A week to go.

Well this time next week I'll be off and riding the Vaujany Master. Hopefully by then I'll be excited instead of nervous.
I've just had 10 nights out in Spain and as you can see I took my hydration very seriously. I really relaxed and enjoyed myself and only put 4 lbs on despite the all inclusive loveliness. It was great not thinking about cycling 24/7.

37 days and counting.

From today I have 37 days until I ride the Vaujany Master - the number of training days is much less at 20 days.

The reason for the difference is we already had 11 nights in Spain booked before entering the Vaujany and obviously there are a number of days lost due to travelling to France. In Spain I'm intending to have 6 days were I don't think about the bike or training and even have a few drinks (not touched a drop this year yet), but I'll be eating sensibly and keeping to a more protein based diet but obviously I'll avoid Spanish steaks just in case I need a dope test!!! The rest of the time in Spain I'll be doing some gentle training more to maintain my fitness than anything else. Once I get home I'll have three days before we set off for France via Poole so I intend to do a long ride on the Sunday and then two days of recovery riding before heading off.

So how have things been going since my last post?

Well I'm now under 15 stone and enjoying the benefits of a lighter frame both on and off the bike.

I've been buying new clothes for Spain as the ones I had for my last trip out there in September are way too big - no more X's on my shorts now and I'm hoping I'll need another shopping spree before Turkey in September to buy some medium shorts. I've also been able to buy fitted shirts from H&M and am amazed by how good I look in them compared to the baggy clothes that I've been hiding in.

On the bike the weight loss has made a huge difference to my climbing especially. I'm riding up climbs I used to try and avoid all costs for fun these days, I'm even starting to enjoy climbing to some extent. My fitness is also amazing me as my recovery from hard efforts is so much quicker than before but the down side to that is that I have to dig way deeper on the harder efforts now to get the work out - dizziness and feeling sick have become my friend.

Last Sunday I rode the Wight Riveria Sportive which at 169km with 2200m of climbing is the hardest ride I've done since returning to cycling. I have to be honest in that it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be and I was really surprised to be overtaking other cyclists on some of the climbs who had the appearance of being more suited to climbing than me. Even though I had some legs soreness the following two days it was nowhere near what I used to suffer from and after 48 hours had settled right down.

I'm confident with the distance of Vaujany now but the great unknown is still the climbing so I'm going to be concentrating on this in the remaining training days I have. The climbs out there are much longer than what I have to train on so I have to work extra hard on the hills available to me.

Finally I've made some changes to the bike by fitting the SRAM Climbers Kit. This means that I have a 34x32 bottom gear now so can use this to keep my legs spinning rather than trying to push a big gear. I did notice on the Isle of Wight that by using this gear I can keep my heart rate really low.

I'll try and keep the blog updated more often as we get nearer the day.

April's Challenge

Well April is nearly upon us and signifies the start of the hill training part of my Vaujany Master preparation.

In January having a target of 400 miles to aim for helped keep the training fresh and my head in the right place so in April I have set myself the target of riding 1319 kilometres.

Why 1319 km you may ask, we'll if you take into account five of the most famous Spring Classics you arrive at this figure as below:

Milan - San Remo 298km
Tour of Flanders 256km
Paris - Roubaix 257km
Liege - Bastogne - Liege 257km
Amstel Gold 251km

I'm intending to do all this out on the road and not include turbo training miles but that's reliant on us having a spring.

Fit and 40

This Saturday I reach the milestone of my 40th birthday and I'm in much better shape than I was on my 30th birthday both physically and mentally.

The past month has involved longer rides than I've ridden before in my second coming as a cyclist and this past weekend I did the most climbing I've done this time around. The thing that surprised me the most is that my legs were fine it was issues with my back that were the main issue.

I'm now under 16 stone too which probably goes some way to explaining the small but significant improvement in my ability to suffer on the climbs.

Today I have completed my third threshold test of this training plan and again I have seen some good improvements.

Along with the weight loss my FTP (Functional Threshold Power) has increased by a further 8 Watts so that's an increase of 19 Watts since I started committed training. The loss of weight has also helped my power to weight ratio to increase by 1.16 Watts/Kg - I'm hoping for the same improvement again before France.

A big thanks to everyone who has sponsored me so far in raising money for the North West Ambulance by riding Vaujany Master but if you haven't sponsored me yet please do so by clicking HERE.

2012 Specialized Body Geometry S-Works Road Shoes

I've done about 2000 miles in these shoes since I got them and as I've never done a review before I thought these would make a good first subject.

The first thing you notice about these shoes when you pick them up is how light they are (that is until you fit Speedplay cleats to them), Specialized claim that they weigh around the 520g mark for a pair.

The uppers are made of a material called Micromatrix which despite the patent leather/shiny plastic appearance is a comfortably soft but tough material and I haven't suffered much scuffing. This material also has the advantage of being easy to wipe clean after the usual British summer ride. The mesh panels are highly breathable and keep the temperature down during the rare hot summer days but the down side of that is the they let in water and cold air when the weather isn't so nice. Compared to other shoes I tried on these did feel a bit minimalist to be honest and less inviting for your your foot but as you appreciate how comfortable they actually are as your ride goes on.

The shoes use 2 Boa S1-M closures for tailoring the fit to your foot - there is no putting these in the oven to mould to your feet. The Boa's work in a very simple way - turn them one way to tighten and the other way to loosen and for each click they pull in a couple of millimetres of cable. I have heard of people complaining that they have broken the dials but I've had no issues whatsoever with them. I do find that if you tighten the upper closure too tight it can dig into your foot and Specialized have move the location of the dials on the 2013 shoes.

The soles are high modulus, unidirectional carbon fibre and are very, very stiff - they're not shoes that you'd want to walk far in. The soles have the 3 bolt cleat pattern to accept Shimano SPD-SL, Time and Look cleats and also Speedplay cleats with an adaptor kit. There is a mesh vent in the sole under the toes and the heel is replaceable should you wear it out. Insoles are the BG+ High Performance foot bed featuring a 'metatarsal button' which is ridge running down the centre to help support the foot and I've certainly not experienced any hot spots on long rides with these shoes.

£200 may seem a lot of money for a pair of shoes but compared with the likes of Sidi they are extremely good value and with them being stiff, light and comfortable what else could you want?

Progress

Well it's been a successful January.

Since I started my training at the start of December I have lost 16lbs in weight (as of the end of January).

My Functional Threshold Power (the maximum power I can produce for an hour) has increased by 11 Watts and the combination weight loss and FTP has led to my power to weight ratio doubling.

All in all I spent 23 hours and 55 minutes training in January.

So I have gone from looking like this in September 2012.

To looking like this in February 2013 (those are the jeans I wore on the above holiday.

A full week on the turbo

With the crap weather we're suffering from at the moment this weeks training has entirely been indoors but its a week I've enjoyed. I know last week I mentioned that turbo training is boring - well I might have found an answer - TrainerRoad.

So what is TrainerRoad? Basically its a piece of software that you load onto your laptop and using an ANT+ cadence sensor (I'm using a Garmin GSC 10), ANT+ heartrate monitor belt and an ANT+ USB stick (again from Garmin) it works out your virtual power. That's not all though as there are workouts that you can download on-line that you can do and you get live heart rate and cadence displayed on screen as you work out. The workouts are based on power so by entering the turbo trainer you are using TrainerRoad uses the turbo's power curve to work out virtual power so you have to keep to the virtual power levels as instructed in the workout.

I appreciate that the power measurements are virtual but if you use the same tyre pressure and tension of the roller against the wheel then you'll get repeatable results as you have ironed out the variables. By completing a threshold test first, TrainerRoad will calculate your FTP (Functional Threshold Power) and use this for your workouts.

This does cost $10 a month but there are plenty of work outs and training plans to keep you busy and the boredom at bay.

Have a look at the video below if I haven't explained it very well.

So with a weeks worth of training how do I feel I have done? Firstly I've been working on cadence and FTP intervals this week and I'm spinning the pedals much better now although it has engaged other muscles so I'm aching in new places but this will make my pedal stroke much more efficient. Interestingly I have also noticed an increase in speed compared to pain levels and I'm enjoying the flood of lactate acid into my legs.

All in all its been a great week of very hard training but I can see progress along with the weight I am losing. This week is a recovery week to let my body get used to the increase in training so I'm off swimming on Tuesday and then have a 45 minute ride scheduled on Wednesday (or an equivalent turbo session) and two 2 hour rides for Saturday and Sunday (or turbo sessions again) so I'm going to enjoy the rest starting with the Spurs v Man U game this afternoon.