introduction & provisional time trial

kamil1891

Hi all,

So,

Firstly, I will more or less introduce myself... be prepared that I'll give you as much detail as possible so everything is clear and comprehensive.

I know I will sound very amateur and to some of you like an idiot wanting to "show off" or whatever you like, but I don't mean that and I'm just looking for some advice and to share some statistical data with you I'm pretty anonymous here so I don't think I have to be embarassed :P

I'm very ambitious about this sport and I love it, therefore I evaluated every step I've taken from the beginning. Although I have been riding since May/June, in my amateur's opinion I have built my endurance and power quite quickly to a reasonable level (however, I have ridden mtb bikes my entire life, but I had a break for about 3-4years when I moved to the UK and now I've got it seriously - I'm almost 20 at the moment). I know averages are a little bit "chidish" topic But I'm still a child so, let's move on ... To backup my statement, not far ago I've managed my furthest distance of 220km (136m) with an average of 33km/h (~21mp/h), mainly flat. My usual rides include a lot of climbing and the distance between 30-170km where I average around 30km/h (19mp/h). Obviously, much more than that on short flatter loops and minimum of 26km/h on the longer distances with thousands feets of ascent and the inevitable wind

But, I didn't want to write so much about that... I want to get prepared as much as possible to be competitive in races that will start in the following season. I also thought of doing some time trials but I'm a little bit worried about my back. My position overall is quite racey as I think my bike is on the acceptable lower end size. I'm 190cm and my bike is 57cm, 140mm stem, on significant saddle setback and about 15cm sadle to bars drop (Bike fitted by Paul Hewitt). I cannot get in the drops for more than 10minutes...

I will start racing whatever you tell me because I've set myself a challenge to get into cat2 in one season (not knowing what is the cat4 like personally!) but I also would like to get into time trialling. At the moment I'm not able to afford a time trial bike and I would not buy it unless I give it a go on a road bike However, I cannot find any flat short courses that would not be divided by traffic lights or bigger hills so I tried rollers to do my first provisional time trial
Just to add, before on rollers my training usually consisted of very high rpm 130/140 various gears but not high, 5kms for each until i get 40km for e.g. I wasn't able to get a "out of this world" time and I thought that anything above 40km/h is quite unachievable.

The result, to my suprise was - 21km with ave of 52.9km/h. On aluminium rollers on bike with 25mm tyes with no wind either ways. No stopping and no corners. My question is how much different is resistance on the rollers than on the road, and how would my attempt reflect in the real race situation? Is there any potential for a competitive time? Obviously from today I will commence longer distances and higher gears + additional ressistance on rollers to my "time trial" training but I'm still interested whether there is any point ?

Have you also got any training tips for me? The only thing I know I have to do is to find a chaingang with good prospects, but I fail so far. Even clubs don't seem to be interested in more serious riding as I've called a few and they usually offered to pop into a pub in the late evening for a "discussion".... but I want to ride, not drink! I've quit all alcohol and I've lost from 86kg to 77kg (I'm 190cm) since I took up road cycling.

And the main question is, am I over ambitious? Or should I focus on something different for now...

Ok, enough bullsh@te (to some of you), I've been told today to start writing an essay for macroeconomics, not a post on forum that lasts forever


PS. Thanks in advance to everyone that will understand me or were in my position before

simon_e

AidanR wrote:

Unless you are training hard for something specific, and need every little performance boost you can get, my advice would be to stay away from "sports nutrition". Eat real food - plants and meat. If it comes in a pack and has more than about 3 ingredients, it's not food. If it is advertised as healthy, it's not food. Actual food doesn't need fancy packaging and advertising to tell you what it is.

I agree.

Having asked around and looked at this subject at length I have concluded that sports recovery products are useful if you're really hitting the turbo / racing on consecutive days; otherwise it's money wasted (though if it makes you happy you could argue it's not entirely wasted).

AidanR wrote:

If we're talking satiation of macronutrients, don't neglect fat. Protein may be king for satiety per calorie, but fat ain't far behind. Carbohydrate is a poor third, and that includes so-called healthy wholegrains, not just the obvious stuff like sugar. Trying to fill up on carbs is tempting, not least because they're cheap, but it isn't wise.

Grains are useful with other foods but aren't good on their own. I find wheat-based processed foods, like 'factory' bread and breakfast cereals, can lead to hunger pangs earlier than otherwise. Homemade bread seems better in this respect. Bran Flakes are just cardboard padding. Cheap muesli is mostly wheatflakes (also padding). I limit my kids' intake of sugary, puffed-air cereals as I'm convinced they are nutritionally sh*t and once they get used to sweet foods and drinks it's very hard to wean them off that stuff, though artificial sweeteners are even worse.

Fats can be useful and the fats in nuts and seeds are particularly valuable.

Bear in mind that your stomach will adapt to a long term change of intake volume; if you eat like a mouse for 6 months you are likely to grow to feel less comfortable with big dinners.

StageWinner

It's like Will and Bhima morphed into one person and posted on whether they should start racing or not :roll:


As always - the simplest answer is - just go out there and f**cking race (or TT) and don't worry about meaningless stats (like speed on rollers or average speed over 100+ mile rides.

Only ONE thing can tell you if you're going to be any good at racing. And that is to race. Or at least try it.

And yes - you SHOULD.

Pseudonym

kamil1891 wrote:

The result, to my suprise was - 21km with ave of 52.9km/h. On aluminium rollers on bike with 25mm tyes with no wind either ways. No stopping and no corners. My question is how much different is resistance on the rollers than on the road, and how would my attempt reflect in the real race situation?

you're doing a theoretical 24 minute 10 on rollers - and to answer your question, that would be nothing whatsoever like doing a 24 min 10 on real roads.

Like stagewinner says - there's only one way to find out.

kamil1891

Pseudonym wrote:

kamil1891 wrote:

The result, to my suprise was - 21km with ave of 52.9km/h. On aluminium rollers on bike with 25mm tyes with no wind either ways. No stopping and no corners. My question is how much different is resistance on the rollers than on the road, and how would my attempt reflect in the real race situation?

you're doing a theoretical 24 minute 10 on rollers - and to answer your question, that would be nothing whatsoever like doing a 24 min 10 on real roads.

Like stagewinner says - there's only one way to find out.

Not to offend you, but your calculations are "slightly" wrong. With ave of 52/9 km/h 10mile = 16.09km would slightly exceed 18minutes.

I know that I will give road racing a go, definitely. However, one of my questions was whether such a training is suitable. For e.g. if we apply corners and "terrain" to the resistance of the rollers how much the time would be different from the real road conditions (without the strong wind that could massively affect the ride either ways).

StageWinner

kamil1891 wrote:

However, one of my questions was whether such a training is suitable. For e.g. if we apply corners and "terrain" to the resistance of the rollers how much the time would be different from the real road conditions (without the strong wind that could massively affect the ride either ways).

+- 10 minutes

SBezza

No doubt alot of people could do 18 min 10's on rollers, they are nothing like the road, and it is impossible to state what sort of time you could do on a normal 10 course, this year I have done 19 min 10's as well as 23 min 10's, the only difference is the course, the wind, the temperature, how much power I put out, how fatigued I was etc, I am sure you can see far too many variables to even give a ballpark figure.

The only way to find out for real, is to enter races, that way you will see where you truely are in the scheme of things. As for training, train hard and recover well and I am sure your times will improve, as to what the best training is for you, well that will be a little bit of trial and error until you see what works.

Pseudonym

kamil1891 wrote:

Not to offend you, but your calculations are "slightly" wrong. With ave of 52/9 km/h 10mile = 16.09km would slightly exceed 18minutes.

that doesn't suprise me - I'm crap at maths. Even better then - an 18 minute 10 would place you as the UK's national 10 mile TT champ, ahead of the likes of Wiggo, Hutch and a whole load of others who have been racing and training at the highest level for years. So, is your roller time a realistic reflection of what you can do on the road...? No.

Like everyone else says, join a club, learn roadcraft, ride chaingangs, put in the training effort and then line up next spring. If you have a competitive nature, then the only meaningful way of testing your form is to race.

kamil1891

Thanks for replies guys.

I'm realistic and I know that I would never do 18mins 10 right now. It's simply impossible and it is possible that I will do sub 15min 10 soon on my rollers with just some practice. As for the rollers it's easier because of no wind, no corners and if we assume that they have the same resistance as the road, the road would have to be perfect (no potholes etc). I was wondering mostly about that, how the resistance on it's own differ from road. I didn't even think for a second of doing sub 20minutes 10, but I was more looking for answers like "if you can do this on rollers then in road situations such as xxx, you could maybe do 25minutes 10" or something like that Anyway, thanks

MatthewBulmer

It's a standard answer, but join a club. There are plenty in the area: West Pennine, Oldham Century, GS Surosa, North Lancs, Lancs, Rossendale. Get out on the chain gangs and you will soon be able to gauge your fitness. You'll also get some good advice on training. As a target, there is an excellent SPOCO series that starts in Feb with my club's sporting 10m TT: http://www.rossendaleroadclub.com/Spoco/

Once into the spring, there are plenty of evening TTs in the area run by the following clubs: Rossendale, North Lancs, Wigan Wheelers, and there is also the PETTS series run by a few clubs( http://www.petts.org.uk/petts.org.uk/PETTS.html )

All the best, and I may bump into you at a race next season.

danowat

21mph avg over 136miles is impressive, was this taking into account any stops?

trickydisco

My advice.. don't get too hung up on stats.

I started training proper last winter to start racing this season as a 4th cat. I was seeing a coach at the time and saw massive gains in my fitness (because i was relatively untrained)I ended up getting a bit obsessed with my stats (power to weight, power at threshold, HR)

What i realised when i started racing is it's a lot more than fitness and it took quite a few races to really get into it. I also got it handed to me in a 2/3/4 race where the pace set by 2nd cats was immense (31mph on a slight incline just outside the neutralised zone to shed weaker riders)

trickydisco

"if you can do this on rollers then in road situations such as xxx, you could maybe do 25minutes 10" or something like that Very Happy Anyway, thanks Smile

Far too many variables.

Like everyone else has said.. Get your licence and enter some races, TT's

Most local clubs with do evening 10 TT's which in my experience are a friendly/casual affair.

Pokerface

I can't ride rollers at all. But can do a sub-22 10. Does this help? 8)

Pseudonym

Pokerface wrote:

I can't ride rollers at all. But can do a sub-22 10. Does this help? 8)

pah - a time like that would be enough to win you a world title. Oh, hang on....

kamil1891

MatthewBulmer wrote:

It's a standard answer, but join a club. There are plenty in the area: West Pennine, Oldham Century, GS Surosa, North Lancs, Lancs, Rossendale. Get out on the chain gangs and you will soon be able to gauge your fitness. You'll also get some good advice on training. As a target, there is an excellent SPOCO series that starts in Feb with my club's sporting 10m TT: http://www.rossendaleroadclub.com/Spoco/

Once into the spring, there are plenty of evening TTs in the area run by the following clubs: Rossendale, North Lancs, Wigan Wheelers, and there is also the PETTS series run by a few clubs( http://www.petts.org.uk/petts.org.uk/PETTS.html )

All the best, and I may bump into you at a race next season.

Thanks for that. Very appreciated I will definitely try this and also the latter hilly TT

danowat wrote:

21mph avg over 136miles is impressive, was this taking into account any stops?

well, that included one planned 10min stop in about 130km and another unplanned one with 60km to go, when I got a puncture on my back wheel and that only slowed me down as my cr@p minipump only get the pressure to about 70psi (I ride ~120psi) and I had to be careful as I didn't have any more tubes.

Pokerface wrote:

I can't ride rollers at all. But can do a sub-22 10. Does this help? Cool

Yes. As a forum reader I notice a lot of things here and you are actually one of my inspirations and definitely a motivation. PS. at least I'm better than you in one thing wow

Alex_Simmons/RST

kamil1891 wrote:

As for the rollers it's easier because of no wind, no corners and if we assume that they have the same resistance as the road, the road would have to be perfect (no potholes etc). I was wondering mostly about that, how the resistance on it's own differ from road.

The resistance of most rollers bears no resemblance to what you would experience at the wheel speed on the road. The same applies to all trainers, with a few exceptions of some expensive computer controlled units.

There are a number of reasons for that, but primarily because the resistance of most rollers is relatively linear with speed and mostly related to rolling resistance only (with a bit of air resistance with the wheels rotating).

Not all rollers are the same either, resistance at a given speed can and does vary widely, depending on the quality of the roller, what it's made of, the drum diameter, bearing quality and so on (not to mentioned tyre type and air pressure).

On the road - the power - speed relationship is a cubic equation and depending on speed and gradient will mostly be determined by air resistance. That is a function of air density, speed and your aerodynamics (as well as wind). and of course outdoors there are these pesky things called hills.

nferrar

Forget roller speeds - they're irrelevant, wind resistance is everything in cycling when it comes to speed.

Sounds like you want to do road races and TT's and that you have a very good base fitness already. Bit of an over-oversimplification but what you need to add to your training to prepare for races is intervals.

TT intervals should be designed to raise your FTP (sustained power), so you want to be doing longer intervals (like 20 minutes) at the maximum effort you can sustain for the duration and have a decent rest between (2-5 minutes). I would start with just a couple of them in a session (can do on part of a longer steady-state ride) and then add a couple more when you get the hang of them (using a powermeter obviously has benefits here but a HRM will also help you judge pace).

For road racing it's mostly about repeated high intensity efforts followed by steady state riding in which you need to recover quickly. For that you need to do high intensity interval training, so shorter intervals (30sec-2mins) and shorter rest periods between them + more intervals in a session. You need to make sure you get a good rest between HIT sessions otherwise you won't get the benefit.

Tom Butcher

I would be getting out on some local chain gangs and longer group training rides now - you need to learn how to ride in a group as if you can't all the fitness in the world wont help you in a road race - well unless you are fit enough to just ride off the front solo. It'll also give you a decent measure of where you stand relative to others who are racing - and you'll get to know a few people which will give you a pointer which club you want to join if any.

There must be someone on here who can point you in the direction of a time and a place to turn up for a midweek training ride near Rochdale.

kamil1891

Alex_Simmons/RST
Well, that make a sense to me now

nferrar
Thanks for those, I have been already trying to do some intervals. 2x20m and ocasionally, a very high effort for minute followed by a minute rest x about 7 times (on rollers). But, I actually didn't have any specific interval training. Sometimes I feel like I do an interval for e.g. for 1h, as I push to the maximum whenever I am able to. Does that help too?

Tom Butcher
I have done few sportives and have ridden in a group few times but actually that is one of my biggest weaknesses at the moment. I hope I will find something decent

Thank you all guys