Zipp test complete

First off, thanks again to JW for the help in getting this wheelset last year.

I haven't ridden on them since last September and there's the chance that I'll be using them this Sunday at Jeff Cup. The only reason I'm on the fence is because of the chance of rain. If it's raining, I won't be riding them, if it's dry I will. If the roads are wet, but not raining...not sure.

It's supposed to rain Saturday night and be windy on Sunday. Hopefully the weather will stay that way and the wind will dry the roads out. The CAT 5 race is at 12:30pm.

So, today I just wanted to make sure they were all set to go on Sunday. To be honest, I was a little nervous about the integrity of the wheels after the cross-country trip last October. I brought them in with us at night in the hotel rooms, but not every night. So, there were times when the temps would get down in the 20s at night and then the sun would make it really hot in the car during the day. I guess that would have less of an effect on the carbon and more on the glue holding the tire to the rim...

I was a tad bit nervous that the tire would roll, but today's ride helped put my worries at ease so I wouldn't be hesitant if I use them this Sunday.

I kind of feel like a tool riding Zipps on a training ride and an easy one at that. I was passed by a group of 3 guys riding up a short and steep hill today and I really wanted to chase them down, but I stuck to the plan of keeping the pace moderate. What made it tough keeping the pace easy was the fact that I was riding with the Zipps. They make you want to push it and explore just how fast and long you can go.

Think I might be going to bed soon...feel like I'm catching the bad cold that I've been trying not to get from Cezanne this week.

Tuesday riding

Tuesday, for some reason, has been designated as my toughest riding day of the week. Actually, my philosophy is that riding hard on Tuesday gives you Wednesday as an easy spin day, Thursday as a medium effort day before racing on the weekend.

I'm not sure if that's a good way to train, but I don't know any better. Last Tuesday I crushed myself with repeated hill sprints around a new loop I'm riding in Rock Creek Park. My legs haven't felt that sore in a while. Usually they can get pretty tired, but not really too sore. I think it was the heavy sprinting and big ring, low cadence climbing.

Last night I was able to get out for an hour and a half ride before sunset. I chose the same Rock Creek Park loop/course, but instead of crushing myself, I set out for a medium effort ride in some sort of attempt to do a taper before Jeff Cup this weekend. It feels a little silly to me to be tapering for a 30-mile road race, but that's what is making me feel more comfortable, so I'm going with it.

You can see the ride here: http://connect.garmin.com/activity/2745298

and the splits here: http://connect.garmin.com/splits/2745298

Laps 1 and 8 are going to and coming from the loop. I did one relatively hard effort (lap 5), but didn't crush it like last week. What's interesting is that effort gave me my fastest time on the loop yet and I think it's because last week I was sort of doing intervals and tried to destroy myself on the first part of the loop going up the main hill of the loop and then do some other sprints up the smaller hills on the loop and kind of used the back side as recovery before the next loop and sprints started. Yesterday I just moderated my effort around the whole loop and surprise surprise, a faster time. I guess it's not rocket science.

Last week's splits (with less warmup): http://connect.garmin.com/splits/2606661

The elevation profile of the ride is interesting. It shows the climbing loop, but at constantly adjusting baseline elevation for each lap. I guess it may have something to do with the changing pressure the closer it gets to sunset. I honestly forget how the 705 calculates the elevation (if it's GPS, barometric altimeter, or both).

To see the elevation, click on the ride link: http://connect.garmin.com/activity/2745298, then click on the "elevation" tab towards the bottom of the page.

On the way home last night I saw 3 deer (pic above). They were just half a block from Connecticut Ave, a pretty busy area. Good news is that no squirrels tried to jump out into the road and kill me yesterday.

I'm off to drop my bike off at the "Bicycle Pro Shop" in Georgetown for a tune-up...hasn't had one since I got the new frame last June... Poor bike, I feel like a dead-beat Dad.

By the way, in reference to my post about the Milan-San Remo results, cyclingnews.com eventually posted the corrected results (with no explanation of course). In other race results news, yesterday it took cyclingnews.com a few hours after the Castilla y Leon Time Trial ended to post more than the top 5 results. Lame! Almost as lame as this blog!

Milan-San Remo Results

I think the results are being reported incorrectly. George Hincapie dropped Cavendish off with about 400m to go and they're reporting Hincapie finished 8 minutes back...really? I swear I saw 2 Garmin-Slipstream guys in the final group with 1km to go and they show Julian Dean finishing 3:39 back and the next Garmin guy back at 8 minutes. The guys I thought were Garmin may have been Rabobank, but I don't think they were.

The youtube video they have isn't the best quality, but I think I'm seeing the riders correctly.

What's the deal?

First bike crash

I have these couple of race photos courtesy of Amy Jones (www.amyjones.zenfolio.com).

This past weekend was great, had Wick and Kyle up the night before the last Trade Zone crit of the year. Since I knew there was a chance they would be racing the 4/5 race (on the wait list), I sabotaged them with bellies full of heavy banana pancakes. It didn't really dampen their performance, but it made them have upset stomachs.

The weather was not great for the race. Low 40s and drizzling. The 2nd turn of the first lap of the race was not great. That's where I experienced my first bike crash. The guy whose wheel I was on bit it right in front of me and I had no option. I tried to lay it down smoothly and disperse the impact across my back. Right after I felt okay, just my left elbow hurt a bit. I grabbed both bikes (my handlebars where tangled in his rear spokes) and carried them to the grass to get them out of the way of the race. The guy who crashed in front of me somehow face planted and was checking to make sure he had all his teeth. He wound up being okay. Here is a photo of him: http://amyjones.zenfolio.com/p777069899/h1c370df2#h131ca863

After detangling the bikes and straightening out my handlebars, I was able to hop on to the group on the next lap around and it was kind of like it never happened.


This race seemed to be easier than the race last week. I didn't do so hot with stopping my computer from recording my cool down laps, but once I take those out of the equation, I could get a sense for the comparison to last week.

I actually took out the first lap of both races too being that I crashed in the first lap and the stats don't really tell the story of the race. Average speed this week was 24 mph (over the laps I counted as "race" laps) and last week it was 24.5mph. Average heart rate this week was 166.8 bpm (again, with taking out the first lap and "cool down" laps) and last week it was 169.1 bpm (with no break-away attempts).

I hope this means that I'm getting a little better form, but who knows.

I felt the race was easy so I took a flyer (photo above passing a lapped rider) around lap 8 or 9 of 15 and I think I remained out in front for 2 and a half laps. Nobody came with me and Wick (and apparently one of my NCVC teammates) "blocked" on the front of the group, so I could get a little distance. I tried to break away again with 2 laps left, but wound up pulling the field (1st photo of this post) up until the last 3/4 of a lap. Not great tactically, but good training.

If you go to my race data (http://connect.garmin.com/activity/2560915) and click on the "heart rate" tab, you can see my 2 attacks of the race, both times with my heart rate shooting up over 180, then trickling down...and down :) until I got reabsorbed. You can also "see" my crash which is the area right after the first heart rate spike. Garmin keeps recording the heart rate, even when you've stopped, but it doesn't factor it in to the average; hence why there is over 53 minutes of heart rate data for 46 minutes of riding (recording some extra before the race too).

As far as the results from the crash, I think my rear derailleur is bent a bit. On my last couple of rides I've been getting a little phantom shifting. I think it's sitting a little too far inward towards the hub. As far as I go, the thing that hurt the most initially was my left elbow (hit the ground) and behind my left knee (don't know what part, but the bike hit it). Since then, the soreness has crept up...left glute (where the biggest road rash is), neck (presumably from stiffening and holding my head off the ground as I crashed), right lat and right shin.

Nothing major and all of it, but the minor scrapes, is mostly gone.

I found my new favorite ride in the D.C. area on Tuesday. I had just enough daylight to get it in on Tuesday and wound up riding for about an hour and 15 mins and 22 miles. One of my teammates sent out an email saying they would be in the park doing hill sprints on a loop consisting of Ridge, Ross and Beach, so even though I was going later, I decided to give the route a try.

The loops start only 2 miles from our apartment and the loop itself is about 3.6 miles. It's perfect if I want to stay close to home and want to measure the remaining daylight against the 11 minute (for me) loops. It's also great because the car traffic is at a minimum, but unfortunately the squirrel traffic is high. Also not perfect is that after I destroyed myself around the loop a few times, my cooldown on the way home starts with a 10% wall and is uphill the whole 2 miles.

Ride info here:
http://connect.garmin.com/activity/2606661

Next time it would be great to warm up around the loop twice instead of once and then hit the loop hard more than 4 times. Just couldn't do it this time with the lack of sunlight.

Above is a pic from my iPhone when I was out on the loop yesterday doing an easy 45 minutes to cool down from Tuesday's hard workout. You can't really tell, but it's a good little drop off down the cliff to Beach Drive.

It's supposed to rain today, but I'll try to get in another hard workout today, hopefully outside on this course or inside on the trainer. I'll go hard again on Saturday and not sure about next week as I prepare for Jeff Cup, a 30-mile road race on Sunday, March 29th. I might not do a hard workout next week or maybe just on Tuesday and do medium efforts the rest of the week.

Fitness Assessment

A few weeks back at work I received an email that certified trainers were coming over to the building to complete fitness assessments, which will ultimately give you your "body age."  What peaked my interest was that they were going to do a VO2 max reading, so I emailed back and got a spot.

What was interesting is that it said that this was a test done at rest.  I've never done a VO2 max test, but know that typically for cyclists, it's done on a bicycle with slowly increasing resistance over time until physical exhaustion/failure.  So, that reading below may be a little off, but oh well.

The body age I got from the tests was below my "real" age of 31, but not as low as in the photo above.  

For the past few years I've had some issues with my systolic pressure (the upper number) of my blood pressure reading.  It's typically in the mid 120s to 130s, but on Thursday afternoon it was 140 which is basically "high blood pressure."  The day before it was 122.  The trainer suggested looking at the DASH diet.  I will, but my diet is pretty darn good, I think.
My VO2 max wound up being 56.8.  According to the chart, over 56 is elite, but somehow the program put me in the "excellent" category.  You have to remember that all of these are comparing me to the "average" population, so my cycling has put me above average, but no where near top cyclists.  For reference, I think Lance's VO2 max is in the mid 80's.
The strength test was interesting.  It was basically a bicep curl, but you stood on a scale and you pulled up on the pulley with the handle and pulled as hard as you could for 5 seconds.  I was kind of proud of the strength one to be honest given my twice a week 20-30 minute gym workout. 
Flexibility speaks for itself.  I don't consider myself extremely flexible, but I think my cycling has caused me to focus more on stretching my hamstrings.
Body fat, hmmm.  I was a little surprised it was this low.  I don't know why, but I was thinking it would be more like 7-8%.  For guys, 3% is the essential fat your body needs to function.  5% is pretty darn good and I feel healthy, not too skinny.  I definitely don't starve myself, I just eat smart and exercise.
All the tests took only about 40 minutes.  The result was a "body age" of 22 years old.  Not bad at 31.  I think the second recommendation is absolutely hilarious...increase my VO2 max from 56.8 to 57 and I could decrease my body age by a year.  Really, that small of a change and you get a whole year?

I agree with the first recommendation about my systolic blood pressure.  It's part genetic for me along with my cholesterol which is slightly high (not tested here).

So, all in all it was fun to get the fitness assessment done and interesting to see the results.

My cycling training has basically been crap this week.  I was drained from this weekend and have been tired all week.  I tried to do intervals on Wednesday, but they weren't so hot.  I wound up riding the hill I planned, but not really doing intervals up it: http://connect.garmin.com/activity/2485988

I didn't have time on Thursday to do anything on my trainer because we went to go see "Road to Roubaix."  Discussing that is for another time, but overall decent movie, but I wish it showed more footage from the races and what it's REALLY like in the trenches and on the cobbles.

I did 30 minutes easy on the trainer tonight just to loosen my legs up.  Tomorrow we have a team CAT 4/5 "mandatory" ride followed by getting the team kits ready for distribution to the team. 

I'm not sure how the practice race is going to go on Sunday.  We'll see!

Fun weekend of riding

I had a good week of riding, getting on the bike (trainer mostly) every day except Friday. On Saturday I rode 48 relatively chill miles: http://connect.garmin.com/activity/2432720

I started out on the Saturday 7am hammerfest ride, but saw one of my teammates pull off and stop. He was pretty sick (maybe food poisoning or virus). I felt pretty good, but was actually looking for an excuse to take it easier than keeping up (trying to keep up) with the fast guys, since I was racing the next day. I don't think I have the experience and hard miles in my legs to do well in tough rides on back to back days. We'll see this season!

I did the same ride last Saturday, but I drove to the start instead of riding to the start. It was tough, but short at 34 miles. Riding up Beach Drive through Rock Creek Park to the start and back afterward added 14 miles. Take a look at the map on the above link and you'll see the winding (flat) route through Rock Creek Park. What's cool is that on the way back about 75% of that route is closed to cars so there was no traffic except for runners and other cyclists enjoying the unseasonably warm weather.

I woke up feeling sick on Sunday morning. I felt "off" the night before and it got worse in the morning. I couldn't finish my oatmeal and my stomach was bothering me. I had this fear that I quickly got what my teammate had the day before. Probably unlikely?

What was cool is that my Mom came out to watch the race! It was her first one and it was great that the weather was nice. I warmed up and felt decent then about missed the 9:30am start when I went to use the bathroom at 9:25am.

I was able to set up my Garmin to automatically record a lap each time I crossed the start/finish line so I could compare laps. It is a cool function. There are a few different options, but I set it up so that the "lap point" is wherever I initially hit "start" to start recording data. It worked perfectly.

The main stats from the race were: 20.32 miles, 50:19, 24.2 mph average, 168 bpm heartrate average, 185 max. As you could imagine, the last lap was the fastest at 26.9 mph and my heartrate average 178 for that 3 minute and 2 second lap.

Here is the link to the ride: http://connect.garmin.com/activity/2432754 Once you open up the link click on the tabs below to see the different data values and then the "splits" tab in the upper right to see all the laps.

Overall the race went well. I did better than I thought based on how I felt in the morning and riding 48 miles the day before. I was actually contemplating not racing because of my stomach, but I'm really glad I did. I didn't put in a solo attack like last time, but I was able to hang a lot closer to the front in the last quarter mile or so rush to the line in the last lap. I kind of faded at the end in the previous race. I'm not sure what place I finished in, probably in the top 20 or 25.

I'm hoping to go in a break or solo next week, the last practice race before a race break over the 3/22 weekend and then the start of the season at Jeff Cup on 3/29.

This is a short video of our race: http://www.vimeo.com/3527528 You can kind of see me at around 20-25 seconds over on the far right side of the frame. I've got a red & white jersey on with white and black Garmin shorts and charcoal helmet. One of my teammates (not in a team jersey) crashed at the end and the video shows it. He was in the white jersey. I don't know who was at fault, but it looks like the pink guy went a little too far to his right and came back onto the course into the guy in the white jersery (Mike).

After the race I had Cezanne drop me off in a predetermined spot that I picked out, so I could ride my bike to Annapolis. It worked out perfectly. It was about 20 miles and took me a little over an hour. Cezanne and I had lunch with my Mom and then we left to head back to Alexandria for my Retul fitting. Busy day. Here is the Annapolis ride: http://connect.garmin.com/activity/2433180

It was beautiful. The temperature was perfect and the country roads through Davidsonville were great roads with infrequent traffic. The above pic is of those Davidonsville roads from when I rode there in the fall. I didn't stop this time to take a pic. They are great roads, just need to be smart about looking back and checking for the occassional car, especially going around a sharp right hand turn.

I didn't get any pics from the Retul fitting, but I have to say I was a little bit underwhelmed. I was the 7th of 8 fittings that day, so I'm sure the guy was a little worn out. The "zin" tool wasn't working, but he promised to get it working then contact everyone to do it free of charge. The zin uses the system to give pinpoint measurements of all the major points on the bike so you can replicate your position if you get a new bike or change equipment. The zin part was the least important though. The important part was the marking devices on my wrist, elbow, shoulder, hip, knee, ankle and ball of my foot that recorded all my angles through 15 second pedaling capture periods. The 3D movement and relationship of all those markings provides the basis for analysis.

The end result is that my saddle was raised about 4-5mm and then brought forward a bit to compensate for the fact that as you move the seatpost up the saddle moves back slightly relative to the bottom bracket. Mom, I hope you're reading this, it probably makes zero sense :)

That was the only adjustment! Which isn't a bad thing. It kind of confirmed some stuff for me. I thought that I might need to stretch out and lean forward more (maybe a longer stem or less spacers), but he said that my hip angle was good and actually just a few degrees more leaned over than the middle of the optimal range, but I was still in the optimal range.

He showed me on the computer readout how my knee angle changed (into the optimal range) when he raised the saddle and he also showed how my knee had less lateral movement as well when we raised the saddle. He said that that was a natural thing because now that the leg extension was in the optimum range, my knee wasn't looking for more room (which it found laterally by slightly kicking out) at the top of my pedal stroke.

He's going to be emailing everyone all their angles and readouts from the fitting at some point this week.

Overall I think it was a good thing, a slight adjustment and verification that I was doing things about right.

Long post, wish I had more pictures!

Bono's booties

Ever since the day Bono faked injury (acting like he had hurt paws/joints) we've been giving him a bit of a hard time for not being a tough doggie.  

We figured out his paws were cold from walking in the snow (my feet definitely would be) and he wasn't injured.  He had a condition known as frozen paw...well, that's what I call it.

So we got him some booties from PetSmart.  The first time we didn't strap them on tight enough and they came flying off as he galloped down the stairs.

The recent round of snow gave us a second change to try them out.  One cool feature is the reflective material.  It's great because it alerts people taking photos with the flash on of his presence.  Ha ha, I crack myself up and I'm pretty sure that I'm the only one laughing.

So if he's out at night the car's lights will hopefully catch the reflective material, which is a good feature.

Below is a video of him playing around in the snow.  He runs a little funny in the booties.  I guess he changes his gait a bit.  He hops a little more.  You can hear Cezanne laugh a bit in the video.