We’re not having a proper holiday this year, instead we’re having several long weekends and staying at home enjoying our local surroundings more than we usually would.
Yesterday was one of these days off so I had a bit of a lie in (for me) and didn’t get up until 7.30am. One of the nice things about stay at home holidays is that I can still do a little bit of work each day as well. This means that I can stay on top of e-mails and a few other bits and pieces and not have that horrible post-holiday backlog to come back to that I always dread.
After a couple of hours work I did some computer research into which new bike to buy and then pottered around the house for a bit before jumping on the turbo trainer for my first workout of the day. It was nothing too difficult, just a 25 mile fairly easy session. This was followed by a light lunch with Anna and Morgan before I headed across to the beach with my windsurf kit for a nice windsurf session exploring the high seas between Borth and Aberdovey. I covered over 26 miles in and hour and a half so I was now up to over 50 miles of activity for the day and 2 hours 45 of exercise.
It had however only just begun because as soon as I was off the water, packed up and showered, it was time to head into Aberystwyth for an hour of circuit training followed by an hour of swim training. All of that may sound like a little too much for some people – I had a tweet from someone yesterday that said:
“Morning Al. Do you ever think about sitting down, & having a nice rest ? Wears me out just reading your tweets !”
For me it was a perfect, action packed day with a total of 5 hours of exercise, and what’s more as there was little time for eating I may even have lost some weight in the process.
I bought myself a new gadget the other day, a Garmin Speed / Cadence Sensor for my Forerunner 305. I didn’t really NEED one but new toys are always a good motivator.
When out on my bike in the real world the GPS on the Forerunner obviously tracks my speed and distance and works flawlessly. When on the Tacx Flow Turbo Trainer however I’m not actually going anywhere so the GPS doesn’t record my speed and distance. The computer on the Turbo Trainer does record both my speed and distance and also my cadence and power output, so I was able to see these things. The problem, if you can call it a problem, was that the Tacx Flow doesn’t interface with my computer. So, when I upload my turbo training sessions to Garmin Connect or any other fitness training software I get the data from my Forerunner but have to manually enter the distance, average speed, max speed, and power output data and don’t get to see anything about my cadence.
This is where the Speed / Cadence Sensor comes to the rescue. The gadget consists of a wireless sensor that fits to your chainstay and two magnets – one for the crank arm to measure cadence and one for the wheel to measure speed and distance. Fitting was a simple affair, just pop the sensor on the chainstay and fix with two zip ties, screw the wheel magnet onto a spoke making sure it aligns with the sensor and attach the crank magnet to the crank arm with the provided sticky pad and a zip tie, again making sure it aligns with the sensor.
As I was using this on my Turbo Trainer I already had the cadence sensor from the turbo trainer attached to the bike but the Garmin one is fairly adjustable so it was easy enough to get everything aligned. To make it even easier, the Garmin sensor has a little LED that flashes each time it picks up a passing magnet. It flashes red for the cadence sensor and green for the speed sensor so making sure everything was working before tightening the zip ties was a doddle. The magnets are just magnets so it would probably have been possible to use the existing crank arm magnet from the Tacx Flow for both the Turbo Trainer Sensor and the Garmin sensor but in the end I used a separate magnet for each.
Of course, once it was all attached I just had to give it a go so I jumped on and did a relatively easy workout. As usual I could see my various readouts on the Tacx Flow computer but now could also see corresponding values on my Garmin Forerunner.
The Tacx Flow computer only shows 2 values at any one time (plus the overall time) and I usually have these set to show speed and cadence. Reassuringly the speed and cadence on the turbo trainer readout matched those on the Garmin. I therefore soon changed the display on the turbo trainer to show Power and Cadence, whilst my Garmin (which can show up to 4 parameters at any one time ) was set to display Distance, Speed, and Heart Rate.
Everything worked beautifully and the figures all matched up. Best of all, once I’d finished I was able to connect my Garmin Foreunner to my computer as usual and upload the workout to both Ascent and Garmin Connect. All of the usual data was there (normally just time and heart rate data) but now it also had speed, distance and cadence data.
Here’s the graph of my workout from Ascent showing:
Red – Heart Rate
Purple – Cadence
Green – Speed
Brown – Power (It isn’t recording this but Ascent makes a best guess – which wasn’t too far out! Although it doesn’t know what resistance / slope settings I’m using so it isn’t that accurate. )
Read outs from Garmin Speed / Cadence Sensor
My recent lab tests with Jon at the Sports and Exercise Science Department are finally over. The tests themselves were hard, but nothing compared to the disgusting potions I had to drink beforehand – For that reason alone I’m glad that they are over!
I met Jon yesterday for a quick synopsis of what he thinks the test have shown, and some finally tests to calibrate my work rates with my heart rates so that I can devise some effective training routines. It also gave us a chance to compare my performance with the similar tests done in a previous experiment I did for Jon about a year ago.
I won’t go into the results that Jon noticed as I’m sure he wants to keep those to himself until he’s published his thesis, but it was reassuring that my performance had improved.
The first thing of note was that I’d lost about 3kg in weight. That’s good and as long as my power outputs had remained the same that should mean that I’d be a little bit faster. Last year, my Critical Power (CP) was 251 Watts, this year it had increased by about 10% to 275 Watts.
Now, Critical Power doesn’t really mean that much as it is defined as the the maximum sustainable power output you can maintain for a given amount of time. So, your CP for 1 min will be very much higher than it is for 30 minutes. The CP measurements above are based on a ramp test that I did prior to the lab tests and should be a CP figure for around 30 minutes. Whilst doing the tests yesterday, the 275 Watt setting wasn’t uncomfortable and it did feel as though i;d be able to sustain it for a good 20-30 minutes. Maybe a little longer if needed.
So, it was good news all round – A decrease in weight and an increase in power means that my power-to-weight ratio is a fair bit higher than it was. This should in theory equate to me being faster on the bike, especially up the hills. I certainly felt OK on last nights ride.
I guess really I should aim for a similar amount of improvement by this time next year. If I could lose another 3-4kg and increase my CP to 300 Watts I’d be pretty happy.
Before heading off on todays lunchtime ride I had told myself that the plan was for a nice easy ‘recovery’ ride. I had done a hard 25 mile ride yesterday, I have circuits and Swimfit to go to this evening and a long MTB ride planned for tomorrow, so and easy ride was on the cards.
Once I got going though I couldn’t hold back and ended up hammering out a hard fast ride. Hard enough for it to feel like a good Time Trial effort and fast enough to beat my personal best on the course by just over 1 minute. I think I might suffer at circuits and Swimfit tonight!
It gives me a good excuse to show you one of the cool features of Ascent, my GPS and exercise tracking application though. Ascent allows you to compare up to four different sessions. The video below shows a comparison between two sessions. The yellow dot and upper topo graph is me on the course today compared to the blue dot (and lower topo graph) which was my previous best on the course a few weeks ago.
The movie is a a little stuttery but that is down to the screen capture program I’m using. It is obviously much clearer at full size too, but I’ve had to reduce it for display on the web. Hopefully you can just about make out the blue and yellow dots and get the general idea. You can see where on the map you were, where you were faster or slower and from the topography and heart rate graph you can see where you were trying hard and where you weren’t. Pretty handy hey! Click this link for more info on Ascent, and other Mac software for GPS and fitness training.
Here’s the route on Garmin Connect.
I haven’t done any long bike rides for years. In fact we’re talking 20 years plus since I did anything over about 35 miles. Monday was a gorgeous day, warm, dry and sunny. I was on top of work (or didn’t have much on to be more precise) so set off on a nice little bike ride.
It turned out to be a lovely hilly 45 mile ride. Starting from home I rode into Borth and then Talybont where I started the long slog up to Nant-y-Moch. Then it was a lovely ride around the reservoir on smooth roads – although the cattle grids are a bit annoying. I then dropped down into Ponterwyd and avoided the main roads by heading back up to Pendam. Down into Penrhyncoch and then just to add another hill into the equation rode up to Bont Goch and back into Talybont. From there it was just an easy ride back home.
Just under 45 miles, and at a very slow pace. My legs were tired by the end of it but it was an enjoyable day out in the hills.
I’m supposed to be doing the Wotton Triathlon in just over a week, but preparations aren’t going too well. Jay, Brad, Matt and Beale are going to love reading that!
I should be training hard for it now and then easing down by the middle of next week ready for the race a week on Sunday. Unfortunately though I’ve had a cold for a week now and have done absolutely no training at all. What’s worse is that whenever I get a cold these days it seems to go to my chest which then makes me think I’d best be careful otherwsie I’ll end up in hospital again. The dull ache that I get in m on the left hand side of my middle back has returned so I’m being good and continuing to take it easy despite the need to train!
I didn’t do the Dyfi Enduro at the weekend thanks to the cold and now my main aim is to get rid of it completely before the Triathlon so that I can at least do it. In the meantime it would be good to do some training as I haven’t even had chance to try out the new position on my bike after chaning the bar and saddle positions so that I can reach the aero bars better.
The race is on Sunday 16th so I’ll be driving to Gloucestershire on the Friday evening and if the weather is OK I’ll do a course recce on Friday evening so that I at least know what to expect. Hopefully before then I’ll be able to get out on my bike a couple of times and make sure that I can run 4.5 miles!
I’m not going to be fast, but at this rate I won’t even get around the course.
I’ve just received 8 little bottles of powder ready for my Sports and Exercise Science lab tests that begin in earnest next week.
Bottles for Lab test
I’m not 100% sure of whats in them yet. Four are labeled ‘A’ and the other four ‘B’. Either ‘A’ or ‘B’ will have Sodium Bicarbonate in it as the tests are to determine whether or not Sodium Bicarbonate has an effect on endurance performance.
Apparently Sodium Bicarbonate doesn’t taste too nice so the other bottles have an inert substance in them that has also been made to taste pretty disgusting. I have to mix them with water and drink them an hour before my tests. Should be fun!
Once again I’m being a Sports and Exercise Science lab rat for Jon.
I did the ramp test yesterday which is always carried out before the test to give Jon some data that allows him to calculate the work rate that my subsequent tests should be performed at. Basically after filling in some disclaimer forms and a quick height and weight measurement, I get on the bike and pedal. I have to breathe through a mouthpiece and wear a nose-clip and heart rate monitor too. The resistance is then gradually increased by 30 Watts per minute and I have to keep going for as long as I can.
The good news is that I’d lost some weight. I was 75.6kg this time and 78.2kg last time. Strangely, I’ve also shrunk as I was 169.7cm tall last time but I’m only 169.1cm now! In fact, that makes me 5’6″ when I used to be almost 5’8″. Oh well, nothing I can do about that except maybe think tall thoughts.
Best of all though I’ve managed to increase my Work Rate Peak. Last time I did the ramp test I got to 384 Watts, this time I think I just about nudged it to 400 Watts. That’s good as it shows I’ve improved a little over the past few months. It does have a downside though as it means the subsequent tests will be carried out at a higher work rate than they were last time.
I’ll keep you up to date on how I get on on subsequent tests.
All of this was followed by a hard circuit training session and then swimfit – I should start seeing some real world improvements if I keep training at this rate!
The nice weather continues and I’m beginning to enjoy my rides on my road bike. Not only can I cover much greater distances than on my mountain bike but I don’t need to drive to the trails and I don’t need to clean it after a ride.
Yesterdays ride was twice around a local 10 mile loop. Actually its a little over 10 miles at about 10.65 miles. First time around was OK in a time of 36:29, the final couple of miles into the wind were hard though. Next time around I pushed quite hard on the first few miles with the wind behind me, but then struggled a little over the hills in the middle and against the wind at the end. My time for the second loop was however 2 seconds faster at 36:27.
I had been doing quite well with my fitness drive recently. I’d been out on the bike or on the Turbo Trainer a fair bit, I’d been swimming once a week and going to circuit training once a week and I’d even started running a little bit. Best of all, I’d lost a little bit of weight, getting myself down from hovering around 78-80Kg down to about 75Kg (on a good day).
All of that went out of the window last week though when we went on holiday and the main activity of the week (other than keeping warm and dry!) was eating. Cereal, cooked breakfast, toast and waffles for breakfast every day and a large 3 course meal every evening! Not helped by the fact that Anna and Morgan aren’t the biggest of eaters and as we’d paid for the food anything they leave I feel obliged to eat so often in the evenings I would have my starter, Morgans starter, then my main course, followed by my pudding, half of Annas pudding and half or Morgans pudding!
Needless to say I have some weight to lose again as I’m now back to my standard 78Kg or thereabouts! Oh well, lets hope it is easier second time around.
