Another one with a track saw here, but I managed to buy a broken Festool TS55 on ebay for £50 (It had been dropped) and then bought spares (£30). Works a treat.
It has caused me to then buy a fair few more Festool items (all listed as for repair):
extra rails
extractor
jigsaw
router
I may have a problem….

It’s properly flat round ‘ere. I have a near 100 km route with 300m of climbing.
Riding is better suited to cross or road bikes.
On a plus side there are plenty of good pubs to ride to.

Dalby is probably your best bet, but get there early to avoid the traffic on route.

I bring the big wallowy (sp) heap of *&^%

According to my Dad (70’s copper) anyway. He hated these things, along with the Capri’s as they were damn awful to drive.

@Kayak23 and stumpy01 – Thanks guys. I’ll have a look at those suggestions. Cupboard will be in a similar position to Kayaks, and will be used for storing toys, so may need to hold a fair bit of weight. I could split that cupboard into several pull out sections.
I’ll see what the director of house alterations thinks.

@Kayak23 – Where did you get the mechanisms for the slide out part of the wardrobe? Google foo is lacking today. Would be ideal for our eldest’s bedroom.
Lovely work as always. In fact the majority of the stuff on here is excellent. There are some real talents about.

*Shouts Soup*

That’s the first time I’ve heard that expression. Internet won as far as I’m concerned.

+ that is one FUGLY bike

It’s hidden somewhere in the menus. I’ll have a look when I get home.

And another one for the Magnifica. Picked an absolutely mint condition one off our local Facebook for £60.

We live in a very hard water are, so it’s always telling me to descale.

Bought it with 200 coffees on the counter. Within a month that was over 600.

We’re not wired at all, no really.

Started off with a Gaggia classic and hand grinder. Life is too short, especially with kids, or when guests want a coffee.

We acquired a DeLonghi Magnifica form our local Facebook Buy and Sell site for £60. It had only made 200 coffees. In the first month the total was over 600, Oops.

Can customise the grind and temperature plus other things.

Bean to Cup are the way to go.

That reminds me I need to clean the Gaggia and get it sold.

5:32 for me. Was aiming for 5 hours, but with volume of people and how slippery the roads where I realised that wasn’t realistic.

Stopped to help a guy who wheels just went from under him coming down after Leith Hill, thankfully he was only shaken, but I spent a little time retrieving his stuff and making sure he was ok.

Really enjoyed the day and would like to return in the dry. Next time I won’t forget my water bottles when setting off from York. Had to make do with 500mm ones, so stopped a couple of times to refill.

Talked to lots of nice people of different nationalities.

A group of us on Facebook raised some money for food and drink after the ride, and there was enough left over to hire a masseuse. That was great, and we had a place to get out of the rain too.

The guy who died on Leith was the father of a girl that was part the Facebook group. She was on the ride too. So sad.

Wahoo Elemnt Bolt here. Simple to use and does the job really well. No pain points for me so far. Never really considered a Garmin due to the sheer number of negative comments on’t interweb.

Even though the screen is B&W the navigation and data fields are clear. The unit is supplied with worldwide maps, so no additional outlay required.

I plan routes with RideWithGPS and upload via my phone. Routing on the fly has to be done on the phone and passed to the Elemnt. Phone goes in the back pocket now, rather than on the bars.

Turn by turn navigation is signalled by a LOUD beep and an onscreen prompt (apparently the Bolt is a lot louder than the Elemnt).

A friend has recently completed a 600km Audax using one, and just needed to recharge once at the halfway point. Battery life is something like 15hrs, so his timing was more for convenience than necessity.

It may be worth looking at the Elemnt and Elemnt Bolt side by side to see which size is best for you.

Karoo Hammerhead may be worth a look too.

There are no words that are sufficient.

Things will get better in time, and you will all be stronger for it. Your kids are so lucky to have such an amazing Dad.

We have just found out that the MIL has 4 – 9 months to live, and the condition that has caused her cancer is hereditary, with a 50% chance of it being passed on. Wife and her brother are in bits and we are all hoping that our kids will not inherit.

Thoughts are with you. Keep strong.

Get the chicken (in a baking tray and covered with foil) on a kettle BBQ using the indirect heat method. 1 1/2 hours later and amazing chicken is produced. No need for an oven when the weather is so nice (Unless you don’t have a garden + BBQ).

Failing that go to the pub.

Sorry no practical advice about the oven.

After 8pm is Daddy time in the garage for me. It makes the PRL100 workouts that last 2hrs really late.

I managed to exceed my target weight of 90kg (I’m 192cm tall), unfortunately it was not achieved by hard work or dieting. Food Poisoning is not a pleasant way to lose 4kg in 2 days. For the rest of the week my body was using it’s reserves for fuel. Dropped down to 88.5kg and a week and a half later I am back to 90kg, and trying to maintain this.

For the first time in 20 years I can fit comfortably into 34 inch waist jeans.

Just realised that the workout plan I was following (PRL100 one where they work out the timings) finishes 1 week after the event. That’s clever, that is. Back to the workouts that I select myself, which are harder anyway.

Exciting times ahead scaled (father of 2 headstrong girls here).

Rode into work yesterday 18 miles and then took part in a charity cycle challenge as the Tour De Yorkshire was passing the office. 10 mins on a spin bike to see who could cycle furthest. Basically a challenge to see who could spin the fastest for longest. Zwift must be paying off cos I won. Yippee £40 Wiggle voucher coming my way. Managed to ride 10.48 km, even with having to stop twice due to my foot coming out of the toe straps. Next furthest was 10.15km.

Have a saddle sore now though.

Riding/pootling from York to Scarborough tomorrow morning with a couple of mates to watch the TdY.

ToW Stage 7 yesterday:

I definitely pressed on too hard on the first climb of the Pretzel (around 380w), and was feeling it on the second climb.

Not sure if I was too ambitious to try to stick with the front-most group, but stayed with them most of the way on the way to the radio tower, but being a heavier bloke I was never going to match most of them on the steep section.

I’m definitely a steady state rider, and the kicks on the way down from the Epic KOM in both directions always play havoc with me.

Went into the second accent with slightly heavy legs, but decided to maintain 7th place, so sat at around 340w to keep the 50 second gap in-front and 1 min gap behind. The top couldn’t have come quickly enough.

The run into the finish was a struggle, but managed 7th out of a field of 77.

There was one guy who just took off from the start, and was way ahead after the radio climb, but just disappeared off the leaderboard never to be seen again.

2 hrs 14 mins which is 7 mins off my best. Obviously paced it better before.

Stage 6 today:

Went into the ride with the aim of beating an hour. As it was only one accent I figured I could keep a fairly high effort up the reverse epic kom, depending on how my legs felt from yesterday.

Great prep for the ride was wandering around Newby Hall near Ripon, carrying everyone’s paraphernalia, and a picnic that weighed a ton (mostly water as it turns out). Didn’t really eat or drink much all day, so reserves were a bit low at 6:50pm.

Set off with the front group of about 8 riders. We soon started to split as soon as the climb started. I think I went into it in 7th place. Just switched off concentrating on anything else, apart from maintaining 380w+, which I managed reasonably well. Looked at position after the radio tower, and was in 2nd! How did that happen?

I was pretty spent by then, so just wanted a steady effort down. As yesterday, the kicks before the tunnel were damn awful. Reserves were running low by the time I got to the bottom, and as a result I dropped a couple of places. The first guy to go past put in a massive effort to chase down the leader who was over 30 seconds ahead of me. I was then caught at 3km to go, when I slowed when he dropped a drafting boost. O don’t think he was impressed and shot off at 5w/kg. Ta, ta, no way was I able of chasing. With 1km to go I had another rider at closing in, but must have found something in the bottom of the tank, and opened out to over a minutes lead.

4th place: 57 min 54 secs

Jumped off the bike and inhaled a very large portion of risotto. I’m still really hungry and am resisting eating everything in the fridge.

Now waiting to find out what my final position was in the Tour. After stages 1-5 I was in 156th. I reckon that I’m about 200th which I’m very happy with.

Definitely starting more endurance training now.

There is a cycling challenge in the office on Thursday as the Tour de Yorkshire is coming past. Greatest distance achieved in 10 minutes, with the chance to win a £40 Wiggle voucher.

Stages 6 and 7 for me. Have to look at times to see what works with the family.

If possible try a few different makes on as there is a big difference between the manufacturers.

I started off on dhb, which were good to daily commute (8 miles each way). Tried decathlon bibs which used to be very comfortable for reasonable length rides, but now give me proper grief.

Bought a pair of Assos bibs at the York Cycle Fair, and will quite happily buy them again and again. I know that the racing fit is better for me rather than the regular fit. It’s really hard to justify spending nearly £100 on a pair of shorts, but if you are doing a reasonable amount of miles they are more than worth it in the long run.

Rides over an hour benefit from some chamois cream too. I used to get saddle sores, but cleaning your undercarriage thoroughly before a ride (I can hear you sniggering at the back, that wasn’t a euphamism), and using cream with a quality pad helps avoid problems.

That’s a bit of a bugger Matt. My iPhone battery has just decided that it will start to die really quickly, and coupled with the fact that someone in the house has put my usb battery pack in a ‘safe place’ which cannot be found, I can’t rely on the companion app either.

Stages 6 and 7 to do next weekend – joy. Timings just didn’t work for me this weekend. Only way to do it next week is Stage 7 on Saturday and Stage 6 on Sunday (v early).

Was out walking this weekend in and around Matlock. Calves and hamstrings are really hurting today, so tonights workout may be interesting. If you are out that way and fancy a pint Sinclair’s Ale house is very nice, and worth the climb up the hill.

Hayfever has properly set in too, grrrr!

First time commute to my relatively new place of work. 18 miles each way, averaging 19.5mph on a cx bike, on road. I’m battered today. Actually took a little while for the bike to feel natural, even though it’s my zwift bike too. Last year mostly rode the commute with panniers, so not having any also felt different.

Trying to work out how I’m going to fit i the next two ToW stages. I’m away this weekend, so the Pretzel is going to be in the catch up weekend, but at this point don’t much feel like riding this evening. #motivationgonetoday #mustgetmyarseintogear

1:20:13 for stage 5 and 16th place I think. That one almost finished me. Went off too fast. Group in front was 1min ahead, and group behind the same time gap. TTed from the Radio Tower to the finish.

Looking forwards to Stage 6, Stage 7 not so much. It’s a long time in the saddle in the garage.

Going to eat everything in the house now. Nom, Nom!

Not sure about that weeksy.

Legs are feeling tired today, but according to Stravistix I should be optimal freshness.

Still trying to negotiate a start time.

jk that sounds like a bit of an effort, to say the least. I’m saving stage 5 as a treat for tomorrow morning.

Phil, I most certainly was: PRL100 wk2 Day 4 workout. 1min on at 450w and 1:15 off at 215w, I think. Ten times! Almost lost the will with that one.

Workout finished at turn 4, so carried on to the top and gained the wheels. Always finish a climb + 50m at effort I was once told by a bloke who used to destroy me in my youth.

Day off Zwift today for my birthday meal (46). Pretzel on Saturday at some point for ToW.

Btw nice time Phil.

Wow! If you can ‘just’ manage that for 6 hours you’d win Paris Roubaix.

Doesn’t help that I’m 20kg heavier than the pros. I’d say that I was quicker, or had the potential to be, when I was in my twenties. Being clueless about training, and having found alcohol and girls at uni RUINED IT ALL!!!!…………

If someone could just get on with developing rejuvenation technology I could live my dream, instead of facing 50 in a few short years and a downhill spiral ;-P

Another TdW Stage 4 ride here. What everyone else up there said about turning yourself inside out.

Decided to see what the pointy end of the race was like, so set off with the fast guys. Was jockeying for 1st for the first 8km, then any talent I may have started to run out. It’s horrible to see a group ride away from you slowly, when there is bugger all you can do about it.

Settled in to a small group of following riders and happily* maintaining 380w for the rest of the ride. Little sprint at the end to grab 19th. I was putting out around 1000w from 250m to go, but two others just rode past me.

Took quite a while to recover from that one. Also recovering from a head cold. Just wish the gunge would go away and I could stop blowing my nose.

Final time was 41:39

ZP says I had the highest average power for the event at 397w. At least I’m now down to a steady 93kg.

*really struggled

Also in the 8pm ToW Stage 3 last night. Set off round the volcano at too high a pace really, due to setting off from the line later than most due to my HRM not being recognised. Gave up on the tech and started to play catchup.

Zwift wasn’t telling me what position I was in, or the other riders around me in the ride, so a lot of guess work as to pace. Started the jungle loop with a reasonably fast group, who kept on surging. Probably a good warmup for the climb though.

Started the big hill with 350w in my head, which by turn 10 was 370-380w. Managed to hold pace steady all the way to turn 1 (with the odd surge around a few of the hairpins) with 500m to go I decided to raise the effort and was peaking over 550w for about 200m, before I had to drop back to a sensible pace (slow).

I like the fact there are always people to use as targets to catch on a climb like that. Definitely passed a lot more people on the second half of the climb. Ended up with a AdZ time of 49:13 which was a few minutes faster than my previous best.

Crossed the line, and Zwift decided to show me everyone around, so spent a good part of the descent giving ride-ons due to not being able to on the way up.

Tour of Fire and Ice time was 1:12:18 and ZP has me in 34th place. For a heavy bloke that makes me very happy.

I really should start my RideLondon training, but I have a lot of fun on these events.

Also did Stage 2 last night (8pm). Getting over a cold which wiped me out on Tuesday.

Originally thinking I’ll just bimble round. Connection issues on the laptop meant I had to quickly swap to the phone with 30 seconds to the start. A bit flustered I set off from the back of the field and sat at about 320-350w for a few mins to make up a few places and find a group I was happy with.

Started watching Netflix to pass the time as the screen on the phone is so small. The turbo was a little noisy, so I jumped off, retrieved my headphones from the office, and set off again. In almost last place again. Couldn’t be having that, so set off on a bit of a mission. After the climb upto the ruins I was in 135th. Then spent the loop jumping groups, sometimes pulling others with me, sometimes TTing.

By the end of the loop I was in 103rd and 15 seconds behind one rider, and 10 seconds ahead of the next. Tried to pick up the pace a bit to catch the guy in front, but made no headway after a couple of minutes, so settled into a pace.

With 3km to go I was joined by two others (couldn’t see their gap on the phone easily) and there was a bit of cat and mouse to the line. We did catch one other guy on the way in. Outsprinted in the last 100m by one of the catchers, but kept 103rd in the end.

Happy with 45m 14secs when including a brief stop (maybe 30 seconds), and having to play catchup twice.

Average power for the ride to sky route was 308w.

Nice pace, around 310-320w from the start, with a couple of surges, following others who were just faster. Turn 6 started to bite, and the hardest bit mentally was after turn 1.

Legs are still tired from the FTP test and ZSUN A ride and that ascent topped it off. A couple of days off should sort that though. I’ll definitely revisit the Alpe, if only to get my Tron bike quicker. 51% of the way there. All workouts will be heading up, up, up I think.

53 minutes 40 secs up the Alpe. OMG that was long, but fun. Maybe on a less rapid ride I’ll have a bit of a look around.

Spotted the squirrel too.

My FTP increase was definitely mostly to do with knowing how hard I could push myself after doing the 4wk FTP Booster workouts.

Couple of days off now to visit friends, and grab some calories back.

@Weeksy Great work on the weight. I’ll be happy with being 90kg in 4 months from 94kg now.

Joined a ZSUN A ride last night taking in Box Hill and Fox Hill. There are some properly fast climbers out there. I did OK, setting a couple of PBs climbing at over 400w (7m 30sec for Box Hill I think) , but there were at least 3 guys who just rode away and were over a minute and a half ahead.

Spent a lot of time yo-yoing out the front and then to the back of the group. Is there a particular technique you guys use to avoid this?

Looks like the Alpe du Zwift is live too. May have to have a look. The Four Horsemen route in particular looks brutal, but the Tour of Fire and Ice could be quite nice.

The RideLondon 100 training plan is up too, so thats my next 16 weeks planned, although looking at the workouts I may have to add in a few longer outdoor rides.

Good job I don’t race (yet).

I’m sure that in a race I’d be rubbish as I have no idea about tactics, and can’t stop yo-yoing when trying to catch a draft.

That’s a colossal power increase in what seems to be a very short time and a whopping FTP. How are you measuring it?

All measured via my Tacx Vortex bought just before Christmas – regularly calibrated. I’m not saying that it is accurate by any means, but I’m using it as way to see if I have improved. As I said that was my first proper FTP test, rather than just setting it in Zwift events. I’d only previously performed FTHR tests, and I never managed to get anywhere near what I did on the trainer (10bpm difference at least). I guess without the distraction of trying to avoid being cleaned up by a car I was able to bury myself deeper. The last minute was absolute torture, and the last 10 seconds were throwing up territory. I did find that my recovery was relatively quicker than I expected though.

Edit: I don’t mean to sound dubious, but a 400w ftp is up around pro level. It’s about what Alex Dowsett put out for his hour record in May 2015. I guess you probably weigh a little more though.

I’d be dubious that I could maintain that for an solid hour, which makes the FTP figure a bit of a joke. Maybe I’ll have to try it one day. I’m just under 94kg at the moment, but am 6ft 4 so it’s spread out. I suspect that Alex has a better w/kg than me, plus he’ll be less of a wind-brake. Apparently I leave quite a large hole in the air for people to draft in.

@jk501 Nice!

Well I decided to avoid an endurance ride and rest day on the 4wk FTP Booster and went straight to the last workout – The dreaded FTP test.

First a slight disclaimer that I have never taken one of these tests with a power meter, only on the road to find out my FTHR. Any FTP values in Zwift have been obtained on Watopia Mountain, usually in an event.

Aim was to sit at a steady 380w for the 20 minutes (like in my previous post), but I couldn’t find a suitable gear. It was either 340w or 390-420w @95-100rpm. So I ended up trying to maintain 400w. Good God that was hard work. The first 10 minutes were manageable, and I was feeling reasonable. At 15 minutes it was starting to hurt and the HR was climbing into the 170s. At 18 minutes the real mental battle started and the power dropped into the high 300s for a while. With one minute to go I just shut my eyes to avoid seeing how long I had left, and pushed as hard. I think I hit 460w at one point.

The result? An increase from 346w to 392w. Absolutely astounded! I can barely walk, my legs are like jelly

Next goal is RideLondon 100, so swapping to more endurance based riding now and hopefully lose a few kg in the process. Just in time for the new mountain to be released. I may even ride outside!

Looks like that workout does not follow the same rules then. Cheers for looking.

In the workout I was following ERG mode was controlling the wattage for the buildup. When I started the free ride section it changed the resistance according to the terrain.

Forgive me if I’m climbing the wrong tree here. If I select the ERG mode button (I assume it’s a button in the companion) the resistance will change back to being constant in the free ride section and I just change gears to get to the required wattage?

I have a Tacx Vortex, but didn’t realise that was possible. How do I do that in Zwift as I’m in a workout?

Last night was the week 3 10 minutes best effort workout from the 4wk FTP booster for me.

After setting a new ftp on Sunday the lead up was that little bit harder, but went into the main effort feeling good.

The aim was to maintain 380w for the first 9 minutes then empty myself in the last minute. Didn’t quite work out like that…

All ready to set up and found that I’d left the laptop charger at work, so had to download the Zwift app to my phone.

Didn’t really think about route due to the faf and ended up on Watopia figure 8. I’d normally try to pick a route with the mountain to climb. There are a lot of kicks on the section where the test section started. Not ideal when trying to set a maximum steady effort.

Constant changing of gears throughout the ride to try to maintain a decent average at a reasonably steady cadence was putting me off. For every little downhill I felt I had to put a bit more effort in to raise the average again. Peaked at 684w at one point after a section at 282w.

Looking on Strava today shows a new 10 minute average of 423w. No wonder I could hardly stand after getting off the bike. If I could maintain that for 20 minutes my FTP would be over 400w.

Two more workouts before the FTP test. I’ll be picking the route very carefully this time (Alpe du Zwift may be ideal for this), and not using Zwift on a 4 inch screen. Aiming for 380w average again.

In’t Zwift fun?

@Tiger6791 – It’s always when you least expect/plan it.

@zokes I’m happy to be corrected, but from what I understand you will need the 4k Apple TV, and only two Bluetooth (not sure about ANT+) sensors can be linked at a time. To get round that you need the Zwift companion app on a phone and link the additional sensors to that.

Looking to go down this route too.

I’m on a 2013 MacBook Pro 13″ and it runs OK at Medium resolution, but goes to pieces on high.