The Downsides of WInter Riding

I like riding my bike and I like riding my Scott in preference to my Giant. The problem is that at this time of year it just gets filthy, as does the rider. The Giant has mudguards but it has got that each year I put off hibernating the "best bike" later and later. This weekend may however be the last for this year.

Here's some photos of the Scott after 50 miles of wet and muddy country roads today:

The bike is actually an olive green/grey colour!

I was as dirty as the bike up my back

Bottom bracket and cranks covered in mud

Tyre and rim covered in mud and only the brake track clean

And here its is after 20 minutes of cleaning - nothing more than gentle and careful use of a hose, a bowl of warm water with a dash of washing up liquid, an old saucepan cleaning brush and a rag - quite a transformation:

While the frame cleans up easily I did not remove and clean the chain (it has a KMC Quick link so its not too difficult) and the wear on the rims from mud and brake pads is higher - and it sounds awful every time the brakes are applied. The tiny rim wear indicators still show that the rims are OK but they are starting to look quite grooved and worm now after about 8-10000 miles, firstly on the Focus and now on the Scott.

This weekend may well be the last for riding until the weather dries out again next Spring

White Lane (#16) and Chalkpit Lane (#117) - Again

I was at my parents for a weekend in mid November and so planned a shorter trip to repeat a couple of the hills listed in the 100 Greatest Cycling Climbs book (and in fact the Another 100 Greatest Cycling Climbs book as well). Feeling a little tired after a lot of miles this year so far I planned to do only White Lane (#16) and Chalkpit Lane (#117) again, both of which I have only done once. I also planned to do a fairly basic "there and back" route as well, although this would mean doing a new route back - although on roads I have used but only in the opposite direction.

I plotted the route (using Strava) and made a few small changes to the normal route, so the ride onto the Hawley Road was different, as was the return leg when almost back. Here's the full route:

I also planned to ride across the ridge/escarpment that is the top of White Lane, on past the top of Chalkpit Lane and past and then climb Chalkpit Lane again, and then on the way back drop 1/2 way down Titsey Hill and climb White Lane from there, rather than from the bottom of the Hill in the village of Limspfield. This plan is here:

The first problem I realised after about 1/2hr was that I forgotten a water bottle. I though I might get away with it but after about 45 minutes knew I'd be in a bad way without anything to drink. I stopped in Halstead at a newsagent and got a bottle of orange juice that fitted in my jersey pocket. I also took my gilet and cap off as it was a lot warmer than I expected. I'd felt pretty unfit up until that point - grovelling up a slight incline the first time I crossed under the M25 heading into Shoreham but I felt better after the drink. I still didn't feel great though and was already thinking about skipping at least on of the hills. When I descended (what I later learned was) Sundridge Hill I was even more sure I was not in a fit state for the 2 big climbs. Sundridge Hill - which I have descended several times but never climbed before was now on the return route an I felt it was probably going to be at least as hard as White Lane and Chalkpit Lane. However the right turn near the bottom of the hill takes you onto the Pilgrims Way which is reasonably flat and this allowed me to get more into a rhythm and feel a lot better. After a number of miles I turned right off Pilgrims Way onto Chalk Lane and the B2024 which climbed up to the top of White Lane as planned.

Once you finally climb to the top of the escarpment its relatively flat and after a few miles I passed the top of Chalkpit Lane and started the descent down to get to the bottom.This road (Grangers Hill) was not nice to descend - it was quite a poor surface and was covered in loose gravel and leaves. I descended very gingerly and was passed easily but someone I hope was local given the rate he dropped me! I was also saving myself for what might be the only climb of the day. Once at the bottom it was a few miles to the bottom of Chalkpit Lane proper. You turn off and pass some houses and under a railway bridge. Shortly after that you pass under the M25 and the road starts to rise properly from that point. 

The gradient gets to 10% or so pretty quickly. Its tough to climb past the two entrances to the chalkpit (hence the name) and the road continues to steepen especially as it swings sharp to the right and the gradient kicks up again to 17-18% according to my Garmin. This section is the steepest and is relatively straight before curving gently to the left to reach the top. I found it very hard work. I was in the 34-28 gear which gave me a sensible cadence and I could plod out the climb while remaining seated, and while it was hard it was not quite as hard as I expected.

I stopped at the top to have a gel and some more to drink and felt confidant enough to go for White Lane as well. I enjoyed the descent of Titsey Hill but slowed quite a bit to make sure I made the left turn up White Lane. The first thing I noticed was that the climb felt easier than the other time I had ridden it with my son earlier in the year. The second thing was how smooth and clean the surface was and I guessed this was because it was used for the Becc CC Hill Climb a few weeks before when David Millar rode it as a final pro ride. Given the improved surface, the fact that I approached the climb from a descent rather than another climb I was hoping to make an improved time compared to last time.

From here it was pretty much ride back the exact same route as I'd come out on. The climb up Sundridge Hill was every bit as bad a I expected - a long drag with some pretty steep parts - although once over that the ride was relatively easy. I stopped at Eynsford for a gel and to finish the drink and took a couple of photos:

Then I was back and it was all done: 50 miles exactly, 3600ft climbing, 3:16 time and an average of 15.3mph - not great but given 3 tough climbs I was happy.

I was also slower on both the 2 climbs than before - disappointed but not too bothered as its late in the year and I have done a lot of miles.

The ride on Strava is here: http://www.strava.com/activities/219771684

The "Hot-Crazy" Matrix

Looking at Split Times over a Ride

One of the features of my Garmin 800 is that it can record split times  - the data is captured at predefined distances as well as for the whole ride. I was idly playing with it some months ago and decided I'd give it a go to see how my performance (speed) varied over a ride. A common perception is that it starts of quick but fades away over a ride. I have picked some data from some different sorts of rides over the past few months

I have presented the data as the difference between the average for each split compared to the average of the whole ride. Thus a positive value shows that for that split I rode more quickly than the overall average speed and a negative value shows I was slower over a split. I have used a 5 mile split distance as its long enough to cover a varied amount of riding but no so short that its possible to have massive differences.

This first example is a 75 mile loop from home. Average speed just over 18mph so a better ride form me over that distance. Firstly a simple linear fit of the split data shows a drop of ~1.6mph average speed from start to end of the ride. Clearly this is a good example of me losing performance over the ride, so although I had a pretty good average this was a result of some good pace at over the first 20-25 miles which I then lost in the last 20-25 miles. This early example was how I felt that I normally rode so the data confirmed the perception. It also showed that my pace is incredibly inconsistent over a ride.

The next split data is from my Ride London 2014 (My Ride London 100):

For this ride (which is unique amongst the many rides I have ridden) we can see that I actually got faster through the ride. The first split was quite quick - not surprising given the very wide roads so plenty of room for all the riders. Then slightly slower as we moved through Richmond Park  (I was early enough not to get held up as much as those passing through after me) and it then slowed further as there was a stretch of quite a narrow country road, and then even slower for the 3rd split when I think both the weather turned for the worse and also the only climb left (Newlands Corner) caused people to crawl all over the road. However once over the "hill" the pace picked up somewhat as did the weather and clearly quite a lot from looking at the data.

There was a good stretch up the A24 where I was part of a small but fast train and got a good tow (over 20mph) for a number of miles. The roads also were wide enough all the way back to London to stop slower moving cyclists blocking faster moving ones. Although there was a bit of a headwind in the run back to London again there were good wide roads and enough people to get a good tow from. I was please to see the highest average speed I have ever achieved over this sort of distance and the high pace for the last 1/2 or so of the ride showed I could have pushed a bit harder I think.

The next ride to look at in detail was my "Malvern Mad Hatter" at the end of August 2014 (I might write a blog entry for this if I get around to it).:

This was a partial spur of the moment ride. I had seen it advertised (from an email I think) and kept prevaricating whether or not to ride it. In the end I turned up on the day and rode it. I rode the 100 mile route (103 actually) and did not really look at the climbing - it was rated by the organisers as a 3 I seem to recall. Again a failing I made was not to look to closely at the route profile - I knew there was a big climb near Malvern itself at about 35-40 miles from memory but the rest of the route looked "rolling". The Malvern climb was pretty big but (at the time) I was doing big miles so it was not really a problem (and after uploading to Strava I was briefly 7th). The data shows a big drop in average speed at this point. The climb may have been "OK" but I wasn't racing up it by any means. Once by the British Camp which marked the top of that part of the route there was then a reasonable down hill stretch hence the following higher speed section up to about 50 miles.

I passed the 1st and 2nd feed stops not needing anything and relying on what I had in my pockets which was some cereal bars and gels. The 2nd stop was actually the start and finish of the extra loop for the 100 mile ride so formed the 3rd stop on the return. Shortly after the 2nd feed stop the "rolling" terrain was clearly more testing than just rolling and there was a fairly tough 10-15 mile section where again my speed dropped significantly below the overall average. I was also feeling pretty low on energy and was down to the last gel in my pocket. It seems on all 100 mile rides I do that there is a stretch where I feel low, both in energy and mental drive and this can been seen in the data. I wasn't bonked by any means but I was rolling more than riding.

The 3rd feed stop was very welcome and I ate quite a lot and filled my pockets and water bottles as well. I really needed the energy and although the 1st 5 minutes back on the bike was hard I could feel the energy coming back and I was riding harder again. There's also something psychological was well about being on the home stretch - even if that's 30+ miles and 2 more hours riding. However the difference on this ride was the help of another rider. I looked behind with about 15 or so miles to go and could see someone catching me. I could note have gone any faster and anyway I am never that worried if people are faster than me and will pass me. It took a few minutes for him to catch me but as he passed I thought I'd make an effort and hang on for a bit. In reality the chap was just a little faster than me and I was able to get a decent tow, so my speed rose for minimal extra effort. I also took a few turns on the front but I think I was not quite fast enough as I would be re-passed after less of a turn than the other rider. However on the remaining small climbs all the way back I was clearly stronger (lighter?) and could easily take the front.

After a few miles I think we both realised that it was in our interest to work together to our mutual benefit. As a result we made cracking speed and even caught and passed a few other people. The other rider was older than me but faster. He'd left about 5-10 minutes behind me so was in line for just about 6hrs. I hope I am that fast still in another 5 years or so.

We sped to the finish line and passed a few more people in the last few hundred meters or so as well. A bit of mutual back slapping and that was it - the ride was over. For me it was a really good achievement: 103 miles in 6 hrs 7 mins and 6535ft of climbing. The average pace works out at 16.9mph, and if I was optimistic I'd have said that I rode for sub 6 hours given the stop time at the 3rd feed stop - so my long standing target of 100miles in sub 6 hours was almost completed.

The split data shows that the average speed rose imperceptibly all the way through the ride despite the big climbs and the 4 segments/20 miles were very quick and contributed to the average. At the end of the ride I felt tired but not spent by any means - clearly filling my face at the ~70mile point worked very well and the working with the other rider also helped. Looking at what the split times showed I could achieve I am glad that I stuck with the other rider and pushed myself.

A good month in August (The Mad Hatter was on 30 Aug) meant I was closer than I have ever been this early in the year to my 5000mile target, and about 4300. I'd been turning out an average of 650 miles per month since about May and this put me close to the 5000 in early October. I think that given some other things to factor in this spurred me to try and get to the 5000 by the 2nd week of October and so September saw another huge mileage effort from me. However the effort was I think starting to get to me. A lot of the September miles were commuting and its easy in good weather to get 3 commutes in and get 100 miles a week. With that an some 75-80 mile rides on a Sunday I reached 4900 miles by the end of September. I still seemed to be doing the miles and pace seemed OK (based on the overall average) but some of the splits showed I was fading in the 2nd half of the ride, as shown here:

This ~50 mile ride shows a pretty decent (for me) average of 18.7 but its mostly in the 1st half with a pretty fade in the last 20 miles. This data confirms that what I felt, which was being pretty well all in by the end of some of the Sunday runs.

In the 1st week of October I made an extra effort to close off the 5000 miles by the 1st weekend. Some commutes and an 80+ mile ride on the 5th October saw the 5000 miles pass and 20000 miles total on Strava. I also completed about 3 Strava challenges as well including the October MTS. However, again despite an average of 17.6mph (that a year ago I would have been ecstatic with) I was almost completely destroyed at the end of the ride. The reason for pushing was twofold - it was getting too dark to feel comfortable to commute and I was going away for a long weekend in October with my wife for our 25th wedding anniversary - so it was a welcome chance for a good long non-cycling break.

After 2 weeks off the bike I went for a windy 75 mile ride, and even accepting that  it was a strong headwind on the return half of the journey here's what 2 weeks off the bike can do (along with getting over a huge milage and 5 days in a hotel and eating out:

Its clear that I just blew up pretty spectacularly on the way home. Three rides on from this date its pretty much the same! I am assuming that even after just 2 weeks my bike fitness has evaporated 

Its been a long post but what I have hoped to show is that looking a split times is useful for me to relate how I feel to some actual data. I appreciate that average speed is a poor measure for many reasons, but its helpful in the absence of power meters etc