Hounslow 100m TT (well, 62 miles of it)

I never learn. I never bloody learn. Three hours into the Hounslow 100 time trial on Sunday and I've gone out way too hard, again, and I'm wondering why everything hurts so much. To be fair, when I saw on my Garmin within the first 20 minutes that I was cycling at an IF of 0.86, I did realise this and did make the decision to keep on, thinking that it would be an effort that I could maintain until the end.

But of course, I couldn't. The wind was getting up steadily during the morning and it went from being a bit annoying to damn hard work. The terrible road surface finally got to me too. I was having a massive internal battle, knowing that I really wanted a good 100 mile ride under my belt as part of my Ironman preparations, but at the same time actually hating every minute of the experience. The more the wind blew, the harder my deep section front wheel was to control, particularly when orbiting the Farnham roundabout.

 Eventually, the decision was made for me when the bumps in the road actually caused my rear mech gearshifter to come out of the end of my aerobars. I was frankly delighted to have a legitamate reason to pack. I was also absolutely covered in energy drink from the continual ponding the bike took

 With 22mm tires on my race wheels, the bumps were always going to be difficult but I had coped with them well in the 12 hour last year. I think a combination of them along with the feeling of barely able to control my front wheel at times sapped all my mental strength to cope.

It wasn't a complete disaster. It was still a hard 60 miles covered with a 40 minute brick run off the bike; to date, my first brick of this training cycle. It was a little uncomfortable, but with a final IF of 0.83, it was to be expected and was at IM pace.

Sh*t seems to be getting real.

Spring post

I’m in a state of flux.  I want to time trial and get faster but a big part of me can’t be bothered to do the work. I’m still using Trainerroad but I have stopped following a plan and instead picking my own sessions. This means I’m not beating myself up if I miss a session and I can fit in a turbo when I have the time. I’ve tried to do a VO2 max session and a couple of sweet spot sessions which are less intense but seem to give my ageing body a good work out.

My Argon TT bike is in bits in the shed.  A whole winter of gurning and sweating all over it and the many ‘miles’ it’s done on it has taken its toll.  I’ve got to the point where I cannot see me generating a lot more power, so I’m going to focus much more on aerodynamics and looking at my position. I have bought a new pair of bars with a view to tidying up the front end and reducing my overall cross section.

I’m sort of looking forward to the time trialling season but it’s not absolutely lit a fire underneath me. I think, partly, because I’ve probably got to a point where I’m not actually going to get much faster. Maybe on a really fast day on a fast course I might take some time off here or there, but so what? It doesn’t actually matter and I’ve probably reached a point where I’m going to have to train a lot harder to see any significant improvement, and I just know that I’m not going to be able to do that without running myself into the ground.

First TT of the season

Last Sunday was the first chance for me to see how the winter training has gone. I went into it feeling pretty upbeat as I had  recently pushed out a new ftp highest value on TrainerRoad, and I had also dropped 4kgs. The event was the Kingston Wheelers’ Sporting 14. A two lap event that took in the Hungry Hill road just outside Ripley. It’s a steady, long drag rather than a hill and a felt that I should be able to power myself up and over it fairly well and with Simon starting 2 minutes behind me I thought that I should be able to keep him at bay fairly easily. Factoring in the last time I did this event a couple of years ago and the improvements that I have made since then, I thought a long 35 should be manageable.

I didn’t work out that way. I ended up riding 37:57, a long way from what I thought I would do. I can’t really explain it. I did have some mechanical issues with my shifting not working properly, but other than that I was just a lot slower than I should have been. Simon is probably a good 7-8 kgs lighter than me so I would have expected him to take some time out of me up the climbs, but when he overtook me halfway through the second lap, he kept pulling away from me on the downhills too. I just wasn’t generating the power tha5bi had been in training and it was very frustrating. Oh well, it’s only a hobby and it’s a very long season, so plenty of time to get my legs fired up again.

In other news, Mrs Wheezy and I have joined a gym. While I have been regularly bashing out 8-10 hours a week, Mrs Wheezy has been holding down a career and doing the vast majority of the childcare while I have been out riding my bike with my mates. We thought it was time that she had the opportunity for some health and fitness stuff and as our children are older and can look after themselves for a few hours,  joining a gym and doing a few things together seemed like a good idea.  So far, it’s been great. A 25m pool that’s usually deserted and has a lot less chlorine than other pools; watt bikes for me to do some interval sessions on, and some very funky treadmills, which hopefully will mean I can get back into some gentle running. Mrs Wheezy loves the pool and the cross trainers  so it mean we can do a few bits together, which is a bonus. It almost means that I’m a triathlete again.

Mind Games

It's been a very odd, topsy turvy week. It started last weekend with a 10 mile TT on the F11/10 course where I set my pb last year. Dale, Simon and I were all going for pbs and he Phoenix record. I had a bit of a shocker as I just never really got going. It was quite blowy and I just didn't cope well and my legs felt very tight.  Dale did a long 21 while Simon set a great pb of 21:56, while I was a long way off in 22:29. My fastest time of the year and my second best time, but I couldn't help feeling a bit disappointed. The good news was that we broke the team record convincingly and with neither Dale or I being near our best, it's nice to know that there's more to come. 

The rest of the week was a complete washout. I managed a VO2 max TrainerRoad session which is about as hard as it gets on a turbo and it left me feeling unusually wiped.  I could tell I was getting my usual overtraining symptoms and this was confirmed when I tried a turbosession on Thursday evening. It was meant to be. 1 hour 20 threshold session but I climbed off after 30 minutes, barely able to turn the pedals and feeling mentally and physically drained.  The next day I was back on the turbo and this time only managed 20 minutes before calling time. With the three of use going for the 50 team record on the Sunday at the Blazing Saddles event on the P885 course, it was not looking too good for me. 

I felt a bit better on Sunday despite the 4am start and in my mind I was not expecting very much having had such a poor week. The course has a massive gift hill at the start and as I rolled down it I just didn't feel very fast and the turn onto the A3 felt even slower. Mentally, I had already given up but the thought that I would be letting Dale and Simon down kept me rolling on so I decided to get to half way and see how things were. A bit of rain and squally wind came through which cooled me down a bit and was actually quite welcome. So I went through halfway in 59:25; my third fastest ever 25 but this included the gift hill. Hmmm... so still in with a shout of a sub 2 and by now I had warmed up and was feeling in much better place. I also had a few slower riders in front and began to reel them in. It was weird. I went from 'Sod this', 'Don't want to be here', 'I'm putting all my TT stuff on eBay when I get home' to 'Ooh, I'm doing all right.'  

At three-quarters distance I was still up on a two hour schedule and then I had the lovely realisation with 10 miles to go that I only had to do it in 26 minutes; something I can easily do on my road bike. My only problem was I got the finish position wrong, which meant I didn't really wind it up over the last couple of miles which would have got me another 20 seconds or so. 1:57:34! I couldn't really believe it as it ended up feeling so easy.  Most of the events I've done this year I have pushed very hard from the outset and suffered later on.  I did a negative split yesterday by over a minute and was still getting faster towards the end. I guess the low volume week with lots of rest allowed me to soak in the training stress which I had accumulated over the last two months; but  it was still one of those 'Where  did that come from?' moments. To be honest, while I thought I might have the ability to go under two hours I thought that I would only just scrape it, so to be two and half minutes under with still quite a lot left in the tank is a massive confidence boost. Dale also ended up beating the club individual record and with Simon, we took the Phoenix Team record too, which means that Dale, Simon and I now hold the 10, 25 and 50 team records, which is something I'm pretty proud to be a part of. 

Kingston to Worthing TT

I've ridden this event four times and just ducked under 2 hours on a couple of occasions. Being a point to point TT the wind makes a bigger difference than usual and thankfully, yesterday, there was very little of it about. There was however plenty of sun, but being an early start most of the course was in shade as we headed South. I had Pat Wright of Paceline three minutes behind me, so my aim was to try to keep him from overtaking me for a long as possible.  There's not a lot of Pat but he is extremely fast and has won a few open events this year.  This however was to just be a training ride for him so while I was in full TT gimp outfit, Pat was on his road bike and road clothing so at least he was giving me a bit of a handicap.  Dale had dropped out so it would be left to Simon and I to duke it out to be the first Phoenix rider in this event so there was quite a lot to go for.  Simon and I are very evenly matched with us both beating each other only by a handful of seconds over various distances with our last 50 only separated by 1 second so it would be tight.

It's quite lumpy until you get to the Great Daux roundabout at about 20 miles before the A24 opens up to proper dual carriageway.  I think I probably overcooked it again in the early part but was glad I still hadn't seen Paceline Pat. It was not until the penultimate roundabout at Washington that he went past me, with a much higher cadence than anything I could manage, and I really struggled up this last climb.  I gave it everything over the last two miles and saw 1:52:xx on my Garmin which was a 5 minute pb.  My final time was 1:52:45.  Simon's was 1:52:46! So in 46 miles of racing we were split by 1 second.  I get the feeling that had the event been 47 miles I would have lost.

SCCU 50 and Newbury 12 hour TTs - meh

All the gear; no idea.

I can't say much about the SCCU 50 other than I was delighted when it was over.  I just felt really slow, which was damn frustrating bearing in mind how much work I have put in on the bike over the last 6 months.  The course for this event is horrible with lots of slow single carriageway and sapping hills, but I felt that I should be around a 2:05.  I wasn't even close. 2:11:48. The only slight consolation was that I pipped Simon by 1 second, however he lost a lot of time temporarily going off course to avoid colliding with a lorry at a roundabout.  So even that was pretty hollow.  It just felt stupidly slow for no real reason as I have ridden a 2:06 on that course before. What the hell was going on?

So on Saturday I was tinkering with the Argon as I had bought a new rear bottle carrier for the Newbury 12 hour and was just checking things over. I've had a problem with the rear brake for quite a while, not being able to set it up right to bite on the rims properly and I just put it down to the design of cantilever brake that's on there. So I had opened the brake right up so it wouldn't rub the rim, which obviously from a safety point of view isn't the most sensible thing to do, so I thought I would look at it one last time before the 12 hour. It was only then I noticed that my rear wheel was completely out of line;  I'm talking three or four degrees here. So instead of rolling perfectly if would be continually scrubbing sideways, effectively acting as a brake. I might as well have tied a brick to a piece of string and thrown it off the back of my bike.  That was also why I couldn't get the rear brake to clamp true on the rim as well.  Suddenly it all became clear and within a couple of minutes I had adjusted a couple of screws and the wheel was back in line.  A quick road test and it was like riding a new machine.  I've only been riding like that for the last year!

So it was off to the Newbury 12 hour with renewed energy. The only downer being the strong westerly that was likely to gust to 18 mph in the afternoon, but it promised a very fast easterly leg too. I gave a lift down to another rider, Chris, who was ironically my minute man. He was riding his audax bike and has ridden a sub 20 minute 10 and a 1:48:xx for a 50,  so he's what you would describe as a 'pretty useful rider'. I was slightly taken aback when he lit up a cigarette while donning his skinsuit and tied the most enormous frame pannier bag to his bike though. It seemed like he was doing everything to slow himself down. He was looking at riding around 270 miles so with my best being 234 I was unlikely to see him much after the start.

So off I went on the first leg and I have to say I felt very comfortable with the Argon just feeling totally different. The first leg was with the wind and I was spinning out at 30 mph on some sections.  Blimey it was quick.  Not surprisingly at the top turn the anchor was thrown out but I was still able to maintain 22-23 mph.  After an hour I could see Chris and I caught him and went past. That should have been when the first alarm went off in my head, but no, I ploughed on feeling amazing.  The second alarm should have gone off when I caught a guy who was my two minute man, again, a rider of considerably more talent than me. But no, I carried on.  The third alarm should have been when I went through three hours having ridden 70 miles.  A 280 mile finishing distance which would have broken Dale's Phoenix Club record by 15 miles. But no I carried on.

And then, as sure as eggs are eggs and as dependable as gravity, the wheels came off. At four hours I had covered 90 miles so I was still looking at a 270 mile distance finish, which would still be a club record, but the fact I had slowed that much in such a short space of time showed that I had gone out way too fast. This was confirmed when I went through 100 miles in 4:20; that's 16 minutes quicker than my stand alone 100 mile time. The three or so fast guys who I had gone past, overtook  me again like I was cycling in treacle as the stiff headwind began to bite.

While I had slowed a lot I probably could still have seen out 250 ish mile distance but now I had a new enemy; saddle sores. I was wearing my new no pinz skin suit which is a lovely bit of kit, but the chamois pad is a lot thinner than I would use for a ride like this and I started to get very uncomfortable.  The saddle I have on the Argon is the one I bought it with and it's a very cheap, hard and unforgiving one, which is ok for shorter distances of more relaxed riding positions, but now I have a more aggresive position it's just not comfortable enough.

It got to a point at 5 hours when there was no way that I could do another 7 hours in such discomfort so I decided to pack. It's the first time I have not finished a time trial but I learnt a lot.
1: I need a specific TT saddle. Not the testicle destroying monstrosity that I currently own.
2: I didn't have enough savoury food to eat. I should get a bento box for sandwiches etc.
3: Apply sun cram. I have some interesting tan lines this morning.
4: pace it right.

Anyhoo, it was still a good training ride even if I didn't accomplish a finish. Onwards.

Mostly cycling

I rode the SCCU 10 at the weekend on the G10/57 and achieved my aim of a course pb of 22:46; a one measly second improvement. I had a really good ride and with the stiff climb almost from the start, which I have always found tough, it was a well paced ride.  Simon beat me over a 10 for the first time in a year by 9 seconds, which was a great ride from him.  When I compared our rides on Strava he went out much faster than me, climbing that hill considerably quicker and I was going faster towards the end as I slowly caught him, but not quickly enough.  It's really good for both of us to be so close and to be pushing each other on. I was wearing my new Bambino lid, which was extremely comfortable and gave good visibility; it is the most comfortable aerohelmet I have ever worn.  Only time will tell if it will be actually 'faster'.


 Simon, Dale and I currently hold the Phoenix 25m team record so we have all entered the Bedford 10 on the F11/10 course and the Blazing Saddles 50 on the fast P885/50 course, with the intention of us getting those team records as well. The 10 record will be relatively straightforward, but the 50 will need Simon and I to go a good chunk under 2 hours, while Dale will probably be looking at potentially 1:49:xx.  It's something to aim for and it will be pretty cool if the three of us can hold all three team records at the same time.

I did an early turbo session this morning. My legs were very heavy from a 7 mile run home from work yesterday and I just couldn't push out the watts and I ended up spinning for most of the session. I was pretty disappointed and hacked off; I hate it when these sessions don't go to plan and I stalked off to the kitchen to get breakfast and turned on the TV to hear the news about the events in Manchester last night.  A big dose of perspective; it's only a hobby.

Free speed? You must be joking!

So after my outing at the Charlotteville 50 last week, things have been on a bit more of an upward turn. It was a pretty consistent week's training and I ended up riding over 180 miles, plus a swim and a couple of runs. Saturday morning saw me out for another 70 miles on the road bike on my own and while it was a slog at times into the wind, I felt pretty comfortable and got a pleasant increase in speed over quite a few Strava segments, despite it just being a steady aerobic ride. I did have a minor spill while riding one-handed and eating a soreen loaf. A temporary set of traffic lights had been set up for the Horse Show in Windsor and I just wasn't concentrating as I almost ploughed into a group of pensioners. Doh! Hit the back brake with my one hand and went straight down on the greasy surface with fresh rain. Thankfully, I was only pootling at 5mph and nothing damaged or dented except my ego. I had a lot of bemused stares from the elderly as I picked myself up, but the lady who was controlling the crossing was lovely and seemed quite sure that I wouldn't make it back and I should take care.

So, free speed. The bike speed that can be obtained without the need to train for it. However, free speed is a misnomer. Free speed is bloody expensive. My Catlike TT helmet was looking very tired and it was very large on my head. More importantly it had a very long tail and quite a few pictures taken of me racing time trials showed that the tail was often sticking up into the air as I got tired and lost a good aerodynamic position. I decided to get a short tailed aero helmet instead so I have bought myself a Kask Bambino, as worn by Team Sky. If it's good enough for them, it's good enough for me. It may not be as aerodynamic entirely as the Catlike, but with my head potentially wobbling about a lot more than it should I am hoping that the net effect will be a reduction in the amount of watts I need to push my carcass through the air.

And then there's a skin suit. First of all, my existing one is red and I look like an enormous overweight chilli pepper. It is highly unflattering. More important than that is the fact that it has a lot of wrinkles and wrinkles equals drag. I also have to pin my number onto the back and a pinned number also equals drag. So I've invested in a Nopinz skinsuit, which seems to be the current standard for such lycra items. On their website they claim that their Supersuit will give a 10 watt reduction in power needed at 45km/hr, so in theory over a 10 mile TT, that's a 'free' 16 seconds. So, for these two items I have pretty much spent the same amount of money as my first road bike. On Saturday I am riding the SCCU 10. Last year I rode a 22:47, which is my second best time. In theory if the conditions are on my side I should knock that out the park. If not,

Charlotteville 50m TT

I rode this event for the first time this morning, hoping for a pb, which I got, but it was one of those unsatisfying PBs that left me feeling a bit flat. Training's been going well and I've been pretty consistent, ftp's been creeping up and I've done more weekly miles than ever before. It's a pretty fast course so after last year's 55 minute 25 I thought a sub 2 hour should be on. I know that on a bike I have been finding it hard to keep my power up once I am over an hour, so this would be a test to see how my longer earobic endurance work has been going.

Well. it was fairly meh. it was quite parky when I set off but my heart rate was soon up, but on a few flat sections my speed was well down as I battled a head/ cross wind. After the first turn I was able to get my speed back up again and thought I was back on track as I headed to the top turn. Again, a long battle into wind as I headed south and I just hunkered down, trying to keep the cranks spinning quickly.  I ended up with a long 2:02, so a four minute pb, but there were people who I had beaten last year riding 1:58. I find a 50 a hard distance to pace and I think that I was too conservative and probably needed to push harder from earlier on. Next time.

2017

So it was my last tt today with a 25 mile effort on the lumpy G25/56 course. It was frankly a bit rubbish as I developed a cold earlier on in the week and I just couldn't get much power through the cranks. The first half was ok but a 4 minute negative split showed the fact I bombed pretty badly over the second half. 1:05:20, almost a full 10 minutes slower than my pb three and a half months ago, which in fact seems like almost a lifetime ago. So a crap end to the season but not entirely unexpected.

However it's been my most successful season ever. Taking over 5 minutes off my 25 mile pb and almost 2 minutes off my 10 mile time, as well as setting a course pb on the club G10/42 course by over a minute. That's all something I am super chuffed with and beyond my expectations before the season started and I believe that there could still be more to come next year. My 21:58 10 was on a pretty slow day and I had not done as much VO2 max work in the build up so I think that a sub 21 is achievable and a target for next year. I think that a sub 53 25 m tt could also be achieved and I am going to see if I can set a fast enough time to enter the National 25. So, that's the two main targets for next year and I need to get a decent 50 under my belt. My pb is still around 2:06 which is well below where it really should be.

How to achieve all this though? Well, a bit more of the same, in the sense that I'm going to hit the turbo hard again this winter, but as I said above, I'm going to do more VO2 max sessions and really try to boost my ftp over the winter. If time allows I would like to get a monthly long ride in of around 70-80 miles to aid the fat burning and aerobic efficiency. I think that's where I have lost out when competing over the longer distances. The first half of my season was way better than the second so I need to think about how I can not lose focus from June onwards. I'm going to need to lose a few more kgs too. Too many biscuits and crisps are slowing me down and that's where a little bit of running and some Parkruns come in.

All that said, I'm looking forward to a bit of a break over the next 4 weeks. The plan is to have no plan except to keep doing a little bit of running and some very unstructured cycling before getting back on it at the beginning of November. Then it's time to get it on like Donkey Kong.

When is a 25m tt not a 25m TT?

When it's 22.5 miles.

It was the Epsom Open 25 on the G25/54 course, two laps with a pretty testing climb over the first mile and a half of the lap. Only it wasn't. The organiser found out at 5am this morning that dozens of cones had been put out on the second half where a 'Tough Mudder' event was going to be taking place with all the ensuing traffic that would entail. The promoter changed the event to avoid this and it became three shortened laps and therefore three times up the hill. Bah. After the last couple of months I was not expecting much but it was my best ride in a long while. 53:18 for 22.5m equates to a 59:20 25mile TT and on such a lumpy course I'm pretty pleased with that, with me pretty much negative splitting over the course. So I have one more 25 next week and the Bec Hill climb for a bit of fun and then I'm planning to take a month off from anything structured before starting up again in November. I'm not sure what I'm going to change, if anything. I'll be sticking with Trainerroad over the winter but as I intend to focus primarily on 10 and 25 tts again, I am not sure whether to change plans. The guys at Trainerroad are uber-helpful so I might ping them an e-mail and see what they suggest.

I have been ticking over with a few short runs every week and I was back at Bushy for the Parkrun yesterday and recorded a 19:36. Usual scenario. Started too far back, worked my way through and felt comfortable and was blowing like a train over the last mile. 4th in my age group and 49th overall, so quite pleased. Might see if I can do a little speedwork and give sub 19 a go. Onwards.

Taking a hit

Fast bike, slow rider

The last three weeks have seen my training stall completely with me only managing a couple of hours each week. This has mainly been down to work and life stuff which I just was not able to balance up; having to work late meant that I was just too wiped to do a session at night. This has also led to me eating absolute rubbish as well, which is a complete double whammy. Virtually zero training and a steady gain in weight as I attack another pack of crisps, does not make an endurance athlete, even a mediocre one.

There will be a few changes in the Wheezy household next year and I am going to have to change the way and time that I train accordingly. I am going to have to start trying to get some sessions in early in the morning before work so that I can have my evenings free for concentrate on family and work commitments.

My bike fitness has really taken a dive. I did a 25 mile tt three weeks ago which although was slow, felt fairly comfortable, but then last week I did a Sporting 21TT. 'Sporting' in TT terminology means 'lumpy' or 'slow'. I was very, very slow. The first 10 mile loop was uncomfortable with the second one just being downright awful. To add insult to injury I properly bonked on the 15 mile cycle home trying to say on Simon and Brian's wheels as we spun slowly home and I couldn't even do that. Today was a little better at the SCCU Sporting 10. I was able to hit it a bit harder but a long 28 when I should have been doing a low 26 is pretty hard to stomach. Tomorrow is the last SCCU Sporting event of the early season, the Sporting 25. I intend to get there early and try to get a few miles in before the start to bulk the ride out a bit and then use the tt as training. I am simply finding it too hard at the moment to push any form of hard effort without red-lining very early.

I have the Alpe D'Huez triathlon in a few months time and I am going anaerobic on the smallest rise in the road. I am going to hit the hills really hard over the Easter break and try to claw some fitness back;  I think that I might even need some double bike days. The last month or so has shown me that in cycling, at my level at least, nothing beats volume.

Argon 18 E-80

So rather than my usual whinging and whining I thought I would try to put together a useful post about my thoughts on the Argon 18 E-80, my reasons for purchasing it and my first thoughts on riding it.

Why buy a specific time trial bike?

Well, this was a bit of a no-brainer. I have owned a road bike for the last 7 years, first my entry level Trek 1000s which was then replaced by my Van Nicholas Euros. In that time I have done everything on this bike and it's great for most things, but particularly what it's been designed for, that being all day comfortable riding. I always think of this bike as the equivalent of a GT car; long legged comfort for all day cruising but ultimately it's not designed for aero-efficiency. It has fat tubes, cables sticking out everywhere and a very relaxed seat tube angle which makes it great for hill climbing but it's all but impossible to get into the most optimally powerful and aerodynamic position. I was able to put on clip-on tri bars to improve my body position but ultimately my hips were still a long way back, I was very stretched out and my clip-ons had to be quite wide apart owing to the design of my drop bars which meant my elbows were acting as parachutes in the airflow. Most definitely, sub-optimal.

 This is where a tt bike comes in and with my increased involvement in time trial riding with the Kingston Phoenix I knew that I basically had a considerable handicap over the other riders who were on full time trial rigs when I was riding the 10, 25 and 50 mile tts. It seemed to me that a tt bike would be a worthwhile investment. Not free speed, but definitely extra speed.

So I have ended up buying an Argon 18 E-80. How did I come to that choice?

I guess I was looking for the 'most bang for my buck'. I was always going to have a fairly limited budget by tt bike standards, absolutely no more than £1300, but around that price point there are an awful lot of tt bikes to choose from, mostly frames with fairly basic wheels and running gear, so I was looking at the best frame that would fit me and allow the potential to upgrade over the years as funds become available. The usual advice is to ensure that you get a bike that fits. I am lucky in that I am 'Mr Average' and my anthropometrics are not particularly unusual. I'm slightly long in the leg but no excessively so and at 5' 10" tall, most medium frames would fit somehow. The one other useful piece of advice I got was to pick a bike that would allow the most amount of adjustability so that the bike position could be tinkered with as much as possible.

So, aero benefits, budget, fit and adjustability. The last thing I wanted was a certain degree of exclusiveness. I wanted a bike that was at least a little bit unusual; a bit of a head turner. You can imagine then that that pretty much ruled out every Trek, Giant, Scott bike. I ended up narrowing it down to three bikes.

Nice, but not nice enough.

Planet X Stealth. There's no doubt that this bike cannot be considered unusual or exclusive. Every TT start sheet and triathlon transition area is littered with them. They are amazing value and Planet X have become a leader at selling road and TT bikes where it does not seem possible for them to be able to sell them at the price that they do. A couple of months ago they were doing their Stealth, complete with a set of Planet X deep section wheels for £1100. I very, very nearly signed up on the dotted line. There were two reasons that I didn't. Firstly, the carbon frame. I would be absolutely paranoid about dinging, dropping, scratching or otherwise ruining it. I am quite haphazard and accident prone and I like to ride my bikes in all weathers and I don't want to be prissy about ruining it through my clumsiness. The main reason was though, that it just didn't excite me looking at it. Yes, it would be a great tt bike but I wouldn't feel great on it. So, that was the Stealth out of the running.

Yummy

Cube Aerium Race. I looked at this bike for a long time too. Aluminium framed, so tougher if dropped. The paint scheme looked fabulous and the build quality and components looked great but the thing that put doubts in my mind was the geometry of the frame. The seat post angle was 76 degrees and while this is not unusual for some tt frames, many others were 78 and I wanted to be able to achieve a more aggressive fit. I saw this almost as a fast aero road bike rather than an all out time trial frame.

Lush bike. Stupidly long extensions. Lawn needs raking.

Argon E-80. I had seen a few Argon frames at various tts, usually the carbon framed 112 or 114 and they were stunning bikes but well out of my budget, but when I did a bit of research I found out about their bottom of the range aluminium framed model, the E-80. Firstly the geometry was right, being the same as the 112 and having a reversible seat post  that could give either a 78 or 76 degree seat tube angle.

2 way seat post gives 76 or 78 degrees. A nice touch.

This would give me the adjustability I need to get a really good position on the bike. The other  factor that sold me on this frame was the small aero touches that had been designed in; the hidden front and rear brakes and the internal cable routing. Small things that actually probably make little difference aerodynamically on their own but add to the package and make it look faster and sets the frame apart from the other two I was considering.

Except for one area, the frame is beautifully made with welds that have been ground flat and aero tubing throughout and a fully aero-tubed seat post. You would be hard pressed to recognise it as an aluminium frame and it could easily be mistaken for a carbon one. It just looks like it's really been thought about and the design of the frame has not been skimped on.  The tubing of the seat stays and forks have a very flat profile which with the predominantly black paintwork looks quite 'skunk works stealthy'. I like. :-)   The bit that's not so good? The welding around the bottom bracket which looks like it's been done by an out of control chimpanzee with a welding fetish. The bb is where most of the stresses in the frame get concentrated so the welding has to be integrally perfect and with so many tubes congregating at one point it's pretty hard to smooth the welds out there, but still, it's the one eye sore on an otherwise beautifully made frame.




The hidden front brake.  A nice touch. The rear brake sits under the bb too.

Having said all that, most of the deals on a build with this frame were still too expensive (around £1500-1600), but then a few months ago it started to come down in price, first to £1299 and then all of a sudden TriUK brought it down to £999 and therefore I'd be able to purchase it on the cycle to work scheme and achieve a tax saving too. A double win. The reason for the price reduction was the fact that they still had stock of the 2012 frames and the 2014 frame was about to hit the shelves. Exactly the same frame but with a slightly different paint scheme. My order for one of the final 2012 frames went in the following day. It just goes to show that it pays to be patient and wait for winter and see what the sales bring.


The TriUK build featured fairly basic running gear. Shimano 105 crankset, front and rear mechs with dura ace shifters and fulcrum 7 wheels. I have the fulcrum 5 wheels on my Euros and while basic they are absolutely bombproof and have coped with the worst conditions that the roads of Surrey have dished out over the years. While not particularly aero they would be a great set of training wheels for the rest of the winter. The bars and seat are standard components at this price and the bars in particular could be something else to upgrade in the future with its round tubing to a set of wing base bars would look really nice on here.

The bike arrived fully assembled and I have to say very well made. I checked it over and all was good with the build. I should also point out that with Tri UK being based in Yeovil I was not able to get down for a fitting but they were very helpful and helped sort out an appropriate stem and crank lengths. Pretty good service I thought. There's plenty of stack height left so I am able to tinker around with the spacers and bar height before getting it cut to length. The same with the bar extensions which are stupidly long and will need cutting down so that I can shift gear without having to move my arms.

First Ride

So I have had my first couple of rides this week as up until now it's been bolted to the turbo. I spent the first 10 minutes on the bull horns, spinning gently and it felt very comfortable and stable. The most noticeable thing, coming from a road bike, was that my nose was almost directly over the front axle, a long way further forward that on the Euros, but even so it felt very stable. I have it set up at the steeper of the two seat tube angles but again, while it felt very different it didn't feel weird and was very comfortable. Once I got onto a more open piece of road I got down onto the bar extensions and this is when things really began to perk up. My knees are much further up behind my elbows and my back is a lot flatter than I could ever achieve on the Euros and it feels a lot more compact. The only time that this becomes a problem is when I am stopped and my knees are very close to the bars; I just have to be careful I don't clunk them as I move off.

I didn't push it particularly hard but when up to speed I was able to push quite comfortably and it felt like it was cutting through the air with a lot less effort. The factor I am going to have to adjust to is the gearing. The bike comes with a standard double gearing which is quite different from the compact gearing I am used to with slightly wider ratios. It will require a bit of getting used to in order to keep in the sweet spot but once the bars are cut down and I can shift while remaining aero I am sure it won't be too much of a problem.

I have ridden on it for a couple of hours now and I'm glad to say that I have not had any reactions from my back or joints(blimey, I sound old) and there's still a lot of adjustability left in order for me to find my best position.

So in short, I am really pleased with it and I feel that I have bought the right bike for me with plenty of scope for improvement. I am really excited about next season.

A gentlemen's TT

This week has been a bit of a washout. After returning from my long ride last Sunday I started to feel quite ropey and by the evening I felt so tired that I literally couldn't keep my eyes open at the dinner table so I ended up being in bed by 6 o' clock, thinking that would sort me out. It didn't. I ended up taking two days off work lying on the sofa watching rubbish daytime tv and sleeping. No head cold or sore throat but lots and lots or tiredness and my body fighting something off.

Needless to say nothing happened until yesterday when Simon and I were entered into the Redmond Cycling club's 2 up 'Gentlemen's time trial'. Another quirky event where one of the riders (me) has to be a veteran over 40 and they are towed around by the other rider. It meant that for 15 miles all I had to do was keep in Simon's slipstream and enjoy the ride, as much as I could with all the water being thrown up at me from his back wheel. Still, I had by far the better ride while Simon turned himself inside out while all I had to do was dab the brakes now and again to ensure I didn't clatter into him. I had elected not to use my tri bars on the Van Nic as I didn't think I would need them for drafting behind Simon and it was only after the event that I realised that this was probably my last tt on it. An Argon with my name on it is currently being built. :-)

I still don't feel right. I have just been to do an hour's swim and managed 40 ponderous minutes before calling it quits. The very gentle 20 minute run went much better with my Achilles not self destructing. I'm still doing my exercises and stretching on it and it feels quite strong, but then 20 minutes is hardly a marathon. I really want to get back running soon.

Another pb

Another Kingston Phoenix 10 mile tt last night and my third tt pb within a month. I guess that I must be doing something right. 24:49,  so still quite a way from the sub 24 that I want, but I am getting there. The G10/42 course is quite rolling with a couple of the climbs at the end being the points where I have blown-up badly. Last night I felt a lot stronger on the climbs and I was able to maintain the tt position rather than having to get out of the saddle. I did have a problem early-on when I dropped the chain onto the small chainring and couldn't shift back and I had to brake for a car on the last roundabout, so there still might be some free time to take off yet. A pb's always a good thing, whatever.

By chance, a guest rider from another club turned up on an Argon 18 E-80 so I was able to look at it close-up and he even let me have a short spin on it. It was lush. I want one. I want one now.

Piccy from SCCU 50

Almost smiling with 10 miles to go.

2 up time trial

A warm and calm evening greeted us on Wednesday for the Phoenix 2 up tt, with me partnering Russell. The two of us are normally within 10-15 seconds of each other when doing a solo 10 so we seemed to be a good match, although we are very different. Russell is a good deal taller and bigger than I am and pushes a much larger gear, while I am more of a spinner. We decided to take turns of about a minute or more, rather than the much quicker turnover usually recommended. The less amount of swinging out into the traffic on the A24 we could do, the better.

I took the first turn and felt a bit guilty as I swung out about a third of the way up the first significant rise on the G42/10 course (no need to thank me Russell). Russell then took a really long turn on the front after that before handing back to me as we approached the turn at Beare Green. A nice rest for me as I tucked into Russ' slipstream, even having to dab the brakes now and again to avoid touching his back wheel. We crossed the line together in a time of 23:42, which is a good 40 seconds or so faster than my solo pb. It felt quite fartlekky, with a really hard effort followed by a good rest, just coasting. All good fun.

A good end to the year

A much better week feeling back to normal. I'm just bloomin' loving running at the moment. The rain and wind's been lashing down but it's been so good doing some regular running with a bit of confidence. Mid-week I even did a fartlek run. Nothing too heavy and I was sloshing through a waterlogged playing field, slipping and sliding about in my trainers and the very soft ground lent itself to staying relatively injury free. Perfect. I think that I have finally got the better of my feet but I guess I will not know until I start to do some harder and longer speed work. But at the moment it's all good.

I suppose I should look back at this year and see what went right and what didn't. What did go right was the DW. I'm glad Adam and I nailed that one on the head. The culmination of a lot of hard work and effort and still a great race to do. The other thing would be my 10 mile tt best time coming down completely unexpectedly. Still nowhere near fast enough for my liking but a pb's a pb. I Also got an e-mail to say that I had won a total of £18 in race winnings during Phoenix tt races. That makes me a professional athlete, right?  ;-) Other than that, this year's been pretty poor with my foot injury colouring everything and I think that led to the major mojo dip which other than the few tt races saw me not competing at all. I am pretty confident that next year will be different.

So, what about next year? I guess I need to nail some targets to the mast.

1. Marathon PB. Currently 3.18. Realistically, sub 3.10 should be doable, sub 3 on a stellar day, sub 3.15 for a London marathon 'good for age' time as a minimum.

2. Olympic tri; sub 2.20. Qualifying for the World's is very unlikely but sub 2.20 may well be within my grasp if I can....

3. PB my 10 and 25 mile tt times. Ideally 23.30 for a 10. I'll probably need to invest in some aero help to achieve that, but you can never own enough bikes.

Ultimately, I just want to race a bit more and be fit enough to do so. I know I was pretty much saying the same thing last year but I don't have an excuse now. I've sorted my feet, I'm enjoying my training and I've entered some events. What could possibly go wrong?  ;-)

The best and worst of cycling

What with life proving hectic again, training has been commuting. This week just gone, I ended up cycling to work 4 days out of 5 and I have been finding that I have been tiring myself out because of it. I find I slip into the habit of battering myself at every opportunity when probably I need to take it easy, but towards the end of this week I was forced to slow down. Sheer weight of traffic made it almost impossible to attack any Strava segments so I settled for spining home instead. I had the unfortunate experience of witnessing a nasty motorbike accident on the way to work on Thursday. The rider was being attended to but looked in a bad way and it was a sobering experience. I pride myself on the fact that I am a defensive rider; I don't take stupid risks. No Strava segment is worth a trip to A & E. It just felt pretty dangerous out there. The next day, only a few hundered metres from where I had seen the accident the day before, there was another motorcyclist lying in the road after hitting a van. It genuinely shook me up. I really enjoy commuting on my bike but at some times the risk:reward balance seems rather imbalanced. :-(

The good news is that the regular cycling that I've been doing over the last few months has begun to pay off, despite it being fairly low in quality. This morning was the last tt of the season, the Consolation 25. Apparently, the handicap is closely guarded but the handicapper goes around asking, 'Have you won anything this season?' and those who answer 'no' stand a much better chance in the handicap prize. :-)Anyway, after warming up by spinning the 10 miles from Simon's house I was off at 9am. I planned to rein it in for the first part as I was unsure of what my endurance would be like, but I was hoping to keep Simon at bay for at least the first half, as he would be starting 2 minutes after me. The first few miles on the A24 went fine, catching my minute man, then it was a hard left turn onto the A29 Ockley Road. It was along here that I had detonated quite spectacularly in my first 10 this year but this time I felt much better; normal even.

It was at the end of the A29 after about 14 miles in that I didn't know the route, so after overtaking Ray (almost 80; legend) I then had to stop for 30 seconds to see which way to go. At the next roundabout Simon caught me and we joined a short section of dual carriageway. Knowing that it was the last stretch I put my head down and overtook him, only for him to come back at me. It was great fun and while I was feeling extended I was also feeling strong and thought I could take a significant lump of the 2 minutes back that he had put into me if I could work really hard. It was then that the route incorporates a couple of miles of significantly more lumpy hills and I had to work really hard to keep Simon in touch but gradually he  pulled away and by the time we hit the last few miles on the A24 again, he was some 200 metres ahead. Simon's always been stronger on hills than me but generally I have been stronger on rolling road and I managed to slowly reel him in towards the finish but the line came too quickly and he was still some 10 seconds ahead when we reached the finish. I celebrated by honking my breakfast up as Simon looked on. The perfect Sunday morning.

I am very pleased with it though. I was pretty strong over the the entire event and to bring Simon back in the last mile was a massive confidence boost. It's just a shame that the season's now over.

So, what to do next?

London Olympic Time Trial

Back on the Hampton Court Way to see history being made. What a day. Just a great atmosphere. So pleased to have been there.

Ready and waiting

Armstrong on her way to Gold



Menchov (I think)



Phillipe Gilbert