Completed 1st TT in under 30mins

matt-h

Hi,

took part in my first club 10 @ Bournemouth Arrows last night and got a 29:33.
I was on a standard road bike with standard clothing.

Although i had not actively trained for the 10, i was concious to not go to hard to early.

My Ave HR was 174. Max 188. is this high?
The maximum i have ever got is 205BPM so i was running at about 80 - 90%

I felt i had more to give at the end as i was not expecting the finish to come up so quickly.

Any advice from anyone?

Matt

drlodge

I'd say you paced it pretty well. My Max HR is 187 (I'm 46) and on a recent 10m TT my HR was around the 172 mark - went up slightly going up a hill and then again in the final straight.

When did your HR hit its Max - early on, at the finish or while going up a hill?

It might be that you try and keep a more steady HR at a slightly higher rate, but listen to your body and do try to start at the pace you'll keep throughout.

matt-h

My Max was just before the end.

http://app.strava.com/activities/64857376

Does this Strava link work?

When you say your max is 187, is that during the TT or absolute max?
My Max during TT was 188 but absolute Max has been 205 on a previous ride (31 years old)

Matt

drlodge

Link works a treat. All I can suggest is to try a little harder if you think you have a little more to give based on this experience. You want to be almost dropping dead at the end and the fact you could increase your heart rate like that at the end means you probably had a little in reserve.

matt-h

Thanks DR.
It was sort of what i was thinking. i suppose its experience of percived effort that makes a difference.

Loved it though and will definately try and move some of my training aroung this.
i was so glad i didnt blow up halfway round

Matt

16mm

matt-h wrote:

.

Loved it though and will definitely try and move some of my training aroung this.
i was so glad i didnt blow up halfway round

Matt

If you loved it you're doing it wrong. Next time try to blow up halfway round, so you know your limit:-)

Good time for a first 10 though, you'll go a lot quicker just through pacing, ie riding at your limit the whole time.

16mm

double post

paul2718

I've only ridden one TT this year. http://app.strava.com/activities/58447715 standard roadbike/clothing etc. So that's a 165bpm average, 171bpm max. The highest heart-rate I've ever seen is 180.

So, if you were me, you probably didn't go hard enough anywhere. OTOH it's a first attempt and very respectable.

If you want to optimise your time then obviously pacing is critical. But to learn what efforts you can sustain feel like you may need to experiment, be a bit reckless in your pacing. Start a bit harder than you think you can sustain and see what happens. In the worst case you have to finish the course at a lower speed.

Paul

matt-h

Thanks for all your advice, maybe i played it to safe.

I'm going to experiment over the next couple of weeks to see what happens

Matt

bigpikle

well done for going under 30 but TBH if you dont finish a 10 mile TT with just about the highest HR you've ever seen on a bike, then you arent going nearly hard enough. That last mile should be excruciating pain and unpleasantness and end with you firmly expecting to see your last meal again....

markos1963

Well done on your first TT. It doesn't matter what time you did you've set yourself a target to go back and aim at. I have great admiration for all newcomers to the sport who have the balls to come and have a go. So many bull sh*tters who cruise around claiming their fast but never enter an event and probably never would crack 'evens' anyway.
Your HR doesn't look too bad but as others have said try and experiment, a 10TT is short enough for you to take a risk with pacing. I have used HR a lot in the past but this season have tried PE(perceived effort) a lot more on 10s and have found my PBs tumbling. If it's an out and back course then give it the big one to the turn and then see if you can hang on during the journey back. I usually hit max HR half a mile from the finish and if it's a big race then I ride as hard as I can to the line, not unknown to chuck up around then!

JackPozzi

Bigpikle wrote:

well done for going under 30 but TBH if you dont finish a 10 mile TT with just about the highest HR you've ever seen on a bike, then you arent going nearly hard enough. That last mile should be excruciating pain and unpleasantness and end with you firmly expecting to see your last meal again....

It seems to vary from person to person, I've seen a max HR of 186 in an uphill sprint finish in a very short crit, but never been anywhere near that in 5 years of TTing with pretty good pacing. Generally see a max of 175ish in a 10mile TT with the average being around 170. I find it depends it can also be quite cadence dependent, I've moved to bigger gears with lower RPM over the years which has also lowered my average HR for time trials, while power and most importantly times have improved.

markos1963

Oh and another thing I have learnt recently, you can go hard from the start if you get your warm up right for a 10. You need around 40minutes to bring your HR up gradually in stages and then some spikes to get up to race rate and arrive at the off with you ready to go.

Grill

If your max is 205 then you're not riding hard enough. I wouldn't worry about it too much as pushing the barrier of absolute failure is probably the most difficult part of TTing.

Graeme Jones

My Max is 202bpm and resting 49bpm! so quite a big range but I recently did my 2nd 10TT and found the last couple of miles I was near max and the last 1/2mile sprint was at max. As some of the other have said this should be unpleasant to the point you need to forget your at max and just push as hard as possible for the final sprint.

I have been playing with my position on my standard bike as I held the drops for the full 10miles last time but I reckon holding the tops tucked in a little will be better for frontal area and power delivery so going to try that when its not 27degrees outside!

woody1545

Coincidently, I was at the same TT, completing my 2nd ever 10! Although I've done a few triathlons in my time.

My advice is to keep going. I did the Ringwood TT a few years ago and enjoyed it but for whatever reason never got round to going again until now. I'm please to say I'm a good 2:30 minutes faster now, same road bike but with Tri bars.

The crosswinds in the course seem to make judging your effort more difficult, I guess that'll come with practice. You don't need to wait for a Thursday night as your on strava. Good luck.

matt-h

oh cool.

Well i will be there this week to have another go. Going to go harder and see what happens

Really would like to go below 28 before i go to aero bars - thats my target anyway

Matt

Johnpsanderson

I'm no Strava expert so wasn't sure if the Power and Cadence data was genuine or somehow projected?

If so then i'd say your cadence is surprisingly low. Upping that *may* help you go quicker / offset fatigue as you increase your speed. OTOH - you might prefer low cadence - so that advice may do you no good...

Personally I TT'd for a while with only a speedo - and didn't improve my times much. Then I got a HRM - used the Joe Friel method (google it) to work out my LT - and used that as a target to manage my pacing. After that I basically did a PB every single time I did a 10.

I had been trying to achieve the same from RPE - but frankly wondered if I was really going as hard as I physically could - despite what it 'felt' like. Having a number to focus on on the HRM gave me something more objective to work from.

Realistically - i think just taking a conscious 'I am trying to improve' attitude into your performances will have some form of impact.

matt-h

Johnpsanderson wrote:

I'm no Strava expert so wasn't sure if the Power and Cadence data was genuine or somehow projected?
If so then i'd say your cadence is surprisingly low. Upping that *may* help you go quicker / offset fatigue as you increase your speed. OTOH - you might prefer low cadence - so that advice may do you no good....

The Cadence is genuine, however the power output is predicted.
I will be trying using a higher cadence, believe it or not its actually higher that it used to be.
I have relied on powerful legs until i started trying to take note of my numbers.
As my cadence jhas increased over a ride i have noticed my ave speed increase.

Johnpsanderson wrote:

Personally I TT'd for a while with only a speedo - and didn't improve my times much. Then I got a HRM - used the Joe Friel method (google it) to work out my LT - and used that as a target to manage my pacing. After that I basically did a PB every single time I did a 10..

I will have a look at that thanks

Johnpsanderson wrote:

Realistically - i think just taking a conscious 'I am trying to improve' attitude into your performances will have some form of impact.

Thats what im hoping

matt

Johnpsanderson

Save you looking: http://www.joefrielsblog.com/2011/04/de ... -lthr.html

HR principles are looking a bit 'out-of-date' in some peoples eyes with the advent of power meters - but this worked for me.

If you go down the road of actually using the data you are collecting - don't forget to keep 'testing' every now and again. As you get fitter your LT will shift - although you'll probably realise this as over time you will try and push that bit over it when racing. Push it too much, you'll blow up and you'll know about it - push it a little - you'll start to shift it upwards - which is good!

matt-h

Ok,

so went again last night.
I changed nothing on the bike or me and went a whole lot quicker.

Official time was 26:59 but 12 secs added due to strting 100 yrard up the road so a PB of 27:11!

Really chuffed with that, i was hoping to go under 28 but never entertained the time i got.
Below are my garmin and strava details

http://connect.garmin.com/activity/344777433
http://app.strava.com/activities/68194175

I'm a bit surprised by my HR. i was really puffing and my legs felf a little off from the start - i may have not rested enough in the last 2 weeks - hence the improvement but not the overall feeling.
I'm starting to think that the 206 and 204 BPM that are on my Garmin could be errors. I was really pushing.

At 7 miles i was hurting and struggling to keep my heart rate up.
by 9 miles i was feeling a little nausea and amnaged a sprint at the end.
I was really hanging off the bike at the end and took a good few minutes to recover once i got to the van

Felt great afterwards though, chuffed with my improvement and proud of the genuine effort i put in.

any thoughts on the data appreciated. i really want to keep on improving and will take all comments onboard

Thanks for reading
Matt

Johnpsanderson

Interesting.

Looking at your HR data it almost looks as though you made a step change in your effort at 15 mintes/just after the turn - before that point it looks like you were averaging around 174, after that more like averaging 180. Considering that just a couple of bpm over your LT and you blow up quickly (certainly wouldn't last 11 minutes) I'd say you could have gone quicker still by working harder for the first 15mins.

The nausea in the last mile might align with you going over 180bpm and sustaining that effort.

A good training session for 10TTs is a 2x20. Work out your LT and then ride 2 20 minute intervals 1-2 bpm below your LT with a 5 / 10 minute rest in between. This is not an easy workout - and should hurt - especially when you have to rev up for the second interval!

matt-h

Right,
entered into my 3rd TT tonight and hit a PB.
I was running some £35 Aero bars and wore a Nike Compression long sleeve top.

My time was 26.24 which is an improvement of approx 47 secs.

Strava and Garmin files below
http://www.strava.com/activities/76750325
http://connect.garmin.com/activity/363357592

on the out before the turn I wanted to keep my HR at 180 with a higher cadence, the Aero bars somehow made having a higher cadence easier but i'm not sure if that is where my optimum power is.
180 felt way to high so I sat just below until the turn where I pushed to 180-183
I was suffering, I think I found what is my threshold and I was really talking to myself (Jens style) to keep going at the 7 mile mark.

I would appreciate your thoughts on the data

Johnpanderson, for the last 4 weeks I failed to carry out the interval training that you recommended, instead just went out for fast paced hard rides.
I am definitely going to start doing intervals over the next few weeks and see how that helps

Thanks
Matt

Johnpsanderson

matt-h wrote:

Right,
entered into my 3rd TT tonight and hit a PB.
I was running some £35 Aero bars and wore a Nike Compression long sleeve top.

My time was 26.24 which is an improvement of approx 47 secs.

Strava and Garmin files below
http://www.strava.com/activities/76750325
http://connect.garmin.com/activity/363357592

on the out before the turn I wanted to keep my HR at 180 with a higher cadence, the Aero bars somehow made having a higher cadence easier but i'm not sure if that is where my optimum power is.
180 felt way to high so I sat just below until the turn where I pushed to 180-183
I was suffering, I think I found what is my threshold and I was really talking to myself (Jens style) to keep going at the 7 mile mark.

I would appreciate your thoughts on the data

Johnpanderson, for the last 4 weeks I failed to carry out the interval training that you recommended, instead just went out for fast paced hard rides.
I am definitely going to start doing intervals over the next few weeks and see how that helps

Thanks
Matt

The aero bars might be responsible for the improvement - although assuming that was the first time you used them - you'll probably be able to fine tune your aero position over time leading to more improvements. It's not unusual for people to find they've gone SLOWER the first time they've used tribars.

You may have hit on one of the inconvenient things about training! It's probably more 'fun' to go out and smash it on some unstructured rides, and is likely to help with improvement in performance too - it's probably more effective to measure yourself / define some parameters to train within / keep disciplined to the routine you've set yourself...

1 2x20 session a week is all it needs - although we are now periliously close to the end of the season - so perhaps worth bearing it in mind for the spring?

matt-h

Hi John,
the last TT is next week and i cant make it due to a parents evening.

Its definately something i am going to work on over the winter.
last year i dint turn a pedal from Nov - jan and i wont be making the same mistake this year.

Really cought the bug for TT, its great as a measure of performance improvements and the feeling of giving it my all is rewarding.

Is it work putting pics in the TT position thread even though its not a TT bike?

Matt

Johnpsanderson

yes, worth putting pics up to get feedback, but don't necessarily pay attention to all of it! position-wise you need to ensure you are comfortable but the basic principle is fairly straightforward, make your frontal area as small as possible, usually by getting your head and shoulders lower, and get narrow, ie bring your elbows/ knees/ etc in...