Ducks
Quack Quack

I quite like that idea.
Might work even better under a seat tube bottle cage

@wildc4rd, yes, its quite possible to maintain and even very slightly improve performances when entering the first stage of overtraining. Especially if you are motivated to try and improve the speed all the time – it can easily be a result of just trying harder.
It’s good practice to take one week in 4 with reduced volume and intensity.

The good news is there’s plenty of other signs to look out for. The book covers it.
Mild depression (general grumpyness and apathy towards things)
Hard to concentrate
Disturbed sleep patterns
Muscles aching for no reason
Endless sugar cravings

For me, the depressed HR always come first before signs of the others, but if the others show up i know its time to rest up right away, as thats when carrying on can dig you a hole.

Hopefully though you have the somewhat less glum diagnosis of weak legs which can be cured with hideous interval sessions and gym work 😈

+1 for Friel’s Training Bible.

One of two possibilities for your HR question.
The first is you’ve trained your endurance engine well and raw leg strength is now the limiter (quite rare, but have been here myself, been doing lots of high torque sessions to work on this).
The second is you’re seeing the first signs of having over done things a bit and your HR is suppressed by fatigue.

Only you can really figure out which of the above applies.

Maybe not, but if you did you might have some opinions on what it was like to ride in comparison to your 2x setup.

TBH, i bet its fantastic to ride.
Front mechs are a bit of a pain on the MTB, as they are prone to getting twisted in crashes, and don’t shift very nicely when covered in filth.

But even given all that, i’d still not swap it if it means running out of gears even more than I do already.

Like I said, i’d happily buy a 1x trail bike, I really cant see any disadvantages for that application.
I’d even go with 1x for an XC race bike used purely for XCO racing.
It’s the 29er that sees a huge variety of uses (bike packing, 24hr racing, training, and even a road sportive) that just needs more gears. Eagle 2×12 would be nice 😀

The strongest criticism of 1x almost always comes from people who’ve not tried it, but at this point most people who have a 1x bike have had a double or triple.

Do I need to try it? If I already feel short of range on a 2x, then 1x isn’t going to work for me is it?

I’d happily go 1x on my trail bike as I can easily afford to lose some top end there, but i’ll hang onto 2x for as long as possible on my XC bike.

Like I said, it depends how much you ride, but a 95kg bike and rider going up Alp D’Huez in 90 minutes needs to generate 190W, which equates to less than 2W/kg. That’s a pretty achievable number for anyone who rides.

Yes, but it will also give them an average cadence of 54rpm which for 90mins solid is beyond stupid

Edit:
I plugged some predicted numbers in for myself (225W, 59kg, 8kg bike (saddle bag, mini pump and water bottle))
From your link, that would give me 60mins, and an average of ~86rpm, so still a fraction over-geared.

I’m taking a compact and 28t sprocket to the Alps, and fifeandy’s now got me mildly concerned that I’m going to die a horrible death.

Roll the clock back 5-6 years, and that gearing was the best that was available, and no-one actually died, so you’ll be fine.
But now more gears are available, most people that wouldn’t be bold enough to consider themselves a strong climber would probably be better served by a 32t, subcompact or both.
Bear in mind the pros were running 36/28 for Mont du Chat the other day, and they were pushing 5W/kg.

It mean’s you’ll need that big gear and 50kmh when the golfers start using you as target practice!

Obviously, it depends how much you ride, but most would be able to get up pretty much anything in the Alps with a compact x 28T.

Do you work for Shimano and just like making everyone overgeared for giggles?

You need to be able to hold about 3.5W/kg for 30mins at a time to make 34/28 work on any steeper(7+%) alpine climbs, which is not ‘most’ at all, its actually very few.
‘Most’ would actually benefit from a new sub compact chainset and a 32T cassette for a 28/32 ratio. Then they could actually enjoy climbs rather exploding their knees doing 45rpm.

Pedalling is ‘special’
Everyone knows you’re supposed to push up and the pedals are just foot rests going down.

When you were trying them individually I bet the stanchions were sliding up and down with all the force going directly along the angle of the stanchion. On the bike if you push down on the handlebars the forces aren’t acting in exactly the same way, you’re pushing down but the forks wants to slide at an angle (because the head angle isn’t 90 degrees). This will be worse On a DH bike with a slack head angle. The forces will bind the stanchions against the bushings more causing more stiction than just sliding the stanchions up and down individually. Did you try removing the fork and compressing it vertically with everything installed?

My money would be here too

That’s no different to a fluid trainer though and doesn’t make use of the electro brake.
One of his reasons for changing is he’s not getting enough resistance for 60rpm intervals in 50/11, so being able to simulate a gradient would be a massive improvement for this type of interval.

A slight off topic, but seems an appropriate place to ask it.

My Dad is interested in getting a new trainer (smart/direct drive/electro brake). I’m pretty clear on how that interacts with various apps etc to control the resistance, but what if you want to control resistance manually?

For example if you want to simulate a 8% slope on an old ‘dumb’ training video?

But you want to be able to ride a MTB at 50km/h ? Really ?

Err, yes, pretty normal even for me, and i’m hardly blessed with epic wattage.
I ride 2×10 22/36 11-36, and tbh i regularly wish for 1 gear lower, and sometimes 1 gear higher.

I’m not very good at drinking fluids after a long cycle, so by weighing myself after breakfast and then once back after lunch I can force myself to drink fluids to get me back up to weight.

E.g. I weighed 69.5kg before setting off and 67.5kg after lunch so I poured out 2l of water to drink over the next hour or so.

But also at, what I deem to be, a silly amount of training (15hrs/250-300miles per week) I’ve really got to be careful that I don’t lose.

From what you’ve posted, you’re also not very good at drinking ON the bike, not just after. Even a midget like me that doesn’t sweat unless weather cooking gets through 500ml/hr on the bike. On the hot TDF stage the other day they had someone on that was saying the riders would be drinking 1L/hr.

And yes, over around 10hrs a week eating starts to become like a second job, and only gets worse the more you do. You’re probably burning very close to 10,000kcal per week on the bike, which means you need to eat 11 days worth of food every 7 days.

29er tube, CO2 Inflater/Cartridges, levers, multitool, quick link, self adhesive patches, and tyre boot crammed into a poly bag (kinda thing your bib shorts may be delivered in), just fits into middle pocket of most jerseys, leaving side pockets free for jacket, arm warmers, emergency gel, phone and keys.

Neither did I at one end of the journey! 😀

Looks nice, but its a shame you can’t get an Ultegra build with the Hi-Mod frame.

Bikes like this are very attractive though with our UK roads falling apart, and cycle paths littered with rocks/gravel, it gives the ability to stick some wider more robust tyres on and not worry so much.

Although for me i’d much rather have a SuperSix that could fit 32’s

Best option is to ride, then shower, then another ride once home.

Then sleep like a baby…

Only works if your workplace has showers and your spare room has a turbo trainer though 😆

To share my experience:

– I had a coach last year, and gained quite a bit of knowledge which gave me the confidence to structure my own training.
– Z2 training requires a lot of discipline, focus, humility, and quite a bit of time, but got results for me. I always feared not finishing the event first, and speed second, so that’s how I structured my training. Maybe I was too conservative, but the Monster especially was a big day out.
– it’s basically a time trial type effort, so a constant power delivery, with as little rest as possible (ie pedal all the time, especially downhill!)
– Z2 is the zone (ie has a bottom and a top) not the just max!
– HR only is fine for endurance training, as you’re not putting in differing efforts / intervals, which is where the power meter is better.
– I was constantly reminding myself of the purpose of it, to improve aerobic (fat burning) efficiency, so was thinking about other things like feeding (I now need to eat less than I used to) and did a reasonable amount of fasted riding as well. I tweaked my diet as well, reducing carbs and replaced with more green veg.
– I can ‘zone out’, which definitely helped manage the boredom (at times! I mostly enjoyed it!), especially as I rode mostly on my own.
– I focused quite heavily on endurance over the winter into spring, but always did some intensity each week, and increased the proportion of intensity as time went on, but the priority was consistently getting the long, focused Z2 rides each in week (building up to regular 4-6 hours without really stopping, save for water refills). I did no tempo riding at all, until the six weeks before my main event. Before that it was either HIIT (turbo) or Z2, and when I did start tempo training, was mainly Sweetspot which I often did on the turbo to get properly measured efforts in.
– I was riding 10-14 hours over 5 days a week.
– Z2 didn’t work well in groups, unless people are happy to ride at your pace the whole time – you need to constantly focus on what you’re doing and your own effort.

No idea if my experience is typical.

Not only is your experience typical, its also a really great post that describes exactly what z2 is about and why people should do it.

Maybe if they’re not really racing. I don’t think anyone in the front group would’ve < 5 on any of the climbs yesterday.

So, yes, maybe Nairo doing 275 would keep up with Demare.

Did some digging on Strava (busy afternoon i’m having)
Mostly you are right. Most guys at the pointy end (that had power available to view) were doing ~330W for around 5W/kg on the climbs.

Geschke did 275W up the final climb – suspect that was him ‘rolling in’. Also suspect it was a good bit quicker than Demare.

275W wouldn’t even keep up with Demare.

Depends how much you weigh doesn’t it. If you’re built like Quintana then if have thought 275W(4.66W/Kg) probably isn’t far off for grinding out a long climb mid stage climb at tempo.
Obviously much more when the racing is really on.

…would Aru have also been trying to undo some of the damage his unwise attack caused?

No, when you are morally corrupt enough to think that attack was acceptable in the first place, you really don’t give F* what anyone else thinks.

No first hand experience of them, but a friend at work always had his/hers, another friend had one, and dad had one.

First chap always made a point of changing them before the warranty ran out and thought they were great for the money.
2nd chap and dad thought they were just fine – until the warranty ran out and they fell apart.

So in summary, i’d have no hesitation buying a new one, but wouldn’t go anywhere near one over 3yrs old.

Sad to hear about people behaving like arses and hurting others, particularly in non-competitive events. People are supposed to go for a weekend away to enjoy themselves, not end up in A&E.

Most are already running Di2 which is enough heavier than a standard groupset to negate the need for the lead weights iirc.

I don’t disagree with you but the peleton appears to, one of the biggest barriers to disc break adoption in pro racing has been lack of interest from riders.

May be a body weight thing? Or maybe having good calipers/pads?
Having tried road hydro’s for the first time at the weekend, having previously only used cable discs, I still prefer my normal ultegra rim brakes in anything other than full on soaking wet conditions.
Sure the hydro’s are more powerful, but I can lock the wheels with the rim brakes, and I find it easier to judge on the rim brakes as you really have to pull hard on the lever to do so.
BUT, this is coming from a <60kg rider, maybe the average 85kg MAMIL can make use of the extra braking force?

I’m amazed that the teams didn’t look at the weather forecast and go “you know what, it’s going to be shit weather so we’ll get the disc-braked bikes out, run with tubeless tyres as wide and low as we dare”.

Of all the “marginal gains” to be had, that one seems a fairly basic maximal one.

Because the stage had about a million meters of climbing, and no-one wants to drag discs and fat tyres up the climbs. Even Kittel wasn’t riding his MAMIL-mobile.

Edit: Stupid work distracting me – other people got in first

Not sure why he gets involved in so many crashes.

Some combination of inattention and poor descending/braking skills.
The crash that put him out was his 3rd of this TDF, and the 2nd he more or less admitted he wasn’t concentrating and rode off the road into a hay bale.

Crazy stage.
Aru scores maximum tool points
G does what he does best
Gutted Porte is out, and shame for Martin to be caught up in an incident that wasnt his fault at all
Delighted NQ has lost time
And they better not let Demare back in, if you are dropped in the first 60s of the stage you don’t deserve to be there.

Not sure about polar, but standard zones in garmin are comical.

https://www.trainingpeaks.com/blog/joe-friel-s-quick-guide-to-setting-zones/

Simple really, there’s enough utter psychos around that if you want to win you have to take brain out and follow at some point.

Even on local weekly training APR’s, some of the risks i see being taken are to me insane – bikes leant over at 35+ mph on broken horrible surfaces.

I rather let the wheel go and catch back on even if it means burning a few matches

A) Do a LTHR test, you may as well be using lucky dip trying to set zones based on a guessed Max HR.
B) Who’s definition of zones are you using? Friel and British cycling for example have quite different z1-3.
C) Have you confirmed HR by taking pulse manually whilst riding? Various reasons a HRM can display the wrong number.

No-one can ride 100km in z5, there’s likely something wrong with your zones or equipment.

19kmh is not bad at all for a mixed surface ride.
And its a lesson learned, sometimes you need to blow up in order to find where your limits are.

Well, i had a 45min test ride on a 2016 Pinnacle Dolomite 5 today. Ironed out poor surfaces well, didn’t feel too heavy when climbing or accelerating, and generally rolled along at a nice pace.

Didn’t get on well with the position and handling though. Felt the head tube was too long putting me upright like a sail, and reach was too short. Handling i felt was very stable, but very slow and as a result just not a fun engaging ride.

So a bike capable of going fast that wants to go slow.

2 TT bikes¿!

Make a sandwich night before, wrap in foil and put in fridge. Not the perfect breakfast, but will do the job.

Kellogs breakfast bakes maybe? I use them on the bike. Minimal protein content, but a few vitamins added at least.

Protein flapjacks? Possible to find ones that are mostly slow burn carbs from the oats and 20g of whey protein. Maybe a bit expensive, but better than no brekkie, and in my experience do a pretty good job of keeping you satisfied for a good 2hrs.

Cheers for sharing your Friday night browsing though, very enlightening 😆