Thanks, tis as I thought.

I’ve a whole load of supplier evaluation meetings in a few weeks where they’ll be pitching software. Having looked at a number of their roadmaps/product plans everthing seems to be based on my client running a browser greater than IE8.

I couldn’t do press-ups for about 5 years, at least not with my palms flat on the floor, I had to do them off my knuckles or by using dumbbells.

This thread has kicked off a Queen Spotify session as I sit here modelling various things, great stuff.

“Flash, we only have 24 hours to save the Earth”

Busted my wrist, (amongst other things), in a climbing accident 7 years ago, ironically I can recommend climbing as an excellent way to build up strength!

I had 4 hours of surgery to fix my wrist and then hit the climbing wall after the plaster was off and the pins were taken out, and it was not that long, say 6 months, before it was feeling pretty good again.

I have no issues on the road or MTB, although it does ache a little more than the other one after a long race.

Best of luck, work hard but don’t push it, the body is an incredible instrument that does respond to training.

I use a 2 baseline sessions throughout the year, done on rollers with a PowerTap.

2 * 20 minutes with 5 minutes rolling recovery
4 * 4 minutes off 2 minutes rolling recovery.

I know that my FTP is roughly 300 if I can hold 280 watts per interval in session 1 and average 350 watts in session 2, (during a normal weeks worth of training workload).

I had my FTP at 300 in TrainerRoad and the efforts in Sufferfest sessions were hard but not killing me, but that’s OK in the middle of the cross season when you’re racing twice over a weekend, it’s from Dec onwards where I need the assistance.

I need to sit down with the guy who did the test and together we’ll create a 14 week plan, (part of the package I got), which will act as my guide during winter.

2014 is going to be serious cycling, no playing around with training 😀

Sweden has just got its first UCI registered MTB event as well, just up the road from me

EDIT: Its the third test I’ve done with them so they have some background on me

Took a “real” fitness test yesterday with lactate reading, VO2Mx readings, Wingate test, the whole works.

Utterly spent for the rest of the day.

Now need to increase the FTP setting by 15 watts in TrainerRoad, not pretty.

Wheels Far seems to get good ratings, but I’ve not used them myself.
http://www.wheelsfar.com/

Never saw them live but went to the tribute gig at Wembley, wow never realised at the time just how big some of the names were that played there that day.

Ran Tufo Cubus Flexus front and rear last year and liked them, although the sidewalls are not that flexible, however they are excellent in the mud!

This year I’ve got a file tread Vittoria XN on the front and kept the Cubus on the rear, so far this has been excellent. The Vittoria has really soft sidewalls that you can feel giving/increasing the contact patch as you corner. link to wiggle[/url]

Have tried Dugast, a lot of extra hassle with the aquaseal and they wear out super quick, for racing only!

Would very much like to try FMB’s next.

thanks for posting. 8)

First picture published from today. Fighting face with my team mate close behind, (he got me with better technique around a 180 degree bend with 200 meters to go).

As for tyre pressure, up a couple of PSI today as there were a fair few faster corners and I felt that the front was a little too low yesterday.

I run tubs, so sub 30 is no issue on good cross courses, my pit wheels are clincher and they run in at around 32psi.

Haven’t tried tubeless but interesting that you can run tubeless at 30 John, sounds promising.

7th place today, bloody fantastic racing the whole way 8)

Nik Gustavsson race today?

DNF Sat, 8th in Prestige, (Elite), today, impressive.

National cup, round one, home pitch.

10th place for me, despite getting seeded in the last row via the lottery, (stitched up by my own club!). Came past 40 odd people, but finished 1:50 off the lead and 40 seconds behind where I’d have liked to have been.

Still, tubs held, always a relief first time out, big thumbs up to the new Vittoria Evo XN as front tub, really flexible sidewalls that I could feel squishing nicely around corners, ran at 24psi. Tufo Cubus Flexus on the rear at 26psi.

More importantly the boys raced and enjoyed themselves.

Same again tomorrow.

Ooh double picture post, sorry about that.

There is a ton of grass if that makes it more UK style?

Took the day off work and spent it building the course for this weekends first national series race in Gothenburg. Still a little too do, but bring on the racing tomorrow.

New tubs, new skinsuit 8)

You’re right its 170% of VO2Max, which is insane

EDIT:
OK quick a Google says Coggan thinks VO2Max is between 106% and 120% of Power, which I read as FTP, so that would be around 610 watts if your FTP was 300, I think

Part 2 and 3 seems quite good, not sure I want to start with a Tabata style session first.

Tabata, if one follows the protocol is 170% of FTP, so not strictly an all-out sprint, however its the complete lack of recovery that kills. Agree that you’re end up falling off the bike afterwards if done correctly.

None what so ever, its simply a tool to get a job done.

This doesn’t stop me lusting after frames from my childhood, (San Andreas or a Concorde PDM), however I don’t think I could ever be emotionally attached to one.

I never had an issue with the price, it was that I never could grasp the concept of presenting MTB in the same fashion as road cycling, it just seemed a bit forced. The two sports are so very different, historically, culturally, and seemingly in those that partake in it/read about it.

Long time reader and collector of Rouluer which I love.

5:45 alarm
5:50 Shower/shave
6:02 Dress
6:05 lay breakfst board for the fmaily and eat breakfst, check news
6:27 brush teeth
6:30 drive into village
6:42 bus into town
7:15 tram to work
7:30 at work

Right time for an update, we now have some internal wall structures, the bedroom on the left the shower room on the right. The bedroom is designed for two single beds with a small bedside table in between and wall cupboards.

In the shower room you can see the drainage for the shower space on the left hand side.

Not expecting a lot of action for the rest of week as I know the builder has other jobs to do, so I’ll most likely return to this thread on Monday.

In the mean-time I need to decide on the floor colour and material, finalize the kitchen design, and specify where the air fan will sit with regard to potentially adding a wood burning stove at some point in the future, (which I’ll be a challenge as its a double cross race weekend).

I’m currently working for Volvo Penta so I’d like to add Penta power to this thread:

Most likely OK, although noted that Sven runs a ti not carbon railed saddle in case of re-mounting issues/mishaps.

Canti’s here, no plans to change bike, if I did then it would be after this season so I’d have a better idea on the whole disk brake thing, but most likely canti’s again.

The four I listen to are:

Velocast, (which is now Eurosports), their paid for content is very good
Humans Invent
The Bike Shop
Rouluer

My house insurance wouldn’t be valid if I did it myself.

how do you tend to heat your homes over there.

In our main house we have under floor heating controlled by a thermostat in each room, the actual heat and hot water is provided by a geothermal ground sourced heat exchanger.
The basics are explained here[/url]. We also have a wood bring stove that is used mainly for a cosiness factor rather than a main heat source, although it puts out quite a lot of warmth.

The new build will use an air pump to warm the house and we may install a small stove if budget allows, although this is a nice to have requirement at the moment.

Explanation of how they work:
“A fan draws the outdoor air into the heat pump where it meets the evaporator. This is connected in a closed system containing a refrigerant that can turn into gas at very low temperatures. When the outdoor air hits the evaporator the refrigerant will turn into gas.

Then, using a compressor, the gas reaches a high enough temperature to be transferred in the condensor to the house’s heating system. At the same time the refrigerant reverts to liquid form, ready to turn into gas once more and to collect new heat.

Using an inverter-driven heat pump compressor, the system can be regulated so that heat output matches the exact capacity required at any given time. This means the heat pump will only consume the exact energy needed, making it highly efficient.

In the summer, the refrigeration circuit is capable of operating in reverse to provide cooling on demand.”

The base is a standard 300mm L, with 200mm of “cellplastisolering”

Timber is Christmas Tree/Spruce, again very standard construction over here, double wall with 145mm + 45mm with 190mm of isolation, the roof has 260mm of isolation and has 300mm beams.

Can provide more details pictures if needed.

Guests welcome alwillis, I’m 15 minutes drive from the airport and excellent riding on the door step.

Cheeky GEDA, I’ve a 7 and 5 year old, so the track is in it’s first of hopefully many iterations. Saw your last film, looking pretty good for a limited space!

Right today’s update is that we now appear to have an insulated roof.

And a photo from a few weeks ago of the finished climbing frame and cycle track:

How long will you live there for?
It”s just 30m2 is fine but when you get more stuff and kids etc it soon becomes too small.
I lived in a 28m2 chalet for a bit and it just got too claustrophobic for me.

Our house the one behind it, (roughly 160 square meters), this for friends and family who want to visit for longer than a weekend, and potential income from hiring out.

As much as I’d enjoy the minimalist challenge of living in a 30m2 house, two young boys and a wife who works from home would put a strain on things!

Thanks folks.

I’m always amazed at the skills of STWers.

I can not take credit for the actual build, that’s in the hands of our builder.

Vision, garden work, painting, and financing are where I can play a part, not the construction.

And part 2, the actual house build.

Laying out the base:

Prep for the concrete fill:

Final base:

A frame takes shape:

We have a roof:

A new angle:

Hmm cossy:

And that is how I left it this morning, Oct 7.

And the long slow miles approach is the other school of thought.

Personally I find it de-motivational and injury inducing, especially for the newbie. However I’d guess 80% or “runners” build their base this way so it clearly works.

YoYo Ma’s guest appearance in the West Wing was pretty cool!

Played the prelude to the Bach Cello Suite No.1

The three types of session described by Molly are the staples of all endurance type events. By simply applying them at the right pace/intensity anyone will improve. It is that simple.

How much and how quickly will depend on a whole bunch of things, background to exercise, genes, natural talent, technique level.

However as has been said running based speed work will generally increase your efficiency and thus “improve” your technique.

Generally speaking people with good technique make their sport look easy, however there are a fair few examples of that not being true, Paula’s arm carriage/head movement for one.

If its working, then keep doing it.

I’ll investigate the plans in detail after the cross season finishes here, (mid Dec).

I’ll hope to replace the two weekend trainer sessions with like for like road sessions until the snow hits, then its a case of riding inside or XC skiing.

For keeping it simple then 2 * 20 is as good as its gonna get for an hour’s workout, so +1 to thisisnotaspoon

this site has quite a good overview of the principles

How to Increase Your Threshold Power

I’d go with one of their plans to get a better overall effect.

If you’ve paid the money for a subscription and all the ANT+ stuff then you really ought to do it justice and follow a plan rather than dip in and out.

However given your description then anything that is classed as tempo/threshold/sweet spot would be good. Longer intervals not at 100%, so in Sufferfest terms the hunted and angles would be two good ones.

12/13, bugger

Normal bib shorts and leg warmers to around +5 degrees then fully fleeced CX skinsuit and leg warmers to around -10, works fine.

Thank you Mr C