Tommy Simpson goes rollin' in the deep.
When it comes to training, no one loves riding outside and loathes riding inside more than I do. On the other hand, riding outside is dangerous, especially with something like the Tour de Trump running the show. So I’ve been working on my road safety by not riding on the road and riding my rollers instead.
The added benefit of the rollers is that I do it in the early hours of the day, when no one is stirring apart from the odd mouse, so there are no witnesses. No one wants to see a shirtless man crying. Not even a mouse.
The rollers are the quintessential winter training and warm-up device. Merckx rode them. I was going to list other people who rode them but then realized that the list is as complete as it needs to be with just that name on it. I’d never ridden them until last Spring, when Marko sent me his, saying I could have “those diabolical bastards”. I rode them on my road bike until it got light enough to accommodate morning rides outside which was twice. Then I forgot about them until we fell back again a few weeks ago. (Daylight Savings? More like Daylight Shavings.)
With the days getting short and my gut getting wide, I’ve turned once again to the rollers for my morning Spanish Turbo Sessions. Except this Fall, I’ve been riding my Don Walker track bike (which was here until ridden only for the Festum Prophetae Hour) which adds the benefit of an unforgiving fixed wheel to the fun of riding these torture devices.
On the plus side, nothing will give you a more Magnificent Stroke than this heinous combination will. Thirty minutes feels like a lifetime; forty-five like an eternity. I’ll let you know what fifty minutes feels like when I get there. At which point, much like with The Hour, I’ll no doubt climb off, citing road conditions.
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@frank-
"On the plus side, nothing will give you a more Magnificent Stroke than this heinous combination will. Thirty minutes feels like a lifetime; forty-five like an eternity. I’ll let you know what fifty minutes feels like when I get there."
Forty five minutes? Not bad young one...my fixed gear limit to date is an hour and a half, but I have done 3 1/2+ hours on the road bike....I did an hour on the 53x16 this past Wednesday. :-)
Can we just read about cool stuff...."riding, bikes, training". The article was ruined in the first paragraph. I'm so over everyone's political opinion.
man.. i worked as a messenger in downtown SF on my Guerciotti in a 52X16 one summer. didn't do much for my stroke, but my quads and butt got so big i looked like a centaur or mantis or something. not in the Forstenmann/ Bauge category, but enough that i looked really weird next to normal people and i had to buy Dickie's pants four sizes too big and have the waist taken in like a cholo. my favorite all around gear was a rather pedestrian 46x18. i had a 16t on the other side of the hub for when i got bored. never, not one single day in the 17 years i spent riding that, did i ever untilize a freewheel or brakes of any kind.
one thing about riding a fix for a long period of time is that it will alter your pedal stroke in terms of power delivery. as a road cyclist, i spent a lot of time honing the Guimard method of kicking your foot over the top of the stroke and sort of dragging it back, as if you were scraping mud from the sole. after a few months on a fix, that was out the window. my cadence was WAY up, and i found that i was delivering most of my power about ten degrees shy of bottom dead center of the stroke. like a machine gun, as it were. better for rapid accelerations and drastic changes of pace, but nowhere near as good in terms of efficiency.
I too added rollers to my collection of "things you already have and don't need to spend money on..." as the wife calls it. I did my best to explain the difference between rollers and a trainer.
I started using them to smooth out my stroke, then to warm up pre-ride, then to warm pre-trainer. Now, as the dark months set in, I use them to remind me that I didn't properly seat my tub on my front wheel when I swapped back to the winter treads.
Welcome to the Machine, Frahnk!
I've been a Roller Convert since 2011 when my Kreitler 2.25 rollers arrived. I have a trainer as well but it is the rollers for me.
I have never ridden fixed gears on the rollers so that'll have to wait until I get a track bike but I have hit 3.5 hours on the rollers on my road bike.
The key, for me, is to ride out of the saddle for five straight minutes every 15 minutes. Helps the blood flow to the bits and pieces and really gives you something to look forward to every quarter of an hour on the bike.
I usually ride them at least twice a week year round. I keep them in my office and do it at lunch. Quiet and efficient use of an hour that I could never steal outside the office. My staff has "accepted" it as just another weird fucking thing that I do and they just come in and ask me questions all the time while I ride.
Nothing like the '93 RVV on youtube in French, my fan blowing in my face and the rollers humming beneath my wheels!
@Buck Rogers
the '93 edition is a particularly fine vintage.
Rollers, turbo, spin classes?
That way lies madness...
4 sessions this week x 45 mins. It's better than a turbo. Cannot imagine it at work though!!!
I'll be doing a 3 hour indoor session tomorrow. I actually look forward to them on Zwift.
Turbo, not rollers, but constant pedaling for three hours is something you feel afterwards.
I might put the fixie on it one day to see what it's like.
@ChrisO
I've started doing hour long turbo sessions every week. I find that causes me enough undercarriage problems. 3 hours sounds like hell.