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Saturday 30 June 2012

Wahey! Back on it again!!!


  Bloody knackered…..

  Top week of bike riding though!  After Monday’s brisk ride, I’ve done pretty much the same for the rest of the week.
  • Tues 2hrs @ av HR 132.  Struggled really, thought I was tired from the previous day but just not properly fuelled or hydrated I think.

  • Weds 2:15 @ av HR 134.  Wow!  Decent breakfast did the job.  Felt great, even got a suntan! My new shorts are giving me a bit of grief though.  Need to invest in some more udder cream I think….
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    Thurs 3 hrs @av HR 135.  Smokin’!!  Did an improvised Tour of the Rivers and Marshes, including a trip on the Reedham Ferry.  Very hot & humid – did five bottles but still felt distinctly shriveled.  Mega suntan again too!  Feeling really strong, just need to be careful not to get too carried away…..
  Day off yesterday stuffing my face and drinking lots (including scrumpy – ooops).  Weather looks dodgy today so might do some more intense stuff on the turbo.

  I’ve often wondered what sort of power output my Siberian Huskies had when they were seriously race fit a few years ago.  Greebo just on his own could pull me & the scooter so fast on MTB trails that we’d fly past blokes pedaling, and he was only a skinny 20 odd kilo thing.  Woolly was more of an endurance runner than a sprinter, he’d always come into his own and take over when The Greebster had blown himself to pieces within a few miles!
  Anyway, never got the chance to stick them on a treadmill etc but I found some (well, quite a lot actually) papers where extensive lab testing had been done on race fit Sibes.  Staggering results:

VO2 Max of around 220-250 ml/kg/min!

To put that in perspective, someone like Boardman or Wiggins could do 80-85 ml/kg/min.  A champion racehorse about 180 ml/kg/min.  An average hobby time trialist like me about 45 ml/kg/min….

"Zzzzz... Max who???" asked Sir Greeble Mangeworthy


  The British Time Trialing scene is just sooo… well, British really.  It’s so classically bonkers when you think about it.  I often think there’s a Puritanical ‘sitting-on-a-spike’ element to it – the more horrible it is, the more worthy you are.  Bit like those monks fastening razor blades around their thighs.  This pic just sums it up:
Thanks to Danny Watkins for the pic - the cancelled EDCA 25






  The perfect picture.  The essence of UK TT’ing captured on film (or SDRAM I suppose more correctly).  Bonkers.  Totally and utterly bonkers.  Thing is, I love it!!

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