Alpe D'HuZes

Allez Mark

This may be of some use.
http://youtu.be/kqUe2B-g_uY

rolf_f

Greg66 Tri v2.0 wrote:

Rolf F wrote:

I've not done the Alp D'huez but I understand it to be one of the easier ones due to the generous expanse of the hairpins allowing some rest

Ha!

The "generous expanse of the hairpins" allows a ton of rest. If you get off any sit on the low concrete wall for 5 mins to get your HR back in the 100s.

My comment was based on a guide to Alpine climbs that I read. I suppose it depends on what you are used to. The ramps are soft for Yorkshire - it's the overall length that is the issue for me. That and temperature which is what really made the difference for me between what I felt to be easy and what hard.

meanredspider

The temperature does concern me a bit - that's something I'm really not used to (though will, at least, have a few days to acclimatise). I do plan to start as early as possible in the day.

rick_chasey

meanredspider wrote:

The temperature does concern me a bit - that's something I'm really not used to (though will, at least, have a few days to acclimatise). I do plan to start as early as possible in the day.

Just get some friends to point hair dryers at you when you turbo.

andyrr

I climbed the Alpe last summer - reasonably fit (not at my fittest by a reasonable margin I reckon) but weight still around the 70Kgs mark.
I found that as soon as you're heading round the corner to hit the climb itself you have this wall in front of you and almost instantly I was down to single digit speeds.
I'd read that the 1st part was the steepest so had anticipated it but the reality was a step up from what I had in my mind.
For me it was a case of forcing myself to not thinking about going quick on the early section and then seeing how I went from there. From maybe 1/3 way up it probably flattens, relatively, but the early slopes are so hard that my legs were a bit stuffed to really take advantage. I did click it up 1 or even 2 cogs after some of the hairpins but pretty quickly I was back down to the wee gear again.
I was NOT 'racing' by any means but other than 1 'pro-look' guy on a nice bike w'carbon rims no-one passed me and stayed away. I took around the 70 minute mark to climb and there were people on full-sus MTBs and people on hybrids doing it. Only took about 15 mins to descend afterwards
I could have managed a 2nd ascent I reckon, an attempt at a 3rd would likely have seen a serious drop in speed.
With a bit of rest and feeding after each climb 4 or 5 is do-able, 6 mighty, mighty hard - you'll probably be climbing for somewhere in the region of 7 - 8 hours !! Given 5 descents thats 8-9 hours riding so a hugely hard day in the saddle by anyone's score.

meanredspider

If nothing else, this thread has certainly galvanised me into action! I'm determined to give 6 climbs my very best shot - I believe I can do it. I just need to prepare properly (I have 4 months) and approach the day sensibly.

andyrr

I guess a part of achieving the 6 is to treat all ascents, especially the 1st ones, as 1/6 of much longer climb and not ride the early 1 or 2 using up your fresh legs.
For me, the 1st few km's were some of THE hardest climbing I've ever done but it was a case of keeping the legs turning at a manageable speed and where the gradient eased just slow let the speed come up gently and use it to get a little active recovery of a few metres.
Most people will be pretty goosed at the top of the climb - that's after 1, you want to feel ok after 1, and after 2 and after 3 and after 4 - 5 and 6 are going to be hard, hard going whatever but good training and sensible pacing will (obviously) have a massive effect on your ability to hit it 6 times.

Kieran_Burns

meanredspider wrote:

If nothing else, this thread has certainly galvanised my bowels into action! I'm determined to give 1 climb my very best shot and skulk off to hide for the rest - I believe I can do it. I just need to prepare somewhere to hide properly (I have 4 months to buy an e-bike) and approach the day drunk

FTFY!

itboffin

Greg is correct I did drop down through the gears on every hairpin for a fake rest as it ramps back up, it worked for me. In fact I passed the last 1k like a lot of people in the big ring but then only doing it once at the end of a ride why not.

As for your earlier comment about training and losing real weight you're correct, Ive found the best method is to back off to the lightest training you can for a month diet like a mad thing then once you're near target ramp up the training hard, the weight will continue to fall off.

As for simulating the conditions your best bet is a couple of week long sessions in those mountains may be a month apart and any long weekends there afterwards perhaps nearer the time go and tackle Vonteux that should give you a pretty good idea

daxplusplus

First of all .. good luck!

Second .. I haven't done this or any other Alpine route so what do I know? Not sure but I completed over 165,000m of climbing last year so had a lot of time to ponder gears, effort, cadence and the 10 feet of tarmac directly in front of me and my bike.

If i was in your shoes I'd seriously think about getting a triple. I guess it depends on how much you want to stack the odds in your favour.

If you stick to the compact and 28 on the back then that will definitely help up to a certain % but not beyond. Might be an idea to go and actually do some tests with your gearing and what you can get up with a reasonable cadence and sitting down. I'd build this test into my training plan and perform every 3-4 weeks. I'd then compare the profile of the route with the test results trying to see whether there's any points that will be particularly hard.

I guess losing weight will mean getting up a higher % climb at a reasonable cadence\sitting down but I wouldn't rely on it as the way to solve this. Especially if you're have trouble losing significant amounts of weight (I now I do .. my default weight seems to be around 82/3kg and I'm in the process of dropping weight below that buts it's a decidedly slow process for me while still having enough energy to actually ride).

Also I'm guessing you'll be lugging an extra kilo at least in water\liquids up the mountain with you too.

Be interested to hear how your training goes, your ideas and thoughts.

meanredspider

The Highlands has got me pretty used to hills and I was normally running a 25 there. I put a 28 on for L2E because as luck would have it, the longest day of climbing was just ahead of Edinburgh and with the best part of 100 miles in my legs for the day at the steepest parts. I normally climb seated and know I'm pretty ok on a 28 for most things. My goal is going to be to try to train in even longer gears. Fortunately pace isn't critical - stamina should see me through.

daxplusplus

Cool.

I guess everyone's preferred cadence is different - I think on the flat mine is approx 90 at all day pace, 110 at 10 mile TT pace.

When I come to hill that is steeper than approx 15% then my cadence, even on a 28, drops to 60 which, for me, is a bit low. If I really wanted to optimise my climbing on such a climb and make it as efficient as possible (less into the red), then I'd get a 30 .. as it is I'm happy knowing that it's only for a few minutes or so on my routes.

Hoping that if I lose weight then my cadence will increase without any need to change the cassette.

As for losing the weight - I'm concentrating on eating differently between days that I ride and those I don't (obvious I guess) and also eating differently at different times of ride days (Hi GI after ride, low the rest of the time). Also switching to more protein and veg\fruit to help with repairing the body. It's not new regime (it may even be wrong ) but it appears to work for me.

Oh yeah .. forgot to mention in my first reply .. your a nutter! Good luck again.

coopster_the_1st

I think the secret to this will be what cadence you are comfortable riding while climbing. I rode the Alpe last year and had an average cadence of 63, it was regularly in the 50's. This was running a 34x28 and it took me 75 minutes to complete the climb.

If I was doing more than a couple of ascents I would want gearing that would allow me ride near my preferred 80 cadence. This would be something like 30x32

And the decent is not that much fun. I would go as far to stay it is boring. As soon as your start to reach any speed you are on the brakes again for the next hairpin. You start to want for some flowing corners.

The very best of luck with this challenge. I'll be following this thread with interest as I am riding 900 miles from London to Barcelona in 9 days later this year but your challenge scares me more and feels a lot harder!!!

meanredspider

It's funny because, when I got this job in Amsterdam, the recruiter mentioned that one of my referees had said I raised a lot of money for cancer charities through endurance bike events. The recruiter said I'd fit in perfectly because they sent a team each year to do this event....

...so when I joined, I looked it up. With the aid of Google Translate, I worked out that it was a ride up Alpe D'huez and the roads were open only after 5.30pm. I thought "I'm not going to bother doing that" :oops:

Now I know the truth :shock:

I might look at ways to get a 30 on the back but, to be honest, I'm closer to a Diesel engine than anything and I'm certainly going to train on the Tacx using some longer gears. Depending upon how accurate it is, I feel OK sitting at about 70rpm on the 28 though my HR is higher than where I'd want it to be be all day - but that's one of the reasons I'm training.

Any thoughts as to training approaches? I tried hill-climbing intervals on the Tacx: going as hard as I could (up a Col) for a minute then crawling up for a minute then going again. I'm assuming the Tacx measures power reasonably accurately (it is, after all, an electric motor/brake) so I've also set myself the goal of maintaining, say, 300W for as long as I can, resting at a crawl and then trying again. The Red Room of Pain (spare room in my apartment with French doors and a near-industrial fan) is going to get a bit tedious unless I can mix it up a bit

Kieran_Burns

I've also got a Tricross with a 30/32 bottom gear.... just saying

(and yes I do in fact mean less than 1 to 1 gearing)

itboffin

get across to Belgium at the weekends and beast yourself on every cold wet muddy hill climb you can find, basically find hills and repeat repeat repeat puke and repeat some more

daxplusplus

itboffin wrote:

get across to Belgium at the weekends and beast yourself on every cold wet muddy hill climb you can find, basically find hills and repeat repeat repeat puke and repeat some more

I'd much rather do this than sit on a turbo

veronese68

Nothing useful to add to this other than to add my voice to the MRS is a lunatic chorus.
Couldn't work out the cloggy website. Do we press a link on there to sponsor you, the one that says "sponsor hier een team of deelneemer" I guess, or will you set up a Just Giving page?

cjcp

Some more thoughts:

Did it on the Thursday before the Marmotte with fresh legs and JG for company. I found it tough, but was able to ride in the 34/21-23 combo. When it came to doing it in the mid-afternoon heat after three long climbs, well... see my previous comment about systems failure. I would've given my front wheel for a 27 or 28 at the back.

Did it the following year and made it up in the 25. Just. But it was cooler. As Andy says on the previous page, you approach it, and it just ramps up straight away.

From what I understand, the heat on the Alpe was wore for the 2013 Marmotte. Feckin' glad I didn't do it, frankly.

There's climbing, and there's climbing in this heat. With luck, it'll be cooler for you at the start of June.

What time of day do you start?

meanredspider

DaxPlusPlus wrote:

itboffin wrote:

get across to Belgium at the weekends and beast yourself on every cold wet muddy hill climb you can find, basically find hills and repeat repeat repeat puke and repeat some more

I'd much rather do this than sit on a turbo

Yes - we do have some training rides in Limburg (that funny little bit of NL that sticks into Belgium with Maastricht in it and is the scene of the Amstel Gold). The hills aren't very big but there's at least one 18% climb from the pics I've seen. It's 3 hours by train each way though...

I'm actually back in Scotland every other weekend - Mt Eagle is pretty much outside my front door - that's the place I can do my puking

meanredspider

Veronese68 wrote:

Nothing useful to add to this other than to add my voice to the MRS is a lunatic chorus.
Couldn't work out the cloggy website. Do we press a link on there to sponsor you, the one that says "sponsor hier een team of deelneemer" I guess, or will you set up a Just Giving page?

Thank you for looking Veronese - I think I'm going to have to set up a JG site as, bizarrely, I think you can only donate on that Dutch site if you have a Dutch bank account (it's also the only way you can enter the event too). To say it's Dutch-centric would be understating it

meanredspider

cjcp wrote:

What time of day do you start?

From 5.30am I believe. I'll be lining up then I think.

Assuming around 2-hour loops (including resting/refuelling), my first 3 starts would be 5.30, 7.30 & 9.30 - by 11.30 I'd be halfway through. I can probably afford to be slower in the afternoon (I'm sure I will be anyway).

The guy in the bike shop said it was a bit of a shock to the system starting so early and recommended I train early in the lead-up to the event to get used to it.

rolf_f

I suspect if it stays cool you'll be fine. You'll find a grinding rhythm up the main climb and the horror of the initial ramps and ticking off each summit will give you something to focus your mind on.

If it's hot, can I have your Volagi. This wet weather is costing me a fortune in brake blocks!

veronese68

No I've got first dibs on the Volagi. FACT


I do believe writing FACT in blocks makes it utterly irrefutable.

itboffin

If you have enough support crew don't carry anything just a small bottle and perhaps one gel.

Thats if you have enough people to have replacements every two to three hair pins.

To be honest by the time I'd gotten to the alp drinking water was pointless I just poured it over myself to try and draw some of the intense heat being reflected back off the road and by my body.

It was the only place on the course where I really stopped and only then to sit under the hoses for a few mins.

rolf_f

Veronese68 wrote:

No I've got first dibs on the Volagi. FACT


I do believe writing FACT in blocks makes it utterly irrefutable.

Rubbish - you have to be able to provide a predated quote where you claimed it. Besides, the Volagi would be wasted in That London. You can have the Foil.

roger_merriman

Nothing really to add other than what have you been drinking?

Kieran_Burns

Rolf F wrote:

Veronese68 wrote:

No I've got first dibs on the Volagi. FACT


I do believe writing FACT in blocks makes it utterly irrefutable.

Rubbish - you have to be able to provide a predated quote where you claimed it. Besides, the Volagi would be wasted in That London. You can have the Foil.

I do believe you'll all find I had first dibs. Go check the first page. 8)

veronese68

Kieran_Burns wrote:

Rolf F wrote:

Veronese68 wrote:

No I've got first dibs on the Volagi. FACT


I do believe writing FACT in blocks makes it utterly irrefutable.

Rubbish - you have to be able to provide a predated quote where you claimed it. Besides, the Volagi would be wasted in That London. You can have the Foil.

I do believe you'll all find I had first dibs. Go check the first page. 8)

I claimed it before one of his other lunatic endeavours, so my claim predates all of yours. FACT :P Especially if I go back and amend an old post

Kieran_Burns

Veronese68 wrote:

Kieran_Burns wrote:

Rolf F wrote:

Veronese68 wrote:

No I've got first dibs on the Volagi. FACT


I do believe writing FACT in blocks makes it utterly irrefutable.

Rubbish - you have to be able to provide a predated quote where you claimed it. Besides, the Volagi would be wasted in That London. You can have the Foil.

I do believe you'll all find I had first dibs. Go check the first page. 8)

I claimed it before one of his other lunatic endeavours, so my claim predates all of yours. FACT :P Especially if I go back and amend an old post

You can't transfer dibs. Dibs only count for the present piece of lunacy. If he survived the last bout of idiotic endeavours then you need to refresh the dibbage.

Besides which I've already offered bribes of a triple chainset...