of 75km in 2hrs and 40mins. managed to average 90rpm and a speed of 28km/h the last 40mins was tough as it was straight into a headwind and my average speed dropped right off.

acute responses to hypoxia apparently.....

I have also started some hypoxic training, subjecting myself to between 15 and 30mins each evening. It's easy to build your own device only requiring some medical grade soda lime sponge and some yoghurt pots. You will also need a finger oximeter to measure your % saturated in you blood and hence estimate your altitude.

The benefits of Hypoxic training is essentially and improved capacity to deliver oxygen to the muscles. This can occur through several mechanisms.

• Improved blood chemistry
• Increases in Growth Hormone
• Changes in size and number of mitochondria
• alterations to enzyme activity

The protocol I'm using is pretty straight forward. General recommendations are to perform this type of training intermittently ie. 5mins on 5mins off , x6 however i'm going to perform the 30mins straight through using the following protocol.

• 2 Days 15mins @ 90%
• 2 Days 20mins @ 85%
• 2 Days 25mins @ 80%
• 8 Days 30mins @ 75%

I did a cycle before starting the programme and recorded the HR and will perform the same cycle after to see what changes have occured.

Day 267\ Couple of good Granfondo articles.....

Riding a granfondo

http://www.biciveneto.it/ridingagranfondo.html

and more specifically the 'Salto della Capra'

Monte Grappa

http://italiancyclingjournal.blogspot.com/2010/03/climbing-jump-of-goat.html

Day263\ Supplement Review.....

Right you will be able to see from my photo below nutrition selection for the Granfondo Colli Euganei. They were as follows

nutritional mix....

Bananas- Plenty of carbs and +K easy to eat plus you can throw away the wrapper. Down side was the wrapper seems to have stained my sweater!!!!

Optonia Cereal Bars - Easy to eat and no problems digesting, bit dry however and can't through away the wrapper although some naughty people do.

Optonia Hydra recovery - Sold as recovery drink with 10g of protein per 100g but retails for a third of the price of other hydration solutions with BCAA's. Easily drinkable and doesn't repeat certainly seems to enhance perception of fatigue after long cycles.

Optonia Gel - Totally rank far to sweet which isn't suprising as it is totally comprised of Corn Sugar which not to put to fine a point on it is poison.

Nutrition Addicts Raspberry Fruit Bars - Although these were a bit pricey they were great, 100% natural, moist and easy to chew while riding, winner.

The r-pro recupero i used the other day and it was fine, interestingly the ingredients says 0g protein but there are 4-5 BCAA listed?

However bigger news on the nutrition font is that the lovely people at BIKEFOOD have kindly provided us with support for the ride in July. ROCK ON, organic supplements can't wait.

Day 262\ My 1st Granfondo

Right sunday i did it, my first Granfondo, well almost. I had decided to make a call on whether to do the medium course or the long course depending how i felt. I was pretty determined to do the full 144km and 1800m climbing. However the day provided a far greater service than just rattling up km's as it was fairly disastrous but a good learning experience.

What 800 cyclists look like...

Arrived late therefore no warmup. Ate too much and when combined with some anxiety the call of nature was more frequent than anticipated. Heart rate was elevate before the start and then went straight into a 4km climb and never settled for the duration.

Would of happily gone home at 20km just felt terrible and i'm pretty sure part of this was nutritional. Need to be more precise in timing and volume of carbs in the 3 days leading into the event and then during consuming fluids and food in particular more regularly. I reeached the first feeding station and my sides were aching like when i used to go out and do 2hrs without any food. However some bananas and a load of water later i did pick up. Filling my water bottle up with sugary peach tea also helped.

In summary lots to work on. Need to factor in trying to do a long run with race prep prior to Lapinarello.

Day 257\ Two days till my first Granfondo.....

Right 2 days till i cycle in my first Granfondo and i am nervous and excited. I am wondering if i should stick an L-plate on my back to help communicate to those around me my general ineptitude. I do think however my training has made a bit of a breakthrough the last 2 weeks.

the start

3 hrs is generally reckoned to be a bit of a landmark and on my 3rd 3hr cycle last week i finally felt i'd made some progress. I didn't fell destroyed when i got home and it was enjoyable for most of the run. Added to this my hr was much more controlled on the ascents plus for the first 90km of my 108km sunday cycle i felt good.

This week i've tapered right down,

Monday Rest
Tuesday 30 mins easy with 4x3mins at threshold
Wednesday 14 maximal test ( i had to do a medical certificate so i can compete)
Thursday 42km easy 93min (trying to stay about 120bpm @ 90rpm)
Friday Rest

Tomorrow i'll do about an hour on the bike then the race Sunday. The race distances are 104km or 144km. I'll make a call on which one to do on Sunday. I want to do the 'Lungo' because then i'll have  achieved 75% of the race distance for 'Lapinarello' and can concentrate on group riding climbing for the last 4 weeks of preparation.

One mistake i have made is pedaling too slow. I should of been working at 90 not 80, this would definitely of helped for cycling in groups and i was informed on Saturday that once your doing 200km of 'Agilita' then you can start working on 'forza'......

Day 255\ Recovery....

After last weekends adventure the importance of nutrition was hammered home again. After the longer runs i get straight into a tip top recovery smoothie as follows;

Recovery Smoothie

50g Porridge
25g Whey Protein
5g L-Glutamine
100g Plain Yogurt
Load of frozen berries
Fill up most of the spaces with juice

Whizz like crazy....DONE

After a long ride or a hard ride this is a saviour, good mix of carbs some protein, zinc fiber and a dash of glutamine to help the immune system (if that's what it does). All in an cold easily digestible snack.

After sundays marathon i went to a BBQ and was presented with steak, sausage and not much else. It was a total chore to eat it even though it was delicious. When the cakes came out an hour or so later i was all over it.

By the evening i was struggling and felt sick like my immune system was crumbling however i decided to get some carbs in with one of favorite pasta dishes pesto and trofie with tomatoes

recovery in a bowl.....

150-200g Trofie di Liguria
30-40g Pesto (Basil, Pine nuts and oil, not the pepper got knows what else we eat in the UK)
a handfull of cherry tomatoes or daterini chopped
splash of extra virgin olive oil
 parmigiano or grana grated over the top

Total winner halfway through the plate i felt better already.

Day 253\ riding in a group, numbers, lots of stuff...

Last week saw a big jump in my total Km's. The reason for this is yesterday i went out cycling with a the S.C. Berma cycling club. I had been hoping to do a lazy 40km's having done a 600m climb to the top of the Monte Madonna on saturday. My hopes were quickly shattered as the group spend off into the mountains by which point my only hope of making it home was to stay with them......however 108km and 4hrs and 15mins later i had done it.

that was me that was....

Riding in a group for the first time was fairly mental, mainly because you don't know what you should and shouldn't be paying attention to. Also if you don't stay within about 20cm of the bike in front you get swallowed up and end up last. If you don't know the rules people get cross, which is fine because they are all weedy snack cyclists who couldn't punch their way out a wet paper bag.

Day 249\ Helmets....

Eventually i succumbed to a pincer movement from my mum and my wife and bought a helmet...... and here it is below. Now i'm no expert but my main criteria was plenty of holes for air to get to my giant noggin while out pedaling, so although there was a specialized helmet that was more comfortable and almost half the price, it looked like it would of been as cool as a black dustbin. Hence the victor, the Bell sweep....

and the winner is....