Wind SW gusting all the time 25+mph.
Theme song: No Shelter
Tempo recovery ride.
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We’ve been having weather here. Yup, weather. One moment it is sunny, the next it is a downpour, then it’s merely cloudy, or maybe sunny, or maybe a light rain. It’s been a roll of the dice for days and the forecast is the same for days to come. Yesterday afternoon I tried to get out by 4p for a quickie trail ride but I was delayed and didn’t get out until 5p.
And about 40min into the ride, I remember that in 20min I have a Zoom call with my daughter and her new school that I completely forgot about because of my single-mindedness of getting out the door. The 4p/ish departure would have had me back in plenty of time.
In the end, not wanting to be seen, literally and figuratively, as a derelict parent, I dialed-into the Zoom as audio only. Fortunately the cows, with their bells and at most 50m away just above the tree line on the right, moved away in the brief moments I needed to speak. Otherwise it was my daughter and the school talking.
While on the call I was passed by a mountain biker who I suspect stole my local legend status on a nearby climb. Well, Strava told me I lost the LL title but then my ride uploaded and we’re now tied.
It was a bit muddy in parts. By the time I was finished, I was thoroughly caked.
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So you’re gonna host a TR meetup at some point so we can all stop salivating over your trails and ride them, right?
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Totally happy to do that.
By the way, is anyone here doing the Gravel Epic Marrakesh?
Or Grinduro Switzerland? You’ve likely seen parts of the likely course in pictures. I don’t know the course but I’ve ridden a lot in the area and ridden by the event base many times.
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Wait, does that mean you might reconsider the house swap idea I floated a few months ago? The Sierras are calling your name!
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Yeah, that’s going to be a hard no. A kind and generous offer for sure, but I’ll have to decline.
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Only 6 riders (including me 
) braved the conditions tonight for the club TT. I think my Cda was 0.75 or worse, the whole ride for me was sat up. Goodness knows why I brought the TT bike and long tail helmet. Bizarrely though it was actually quite fun. Lol, I managed the virtual podium 
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Today was interval day… which meant 5x6min @ 307w with the final one ending up at 333w. Then finished of tried to take a KOM, but only got 3rd 
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Simulated 1 hour climb in Flatland:
0.88 IF and no decoupling (negative 4.4%). Just a nice and easy upper tempo push that ended in lower threshold. Don’t call it sweet spot! LOL.
Had to do a loop-de-loop coming back via the west end of town to avoid the rain.
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The training ride headed up to Rutland again, my favourite terrain. It took me a while to warm up and my feet to get feeling in them though. They came to life thankfully half way up the hill I managed to set a season power PB on.
On getting back I went with a mate for a quick coffee. The two shops we tried though after sitting at temporary traffic lights were shut and he run out of time
I didn’t fancy sitting at the lights again so I took the longer way home via Farcet and Yaxley.
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It was colder than advertised but still pleasant today.
Does anyone recognize this art? I’ve seen the same piece in Vegas and DC as well… 
Edit: Found it, it’s Typewriter Eraser Scale X.
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Amazing ride yesterday. Joined a random collection of locals and took the ferry across the fjord from Trondheim for some “gentle climbs” (in the words of the guy who suggested the route).
The only native Norwegian in the group. Absolute mountain goat, flew up every climb (and then waited at the top like a champ).
Me (on the left) and a Czech grad student. Actually a skier. Way stronger than me but I definitely have better socks.
Heretical non-drive-side shot of my Checkpoint. But it’s on a bridge!
To be fair the climbs were pretty gentle, there were just more than the guy remembered
This is around where I got a QOM with a 40mm knobby gravel tire on my back wheel so I guess not many people ride this route.
The beginning of the ride was about 10km from downtown Trondheim to the ferry, and we went full gas to get the next boat. I didn’t realize what was happening at the beginning and ended up gapped by a few bike lengths. Getting back on was HARD, and it took FOREVER, and I learned to just never stop paying attention ever. (We made the ferry 
) Also we practiced running a rotating paceline on the way back and that was a pretty good time.
(Actual elevation was closer to 4300ft, TR is as optimistic as ever.)
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Fletcher was in my calendar today and I decided to take it outside. So where I went today wasn’t exciting, Alconbury Weald. The only thing of note. The ride was meant to be 99.99% except for a short cycle path which takes me straight back. Travelling People have set up camp on it, so I had to detour circa 5miles over a local bump.
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I abrogated my TR plan responsibilities. I should say, the plan’s prescription of sweet spot and threshold seems to be my “sweet spot” and what I need to do is easy and more anaerobic work. In that spirit, I went out yesterday for a ride on the gravel bike with a hilly course in mind to work the climbs. The weather wasn’t pleasant enough and all the roads not dry enough (ie not in the shade) for me to go out on the road bike.
I tried to take it easy between climbs and to push the climbs harder. On the way to a climb I wanted to include I did roll on some pavement and avoid hilly trails. The climb is one that I hadn’t done in years: a nice gravel path of just over a third of a mile and averaging 16.9%.
Unfortunately, I didn’t take a picture of the aforementioned climb start. But there was this “nothing to see here” on the road to the base of said climb.
And what goes up often gives you a view. The said climb ended on road, a climb I’ve done on the road bike. This time was special: before I started the climb, a roadie and I exchanged hellos. I was right in thinking he might be headed to climb the road that I would intersect. His route - the hypotenuse of our erstwhile triangle - was 1.28mi at 6.2%, though we intersect about .25mi before the end. We shared a chuckle as I hit the top of my climb, stopped, and sucked wind while he cruised on by. The pic below is beyond that, after continuing on the road and then instead of descending on the road, views from which I’ve posted before, I jumped on the ridgeline trail and continued to climb. Zurich is at the end of the lake in the background.
Near the same spot but looking toward the other end of the lake. The snow level on the mountains in the distance, easier to see in person, is rising, fortunately, even as snow continues to fall.
With yesterday’s focus on hitting the climbs, today was about taking it easy. I aggressively avoided trying to PR and kept reining it in. The weather was nicer and not as chilly as yesterday (Strava reports yesterday was rainy and 8C and today was 9C and cloudy… it felt less cold…)
A bit more sun meant some greens.
There’s a challenging little climb to the left, where I just ascended from, called Angry Grandma. Continuing and hanging a left to go up the hill where the two figures are (horses and their riders, with an ebike behind them) is a climb that just keeps going, which I think should have the Strava name of Son of Angry Grandma, or Son of a… It wasn’t on the agenda for today, instead of turn down to get to the “floor” and start another climb and lamely named segment “a gravel bike does it all” or something like that.
In the end, looking at the data between yesterday and today and I see I failed to truly differentiate the two rides: NP 231 v 220, avg power of 147 v 150… though yesterday did have more 1100’ more climbing for just a mile and a half more distance. Also, though I’m a bit of a dirty boy at the end of today’s ride, yesterday was worse. The bike got bathed two days in a row now.
The downhills were frequently slowed to politely pass walkers, hikers with dogs, and horses. More cyclists were out on the trails than usual and over the last two weeks I’ve noticed a marked increase in the number of gravel bikes on the trail.
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Very green. We have another ~month of green, and then things start to turn brown.
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80 miles on gravel today. Felt good, despite a hard MTB ride yesterday. I had my Garmin Varia radar on the bike. It went off less than 20 times on the 80 mile ride. Its nice to ride in the middle of nowhere and avoid traffic!
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Had fallen off the training and indeed cycling wagon for a few weeks, so naturally you restart with an easy effort. Legs properly toast by the time I fell in the door.
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Nice ride. That’s kinda / sorta in my neck of the woods. I work in SE DC.
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End of day ride on one of my normal loops. No PRs, which is fine as I wasn’t trying. I did create a new Strava segment that combines three climbs (second pic), the first two are gravel (13-15% with kicks over 20%) and the third is mostly pavement that begins with a 21% kicker. I’ve named this “Three Mean Sisters” and even after Strava has been crunching the segment for several hours now, only one other person has done this route (back in 2014). Seems like a wasted opp.
My time on this segment was 40s slower than my best, some of which was due to needing to stop and get in the grass to let a truck going downhill pass me on a narrow segment and respond to a text from the son which came in at the same moment (very timely of him).
Another good time on the bike for mental health.
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