More training ...........maybe

Newlife

Well came back to my post to find I had had some decent replies but it had been locked, I guess due to some infighting. New to the forum though so not up to speed on the internal politics yet!

viewtopic.php?f=40011&t=12960963

I want to carry this on as despite the replies I personally had no chance to respond and check further understanding. Some of the replies mentioned about being able to continue training even with sore legs whilst others warned against this. I can only gather from this that the scientific advice is not clear cut. When I indoor train I do tend to go all out and the intervals are set to be VERY hard to get through, whether I need to push this hard is perhaps another debate that Bender touched on. As said before though I will not be able to replicate such an effort on the road locally, except through hill climbing, so the point may be moot anyway.

When I do move fully to road riding, maybe as early as next week as on an easy week at the moment, I hope to be doing anything from 120-180 miles a week depending on available time and the weather mostly. Does this sound reasonable?

I will take on board what others have said about joining my local club sooner rather than later. I have dragged my heels over joining sooner but am just nervous about being out of my depth.

Hopefully the discussion can be carried on a little without there being any need for it to be locked again.

imposter2.0

Newlife wrote:

I will take on board what others have said about joining my local club sooner rather than later. I have dragged my heels over joining sooner but am just nervous about being out of my depth.

As mentioned before, being 'out of your depth' is probably no bad thing at this stage - and in any case, it's quite possible that you might not be as far out of your depth as you might think. As also mentioned before, you need to be stretching yourself in order to improve - and good recovery is also an important part of that process. But if we take recovery as a 'given' then the main issue is your need to ride as often as you can. The more you ride, the more you will improve. Becoming a 'good climber' (mentioned in your earlier post) is a fairly relative and non-specific goal in itself, so it's difficult to suggest anything specifically to address that.

hypster

I would tend to agree with Imposter. You're never going to know what the club standard actually is until you join and do a few rides with them. If the fast group is too fast then you will have a better idea of just how much training you may need to do to get to that standard and some incentive to do it. It sounds to me from what you have said on the locked thread and this one that a century ride will be well within your capabilities.

In general I try to go by what several coaches have recommended when they say "Most recreational cyclists go too hard on easy rides and too easy on hard rides". I am training for the Marmotte at the moment and do one long, steady paced ride a week for endurance, one, one hour tempo ride, one intensive hill repeat and one other interval type ride like a 2 x20 or HIIT workout. I have three rest days at the moment but will probably fill in one or two of them when the weather improves with MTB rides as well for a bit of variation.

I am 58 years old, 6' 4", 184lbs and retired so have plenty of time on my hands to train! )

Newlife

Imposter wrote:

Becoming a 'good climber' (mentioned in your earlier post) is a fairly relative and non-specific goal in itself, so it's difficult to suggest anything specifically to address that.

Yep appreciate that it is pretty non-specific so is perhaps more accurate to say that it is an area that I am trying to improve as rapidly as possible. The main two hills in my area used for hill training and club trials are as expected Strava segments. So when I say I am looking to become a better climber that involves using my times up these two climbs, either when I just hit them in a longer ride or do hill repeats, to gauge my progress and ability compared to the better climbers. For instance I am 167/401 on the longer steeper climb and 137/682 on the shorter more commonly used one. So for me becoming a good climber will be marked by taking continual bites off of my best time and moving as high up the rankings as I can.

My initial thinking was to join a club once I hit a certain mark in these two challenges. i.e a minute off of the longer time and/or top 100 for both etc. I agree that I should join a club soonest as though.

sloppyschleckonds

Newlife wrote:

For instance I am 167/401 on the longer steeper climb and 137/682 on the shorter more commonly used one. So for me becoming a good climber will be marked by taking continual bites off of my best time and moving as high up the rankings as I can.

What do these numbers mean, is it blood pressure?

Newlife

lol no it means that out of 401 strava recorded riders up the hill my time ranked me as the 167th quickest.

supermurph09

Honestly don't see the Strava ranking as anything worthwhile. You mention moving up the rankings, what if you get quicker and 50 new quicker riders pass through it? Measuring just your time, ie you against you is the only worthwhile barometer.

Newlife

Supermurph09 wrote:

Honestly don't see the Strava ranking as anything worthwhile. You mention moving up the rankings, what if you get quicker and 50 new quicker riders pass through it? Measuring just your time, ie you against you is the only worthwhile barometer.

I do appreciate this and of course first and foremost it is my own best times I want to improve. However I still don't see that comparing myself against other riders is necessarily a bad thing. I will never be a KOM chaser but that does not mean I cannot use the tools at my disposal to try and gauge my progress. I don't know how far I can improve or how good a rider I will become but having markers along the way may help keep me pushing and focusing.

supermurph09

The riders above you could have ridden that segment once, and you could have ridden it 50 times, you're comparing your 50 efforts against their one, that one could have been at half effort or their best efforts could have been in a group. Not trying to be negative, but if you are going to compare against others then do it against club mates on that segment. You'll know how far in front of you they are now, you can check that progress because you'll know the effort they put in.

imposter2.0

As above - the only thing you can realistically compare on strava is your own times - nobody else's. And even then, the wind/weather/temperature or how you feel may be different anyway...

Newlife

Point taken. Thanks guys.

Sent a message to a guy in the local club so with any luck I will be club riding pretty soon.

supermurph09

Newlife wrote:

Point taken. Thanks guys.

Sent a message to a guy in the local club so with any luck I will be club riding pretty soon.

Good choice, whilst it is nice to get out on your own, being with a club should take your riding up a notch. The help and advice you'll get from a good club, and the social aspect will only enhance your cycling experience.

markhewitt1978

+1 for ignoring Strava. It all depends on how many other riders have done that hill and how long the segment has been set up for. I'm KOM on one segment, in the mid 20's on some, and down in 200+ for others.

Stalin

markhewitt1978 wrote:

+1 for ignoring Strava. It all depends on how many other riders have done that hill and how long the segment has been set up for. I'm KOM on one segment, in the mid 20's on some, and down in 200+ for others.

Strava Hacked: Data Lost
By John Ryan
March 7th 2014 8:43

Using the same malleability bug in Strava's protocol that led to bitcoin exchanges like Mt. Gox and BitStamp shutting down withdrawals, hackers cleaned out the training data belonging to thousands of Strava users.

Strava's administrator, known by the username Deacon, said none of its anti-hacking measures could prevent the hack which must have been extraordinarily complicated and required the sort of back up only governments normally have at their disposal.

Deacon said that the malleability bug allowed nefarious users to mask IDs and continually ask accounts to delete. Deacon alleged that six users colluded to exploit this bug, which Strava's automatic verification system uses, to delete thousands of cyclist's accounts.

Deacon said that in hindsight, the system was foolish, especially with news that hackers had started an organized attack against bitcoin exchanges using the same malleability bug.

“I should have taken MtGox and Bitstamp’s lead and disabled accounts as soon as the malleability issue was reported,” Deacon wrote on a blog post, which Deep Dop Web re-posted here. “I was slow to respond and too skeptical of the possible issue at hand.”



Deacon also attempted to appeal to the emotions of the hackers to get them to return the stolen training data.

“It takes the integrity of all of us to push this movement forward,” Deacon said. “Whoever you are, you still have a chance to act in the interest of helping this community.”

“Being a part of this movement might be the most defining thing you do with your entire life. Don’t trade that for greed, comrades.”

Apparently the Strava admins are not familiar with the adage "no honor among thieves."


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Originally from Northern California, John Ryan came to London to earn his master's in journalism from Columbia University. He joined Y Times April 2013.

imposter2.0

Why is that relevant?

supermurph09

Might be of interest http://cyclinguphill.com/hill-climb-intervals/

sloppyschleckonds

I read this recently on Strava:

"The fact that Strava staff is mute on this thread is pretty frustrating and annoying. Anybody knows their CEO's email address? Perhaps an escalation would help".

It was about adding pictures to your ride data.

I'm out.

Newlife

Thanks again guys and cheers for the link Supermurph09, it was a good read. Hit one of my training hills today and took 16 seconds off of my PB. Found a couple more to train up too so hopefully can now put 4 different local climbs on to hard rotation.