Century Training Series: Days 26, 27, 28, and 29 (Week 4 Re-Cap)
Day 26 – I was traveling out of town so this day is an off day.
Day 27 – A 3 hour endurance pace ride was scheduled for Day 27 but it had to be canceled due to severe thunderstorms. I had no desire to get caught in heavy rains, hail or lightening.
Day 28 – This was supposed to be a 1.5 hour endurance pace ride but I ended up only doing 1 hour. I could have easily done the 1.5 hours but decided to take it easy and only do the 1 hour (more on why below). Here are the numbers:
- Total Time (h:m): 1:00
- Total Distance: 15.1 miles
- Avg Speed: 15.1 mph
Week 4 Re-cap
I have to be honest and say that I was very disappointed in my performance this past week. I struggled on the bike all week and it really showed in my measurements and mileage. Why did I struggle?
- I was lethargic. I felt really, really tired all week and even thought I might have been getting sick in the first part of the week. My legs were very heavy on every ride and even though my time/distance/avg speed numbers were there I didn’t feel like I was performing well.
- I was uncomfortable in the saddle. I got to the point on my Thursday ride last week that I had to quit after only about 30 minutes in the saddle. I was just too uncomfortable in my nether regions and couldn’t ride more than a few minutes without having to stand on the pedals to take pressure off. I have been riding enough over the last year that I shouldn’t be having problems like that so I was very frustrated. Like an idiot I had stopped using chamois cream a couple of months ago because I didn’t think I needed it for these short rides. Turns out I was wrong and after having that driven home by @331miles and @gtinla I picked up some Paceline Chamois BUTTr
this weekend and it made a world of difference on my Sunday evening one-hour ride.
- Repeating Weeks 1 and 2 may have been a mistake. If you remember I started the 10-week Century Training Plan two weeks early and did Weeks 1 and 2 twice. This may have been an error because if I had followed the normal 10-week plan I would have had two rest days last week. Because I re-started the plan after two-weeks I missed out on that extra rest day and that could have contributed to me feeling really drained last week.
- My diet sucks. I’m trying hard on my diet but it’s not good enough right now. I’m still finding myself opting for a quick take-out meal several times a week because it seems like too much of a pain to fix food after my evening ride. Sometimes I may not get back home until 8:30 PM from my ride and by the time I take a shower and cook dinner it’s already 9:30 or 10. I need a way to make this process simpler and I’m thinking I need to prepare meals ahead of time or at least buy foods that are easy to fix (I’m not talking about prepared foods). One thing I started doing, instead of cooking chicken on the stove, was to buy a roasted chicken and de-bone it. That gives me plenty of pre-cooked chicken that I can eat throughout the week. The problem with that is that I’m eating too much chicken right now. I absolutely love chicken but I need to get some variation such as meats and fish. I’m open to any ideas/suggestions in this area.
Here are the mileage numbers for this week:
- Total Duration (h:m): 3:30
- Total Miles: 54
- Avg Speed: 15.4 mph
My measurements for this week saw little to no change. My neck and chest saw no change with my biceps decreasing by a quarter inch each and my thighs and calves increasing in size. My weight was also up four pounds from the last time I weighed myself. Overall I’m disappointed in my measurements but I’m not surprised after how I felt last week and with the decreased mileage. I can’t let it get me down though and need to continue pushing.
If you haven’t noticed I added new page to the blog called Century Training Tracker. This is where you can see some graphical representation of my mileage and measurements.
Summary
If you can’t tell I’m facing some challenges in my training right now. Namely my diet and a battle against fatigue. I can impact them both though and it just takes a little will power to do so. I used the word ‘training’ just a couple of sentences ago and I probably need to use it more often because that is what I’m doing right now. I’m training for a century ride and that means I need to stick the plan to be able to realize my end goal.
Thanks to all my readers for the great support.
Read MoreCentury Training Series: Days 23, 24 and 25
Like I said in my last Century Training Series post I’m only going to be posting about my century training on Monday’s and Thursdays. Reading about my training is probably boring enough as it is but asking you to do it everyday would be like me asking you to sit through reruns of Al Trautwig doing Tour de France commentary on Versus. I wouldn’t wish that on my worst enemy. Today’s re-cap will cover Days 23, 24 and 25.
Day 23 – 1.5 Hour Overall Endurance with 4×8 Intervals
I’m finally getting the hang of the intervals and actually enjoy doing them. With the 9 mile (or so) loop around White Rock Lake I can get two eight minute intervals in per lap with each followed by an eight minute recovery. I haven’t felt too great over the last few days and it kind of showed in my workout because I wasn’t able to ride the intervals too hard. I probably averaged about 17-17.5 mph on each interval and 13 mph during the recovery. My last interval was pretty good but I had to deal with a big Hummer that was in front of me that couldn’t pass a rider it was following. That caused me to slow down a couple of times but I was able to pick my speed back up soon after. The numbers were:
Total Time (h:m): 1:30
Total Distance: 23.21 miles
Avg Speed: 15.47 mph
My biggest problem on this ride was my new bibs or rather my discomfort in my new bibs. After an hour I was totally uncomfortable with what felt like some rubbing around the edge of the chamois. Even though these new bibs are much lighter than my old ones (and the chamois isn’t as dense) I’m not totally convinced the problem is the bibs. I’m sure they still need to get broken in but I think the real problem is my gargantuan size buttocks (it’s funnier if you say that in your best Forest Gump impersonation). With my super-sized rear, combined with the new bibs, I believe I need to take a close look at my saddle. The saddle I have is a Vetta Lite Gel and is the original that came with my bike 15 years ago. If would probably come as no surprise either that I had half as much rear then as I do now. I’ve put off looking for a new saddle for quite a while but think I may need to give it a shot again. I say again because I attempted to get my sit bones measured at a Trek store in Jacksonville, FL last year and the employee couldn’t figure out how to work the fit board. This is going to have to be a priority for me next week. If you have suggestions I’m all ears.
Day 24 – 1 Hour Endurance
I was really surprised to get this ride in because it was threatening rain all day. It actually turned out quite nice but was humid again. Luckily I remembered my headband today and didn’t have to deal with sweat in my eyes like Day 23. I did a quick 15 minute warm up and then settled into a nice and steady 15-16 mph pace for an hour. This is a very simple ride that should have been pretty easy but, again, I really felt like my legs were heavy. They’ve felt that way for that last several rides. I maintained the pace for an hour but I just think it was harder than it should have been. The numbers were:
Total Time (h:m): 1:00
Total Distance: 15.64 miles
Avg Speed: 15.64 mph
It was Wednesday so there were several large “packs” of riders out at White Rock Lake today. I was passed several times by groups with six or more riders and saw a few guys outfitted in matching kits. I didn’t get a close look so I don’t know if they were part of team or not. Maybe they just enjoyed dressing alike so they could bask in their poserness (is that a word?). Lots of Cevelo TT bike sightings the last two rides too. Kinda weird.
I almost witnessed a pretty bad wreck too. It was only avoided by pure luck of the lady who was cut off…by her son. I was done with the hour long endurance ride and was slowly spinning back to my car. A lady was riding a road bike in front of me with her son (maybe 10?) on a mountain bike on her right. For whatever reason her son decided to move from her right all the way to the left side of the road by cutting in front of her. As the situation unfolded in front of me I was really surprised Mom didn’t end up flat on the pavement. As the son cut across her front wheel she slowed and turned to the right to avoid clipping his rear wheel and barely manged to get her right foot un-clipped and on the ground otherwise it would have been ugly. I slowed and asked if she was OK and she said yes and that they were still learning. I’m just glad she didn’t smack the asphalt and that there weren’t any riders coming in the opposite direction because he went all the way to the left side of the road. Hope he learned a lesson.
Day 25 – 1.5 Hour Overall Endurance with 4×8 Intervals
Today was a terrible day on the bike. Five minutes into the ride I knew it wasn’t right. The last several rides my discomfort in the saddle had been steadily getting worse and today I had had enough. I did one loop of White Rock Lake, even tried one interval, and had to call it quits. I couldn’t ride more than a couple of minutes without having to stand up off the saddle or try and adjust my shorts.
Something just isn’t right with either my shorts or saddle. I’m leaning towards the saddle because I’ve worn a different pair of bibs or shorts each of the last three days with the same discomfort.
Not how I wanted to go into the weekend.
Read MoreHow to make 2 million dollars in the bike industry
This guest post was written by Jeremy Smith (@jeremybsmith). Currently a web strategist for several industries, including bicycles, outdoor, architecture and planning, and apparel, Jeremy has been in and out of the bike industry for over a decade, with experience at the shop, vendor, and brand levels. I became acquainted with Jeremy last week after publishing my post on The Fleecing of Cyclists. Because of his experience I asked him to write a guest post from the industry perspective and he graciously accepted. Thanks Jeremy.
A little about me and bikes. I’ve been working in and around the bike industry for over 10 years, on the both the retail and corporate side of affairs. I’ve also been a plain old bike consumer, struggling with pricing and value.
It costs a lot of money to make the niche products that we consume as cyclists as a manufacturer, brand, or vendor. There simply isn’t the volume there to drive down wholesale costs enough to the level of other consumer goods. There’s always going to be the floor of wholesale pricing which is the cost of materials, labor, lights, rent, and so on for the manufacturer.
Before I get too far into the specifics of the bike industry, let’s talk general consumer goods retail and pricing. The model varies, but if you take out the razor/cartridge and printer/ink nonsense, in general, when you go into a store, you are going to pay 2x what the store paid for the item. That 100% mark-up is there to pay people, rent, utilities, other marginal costs, and finally, to make a profit. That profit is the incentive to have the store in the first place, and for a sole proprietor of any store, that is their salary. Corporate chains obviously have more diverse structures, but do a lot more volume to make up for the increased cost of infrastructure. Online is always cheaper because there’s less of the people, rent, utilities, etc to pay.
Now, what about how much the store is paying for the item? That’s usually going to be 2x what it cost (in general, there’s tremendous variability in what goes into wholesale prices) to make the widget, including materials, labor, infrastructure, and transport costs.
The most expensive and flexible cost on both sides is people. Materials are fixed cost. There’s not much that any one company can do to drive down the price of raw inputs. However, infrastructure gets cheaper with scale, and labor can currently be found for less, somewhere. There are also gains in cost to be had if cheaper materials are used, or less materials, or both. This creates the “race to the bottom”. Consumers start getting hooked on paying less for less quality, and things just spiral down from there.
Back to bikes.
Our industry is small. A lot of the better products are made by tiny companies, meaning no discount for scale. Most of the products are made in ethical manufacturing factories by fairly well paid employees (whoops, there goes another potential way to make cheaper stuff) and from better raw inputs (well, there goes another way to save money).
So we can’t make stuff cost much less for shops to buy, to sell to you. Once it’s in the shop, each widget needs to pay its way out the door. In other words, the store needs to recover what they paid for it, what it cost to stock it, put it inventory, order it, and for the person installing it on your bike to take it off the shelf and either hand it to you, or install it. It also needs to pay for all the people that come in and ask a question and get a free answer to a question, or tried on something that they bought online, or test rode a bike to figure out their size for craigslist. It also needs to pay for other inventory that has to be sold on clearance for whatever reason. All those things we’ve all bought at 50% off wound up netting nothing for the store.
Basics aside, let’s talk about the things that seem to really irritate the average rider. $8000 bikes and $120 jerseys. I see the big dollar bikes the same way I see expensive cars. It’s nice that someone can make a machine that good. It’s not hurting me that it exists. Maybe I’ll even own a second hand version of one eventually. In the meantime, people dropping that much cash means that I can walk down the street, grab a tube, and chat with some bike people. The really pricey stuff is a bit of a strawman when it comes to arguing pricing. Getting angry that someone bought that $10k pinarello is about as futile as hanging out by the BMW dealership and hollering at the people driving off in new 7-series. Ain’t worth it.
The advantage of such amazing stuff at the high end, is that sooner or later it is replaced by something yet more amazing, and pushed down the line. Meaning, a $500 mountain bike these days is better than what I used to race on, and is probably better than 99% of what was available 10 years ago, or even 5. The low end of Campagnolo’s product line is as good as Record from 4 or 5 years ago. Trickle down is nice.
On the clothing side, yes, the good stuff costs money. It will also last, with care, a very long time. I’ve just started replacing my first batch of real jerseys over the last 2 years that I bought in the mid-90s. Shorts are more personal. I get about 5 years out of a pair, assuming I wear them once a week. It really comes down to cost per wear.
There’s still your choice of craigslist, ebay, goodwill, garage sales, and nashformance if you’re still looking to get really frugal about it. The first 5 years of my riding career I rode pretty all clearance and used gear. I still do buy a lot on clearance. Used is always cheaper.
I’ll throw out two more options:
If everything is too expensive, vote with your dollars, and don’t buy it. You can ride in whatever you want, on whatever you want. No-one’s stopping you. It’s all about horses for courses. Riding the local MUP doesn’t require anything more than a yard sale 10-speed. Cat-1 racing ostensibly requires full kit and a racier bike, but I’m willing to bet a good cat-1 rider is still gonna place even on that 10-speed in street clothes. There’s a few hardcore holdouts in Marin county tearing it up on old Schwinns in hiking boots and cut-off 501s.
If you feel that the industry is out to get you with the pricing structure, prove us wrong. Build a company, set up a factory (or use an existing one, but I personally would rather you open a state-side factory), market your product, and undersell those rich fatcats over Castelli or Specialized. Again, no-one’s going to stop you, in fact, people will probably encourage you to jump into the fray.
I’ll conclude with a couple of sayings from the industry:
- “Cheap, light, strong. Pick 2.”
- “Want to make a million in the bike industry? Start with two million.”
Read MoreJeremy will be out of the country for the next couple of weeks with limited Internet access but wanted me to pass along that he’ll take five or six good questions/points for a follow-up post.
Century Training Series: Days 19 and 20
Day 19 – Rest Day
Day 20 – Today the century training plan called for a two hour endurance pace ride. I was anxious to ride so I could try out my new bibs.
I was up and at the trail riding away from my car at about 8:30. While putting my bike together I saw many cyclists riding up and down the trail so it looked like it might be a busy day. Upon setting out I noticed an immediate difference with the new bibs. I picked up the Performance Ultra II at the local performance store and was happy so far. We’ll see how it feels 2 hours from now.
Once the warm up was complete I settled into my 15 mph pace and felt really good. I didn’t ride yesterday so my legs felt fresh and I easily maintained the set pace even on the hills. I again stayed in the small chain ring to keep my cadence high and it felt good. I completed three full loops of White Rock Lake plus a little extra to get my 2 hours in.
The ride wasn’t without a problem though. I was sitting at a stop light getting ready to do the last couple of miles to my car and only needed a few seconds to complete the two hour ride. Once the light turned green I got up to speed, checked my computer and pulled it off when it rolled over to 2 hours and tucked it into my jersey pocket. Not ten seconds later my rear wheel didn’t feel right so I take a look and it’s nearly flat.
I pull over into some shade to change it. I get the tube out, find the hole and check the my tire in the same location and find a small cut. I’m guessing it was cut by a piece of glass at the stop light. Bummer. I pulled out a new tube, used the dollar bill I keep in my seat bag as a boot and pumped up my tire. It wasn’t perfect but it would be good enough to get me to my car.
Guess how many people asked if I was OK? Zero. Earlier in my ride I pulled over to take a picture of a house and I hadn’t been stopped 30 seconds when the first person by me, a girl, asked if I needed help. I was really amazed. This time though, when it was very obvious I had had a flat and was repairing it, I was passed by no less than 20-30 riders and not a one said a word. Did I have everything under control? Sure I did because I’m prepared for this kind of stuff when I ride. What if it was a noob instead who didn’t know what to do and everyone of those riders just simply rode by without so much as a simple inquiry as to if they needed anything.
How were the bibs? Pretty good. I did start to feel a little discomfort after the two hours but nothing like my old bibs. I think I just need to get them broken in and they’ll feel pretty good.
Here are the numbers for today:
Total Time (h:m): 2:00
Total Distance: 30.5 miles
Avg Speed: 15.2 mph
Why I’ll be a Team Radio Shack Fan
If you’re a cycling fan, and not living under a rock, you’ve probably heard by now that Lance Armstrong’s new cycling team will be Team Radio Shack (@teamradioshack). I for one was very surprised to hear that it was someone other than Oracle or Nike. Now that we know it’s Radio Shack I can honestly say I’m a fan but probably not for the reason you expect.
Sure, Lance is going to be on the team and that’s a great reason to be a fan. Radio Shack will partner with the LAF and LiveStrong in the fight against cancer which is another great reason to be a fan. The real reason I’ll be a fan though is because of my Dad.
My Dad was an electronics genius. He learned the trade at an early age and held several jobs that saw him develop his skills including installing electrical systems on airplanes and performing electronics work on Minuteman Missiles. When I was a kid he had his own business installing satellite tv systems. As a hobby he was a Citizens Band (CB) and Ham Radio expert. He rarely bought new radios but choose instead to either build his own or repair broken ones he would find at flea markets or garage sales.
So, what does my Dad and Team Radio Shack have in common? My Dad was a loyal Radio Shack customer. If he needed parts or tools for a radio or CB he would go to our local Radio Shack store. When Radio Shack would receive returned electronics that were broken, and not covered by warranty, who did they call? My Dad.
Image Courtesy of TeamRadioShack.com
One of the big things going on right now is speculation on who will be on the team. We know Lance will be there but who will be his support cast? I’ve already heard rumors of Cadel Evans on Twitter. Who would you like to see on Team Radio Shack? I bet we see Chris Horner on there. Read More
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