I first rode Horseshoe Pass back in September 2015 when we went to see the Tour of Britain in Wales - I wrote a few words about it here. This time we went on the Railway at Llangollen just after the August Bank Holiday.
Here's the picturesque station from the bridge
After we had ridden the railway and had some lunch and I rode the Pass again. We'd parked about 1/2-3/4 mile up the road from Lllangollen towards the pass so I rode back into the town and beyond before doing a U-turn to ride back up. I'd forgotten that the steeper sections were between the town and the cattle grid, after which it was a lot steadier, and whilst I was not overly fast I felt nowhere near as stressed on the climb as I had previously when I had very little warm up and was on the limit. In fact I felt pretty good and was riding well in my comfort zone and felt faster than the previous time. The hairpin came up sooner than I expected and I had some effort in reserve so I pushed harder at that point all the way to the Ponderosa cafe Here's a video of the climb and descent:
This time I remembered to start the camera in Llangollen so its the full climb.
Despite feeling faster than the first time I was slower everywhere except the segment approaching the summit. I was a bit annoyed as I had some left in the tank and should have gone faster everywhere.
If I ignore being slower than the previous time I was happy with my power numbers - a high average and high Dr Coggan value (weighted power in Strava speak):
I have been happily progressing thinking that a few people might have downloaded my app and used it. I had no feedback but this does not mean its not being used - it could just as well mean it is being used and works as intended or did not do what people wanted. In reality I have written the app for myself as a learning and intellectual activity However I was recently looking through the comments on this Blog and saw a comment saying: "Just quickly tried this and got the following error:Downloading http://i5desktop/Strava Forms V1/Strava Forms V2.application did not succeed."
I had not realised there were errors deploying/installing but on reflection could see that I had never tested the installation using the zip file downloaded from my google drive. When I tried myself to deploy the zip file to my laptop I got the same error. I have done a bit of googling and there are some restrictions and limitations when deploying using Visual Studio Express However I have taken a slightly different approach and believe that there is now a zip file that will allow installation of my application.
It can be found here: Google Drive Link - the latest deployed version is 2_1_1_0_53
I can't be 100% sure that it will deploy but I am much more confidant that I was before.
There are a number of incremental changes and improvements since the last "release" - the biggest is probably that there is now a trace logger that I have been developing so I can identify and address issues that don't appear in the IDE. This is found by using the Menu option "Tools" - then select "Show Data Folder". In this folder will be files called e.g. Traceoutput_2018-09-01_11_50_09.txt - these are reasonably verbose and help debug and diagnose issues
However the software is very much a work in progress and I have a big list of things to do still When installing you may get either of the following warnings (you probably will as the application is not signed in any way)
Please note that I have written this application for my own use and as far as I can tell it only does what it is meant to - acquire and display Strava data. Should anything happen to you PC whilst installing or using this then I cannot and will not take any responsibility
By chance I found out that the famous Silverstone Motor Racing Circuit opens its doors on a few evenings in the summer for cyclists and runners to use the circuit for £5. I have ridden at Donnington Park and Mallory Park previously and its a great experience to ride on a closed track, so I aimed to ride Silverstone as well The details are/were here: http://www.silverstone.co.uk/experiences/running-cycling/running-cycling-club/ Silverstone is just over an hours drive away for me and I was able to ride on the evening on the last Wednesday of August when I took some Annual leave I arrived and was ready to ride about 10 minutes after the track opened and rode 10 laps - that's 36 miles in 1hr 50 minutes. I averaged 19.8mph with an average power of 185W. Given the strong wind that evening (helped in some parts and was a struggle on other parts of the circuit) I was very pleased with that although I would have liked to average 20mph. My first lap was my fastest at 10m13s - an average of 20.8mph and 213W power. All subsequent laps were slower - there were more people on the track by the time I completed that first lap but its very wide and the number of people did not really make a difference. Whilst I was no quicker for the remaining laps I managed to be reasonably consistent which I saw as an achievement as well
The surface is excellent - fast, and very smooth. Its almost flat - over the 36 miles I climbed 787 feet only. The biggest issue was the wind - it was a windy evening and whilst it helped from the first right after the pit lane down to the most southerly part of the track it was a real slog back up and the cross wind along Wellington Straight was certainly an interesting experience with my deep section wheels
I was hoping to try and get in a bit of a train to get some good speed but the fast people were faster than me and there were no real trains formed. It was a great evening - it shows that cycling crosses all classes and people - children to pensioners, tag alongs, trailers, stabilisers, elec-assists, recumbents, mountain and hybrid bikes, road bikes and full on TT bikes were everywhere and everyone was enjoying it it seemed. I would absolutely do it again - highly recommended Here's a video of my 1st lap:
I always enter all the Strava Monthly Cycling challenges. Generally I complete the Grand Fondo Challenge (100km) and in the summer months the Climbing challenge but in all the years they have been running I have never achieved the Distance Challenge at 1250km 1250km is a huge distance and subsequently requires a huge time commitment as well. On a few occasions I have ticked just about 700 miles so just over 75% but never got anywhere close.
However August 2018 will go down in my personal history as the month that I completed all 3 challenges as I rode in total 830 miles. Here's the email from Strava confirming the completion of that elusive challenge:
And here (from Veloviewer) is the proof of all 3 being completed:
The sense of achievement was immense and I had a real sense of pride
I am not sure quite how I did it but an element was consistent cycling throughout the month and a lot of cycling to work. With the prolonged good weather in August and favourable work requirements I was able to ride commute 2-3 times each week - riding on 3 days to work and back gives me 110 miles in that week. Looking at my Veloviewer summary for August it shows that I only didn't ride for 9 of the 31 days in August:
I also managed to squeeze in a number of longer (60mile+ rides over the weekends and I took 2 additional Annual Leave days over the Bank Holiday weekend. All in all this provided the time to actually churn out those miles However the down side is that I am absolutely knackered as a result and whilst I have ridden another 180 miles in the first week of September they have been really hard and tiring - I am going to need to slow down a little in preparation for the Velo South event (100 mile closed roads) that is just 2 weeks away I am not sure I'll be able to do it again until I retire and have the time to do so!
