Q1 2012 V-Kit Order
It hasn't always been this way, where we thoughtlessly disembogue 140 characters or less in messages sent into a medium where our crimes against language, spelling and grammar will live for ever.
There was a time when we wrote letters. These letters were carefully composed and penned onto thick, quality parchment paper and sealed in wax. These letters were then dispatched to the farthest reaches of the world where they would be carefully read and digested before a response was given. Technology and innovation are often taken as synonyms for progress, but with that progress usually comes the death of ritual and tradition.
As we close the books on the Q4 2011 V-Kit order, we open the books for the Q1 2012 order. Our insistence on the highest quality products made to our exacting standards translates into a long wait while the kit is manufactured. This presents a challenge when loving family and friends want to give the kit as a gift to a velominatus, because the timing of our delivery timetables rarely coincides with the intended occasion. To work around this problem in the past, we have arranged for a letter which is carefully crafted and personalized before being printed on thick parchment paper and sealed with a hand-dripped wax V-Seal for wrapping and giving on the day.
With the holiday season coinciding with our next kit order, we introduce the V-Gift Letter for wrapping and laying under the tree, announcing to the recipient the impending Glory of Merckx which will befall them upon the arrival of their kit several weeks later. We also offer a version of the letter for the Keepers Tour in the event that any loving family or friend intends to make a gift of the ultimate cycling trip to their Velminatus/a. The letter is free, with the cost going towards postage only.
With that, we officially open the 2012 Q1 V-Kit order. The only thing that remains is the choice: Zwarte, Witte, or Winter. However you choose, choose wisely and choose carefully as orders are custom made. Place your order by midnight on January 6 for the next V-Kit shipment, scheduled to arrive in late February.
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A point of clarification: all packages from the Q4 2011 V-Kit order have been dispatched.
I just realized the the date on this order and I realized that its perfect! I can usually count on some extra cash at the beginning of the year. hmm, what to get?
@itburns
How could I contemplate anything to the contrary – any wounds inflicted on her will be scars of pride in years to come
@Buck Rogers
Just finished my roller session, 1:32:56 of L’enfer du Nord. Awesome. But it wasn’t on a v-kit pad and I could almost feel that pavé.
@Dr C
I’m quite envious, my Cannondale is not built with comfort in mind.
@Chris
NICE!!! I have my roller session tomorrow early morning before work. It will be my sixth or seventh session. My longst on the roller is only 87 minutes so far. Maybe I will try to push it out a little more tomorrow as I am now inspired!
@Buck Rogers
I’ve not yet tried morning roller sessions for fear of waking the little people up as I crash round the kitchen. Tonight’s was the longest though, previous best was an hours worth of sufferfest, either Downward Spiral or Hell Hath No Fury. My cycling sensei is very keen that I make 2 x 20 minute intervals the cornerstone of my plan at the moment. They’re properly brutal when you get them right. That’ll be tomorrow night.
@Chris
I do not really have a plan except ride when I get a chance. Really should be a bit more formal, I suppose. But then again I do “pushes” here and there throughout the ride and keep the HR up if it is a hard ride day and down if it is an easy ride day. Need to try some of these 2 x 20 minute intervals. What level do you gauge your interval effort by? HR percentile? Perceived effort? Wattage?
@Buck Rogers, @Chris
You’re both reminding me that trainers are such a great way to do interval training. No other way of controlling your effort for precise periods of time. Might have to set mine back up for that, I’m getting great base mileage in this time of year, but I need to do some speed work – noticed I was really flat on my last ride. Wooden legs.
@Buck Rogers
The plan with the 2 x 20s is get a nice 10 minute warm up down then select a gear on which you can put in a sustained 20 minute effort at 100rpm. If you get it right it’ll start off feeling too easy but by the end you’ll be working hard. If you get it wrong, you’ll either breeze through the whole thing or you find yourself looking for bigger cogs Then a nice 5 minute recovery before selecting the same gear and repeating.
I’ve only done a few of these so I’m still getting used to getting the right gear. Last time round I pretty my nailed it. Felt fine for the first 10, worked hard for the next 5 then started to wonder whether I’g gone one cog too small for the last five. Got my heart rate under control during the recovery. From the outset of the second effort I was doubting whether I’d make it without shifting but hung in. Last eight minutes hurt alot. My heart rate maxed at 167bpm and averaged 147bpm (my max HR is 191bpm). It was only in the last few minutes that felt my lungs and heart working hard. The real effort was in keeping my legs going at the required cadence without shifting. I would say that leg strength is a weakness though. In terms of perceived effort, I haven’t really looked at thing from that angle but I’d say that if you’re questioning whether your going to be able to hold your cadence and gear for a few more minutes then this goes all the way to 11.
Constant cadence is key and I also found it helps to count it to keep my mind off the task at hand. If you’ve got, ahem, a power meter then I guess you’d be looking t a constant output for both efforts.
@Chris
Good stuff! I do not have a power meter, hell, not even a cadence sensor, but I do have a HRM and speed distance. I use feel and my HR to monitor effort, even though I know that the HR tends to drift over time.
I’ll have to try those next week, AFTER the Cogal on Sunday (not going to kill myself today with that coming up! :)
@Buck Rogers
You can use your speed to ensure a consistent cadence once you’ve counted your cadence a couple of times and know what speed your going at that cadence. I’ve only got max and average HR so try to count cadence every minute or so to make sure that I stay on track.
The other tip from my cycling sensei is to stay relatively upright to keep the chest open and away from the legs. In the drops, intense, high cadence efforts on the rollers where you tend not to shift around too much on the saddle can bring your breathing rate closer to your cadence which is not good.
If I’m stating completely obvious things here, sorry, being relatively new to la vie means that I don’t always know what is common knowledge.
@Chris
All good advice, although I do ride in the drops a bit to try to make the roller sessions as close to the road as possible. Jumping on the roller sin about 5 minutes. We’ll see what i have in me this morning. The stationary trainer was always so much “easier” to use but so much less of a true ride workout.
@Chris
Looking back, today was my eighth roller ride ever. Rode a new longest for me at 1:45:11. Actually able to stand up now and ride for a bit, which really helps me ride longer as the backside doesn’t’ get so sore! Rode steady with a few pushes here and there. HR ave/max was 146/167 with my max HR from the ITT race three weeks ago being 193. Good workout but not too hard as the Cogal is in three days!!! Man, I LOVE rollers. Not sure that I will ever use my stationary trainer again.
@Buck Rogers
Strong work! That’s a decent length session, were you watching L’enfer du Nord on you tube?
Standing up is not for me yet, it’s hand and bum firmly planted. I did spend a bit of time last night practising taking one hand or the other of the bar last night but trying to get a drink in was not happening.
2 x 20s this evening then hill reps in the dark on Saturday night. Yeah!
@Chris
No, just listened to a playlist that I have on my ipad. Good tunes for riding, though. On the rollers, unlike the stationary tariner, I do not get bored, at least not yet.
I finally mastered the bidon grab and replace with either hand and either cage. Also able to blow my nose into a tissue now while riding (the VMH doesn’t appreciate just blowing one nostril at a time onto the rug). Next step is no hands riding!
But I have been riding and racing since I was 16 years old, with a twelve year break from around ’94 to’06, and am now turning 40 in January, so I am not knew to riding or bike handling, just knew to rollers! :)
@Chris
btw, nice training coming up in the next few days for you!!!
@Buck Rogers
I have a set of rollers. They scare the shit out of me. Any advise?
@Buck Rogers
That is a mammoth session on the rollers, well done! I read somewhere that time on rollers is equal to time and a half on the road, I’m not sure of the details but maybe it’s because you never get to coast.
@Chris
I meant to ask you about these 2 x 20s, thanks for more detail. What is this type of training for? I might try that one tonight.
@both There’s a cadence meter here you’ve probably seen it before I’m just linking for ease and speed (I found it this morning). Yesterday I had my first near slam, was determined not to use the wall, bad idea! Luckily unclipped and caught myself before a serious injury occurred. Holy Merckx.
@RedRanger
I am by far no expert, only my 8th ride on rollers this morning. But I have a few pearls I have learned over the past three weeks: First off, I set them up within one foot of a wall so that I can brace off it if I needed to. The first time I rode them, the first 3 minutes I never let go of the wall! But then, slowly throughout the first ride, I became a lot more steady.
Also, you have to have a high cadence with a decent amount of resistence. Going too slow, either with cadence or speed/resistence, and it makes you fall off. That was counterintuitive for me at first.
As I became better, I started to challenge myself with getting the bidon, trying to stand up a bit, blow my nose with a tissue, etc and it justs gets exponentially easier with each ride, at least for me. Also, need to be on them for at least an hour a session in my opinion, to get the feel of them and get it ingrained in the cycling body memory.
I’m sure that others around here will be able to add much better advice, but that’s what I’ve learned so far.
Oh, and also, don,t be afraid of crashing off them. I have now twice and it was no big deal. Pretty much just an instant stop. I also have a bed on the other side of my rollers so if I do crash, it’s either a wall right there or a soft bed. But each time, it was just a quick stop as I went off the side and no fall (except the time I tried standing up quickly and shot forward, that was a bit if a bitch). But it’s like rock climbing. You HAVE to fall in order to see that you will not get hurt and the equipment will keep you safe.
@RedRanger
I set mine up in a doorway so you have something for your shoulder to lean on if you need it. It also helps to look ahead of you and not down at the bike/guns/white ladies, as sweet as each of them may be. Also, when going for the bidon or towel look ahead and move the hand still on the bars near the stem although while this works for me others might not find it so useful.
@RedRanger
Put them in a doorway and remember that learning to ride a bike was exponentially harder than the minor adjustments needed to ride on rollers. I prefer to place my bike in front of the rollers (front wheel on ground in front of front roller, back wheel on ground in front of back rollers), swing the leg over, then back the bike up on to the rollers to mount instead of climbing aboard with the bike already in place.
Also, as @Buck Rogers found out the hard way, make sure the front roller is adjusted properly under your front wheel. Crucial for stability. The web site has a good setup video.
@frank
Indeed. Trainers are almost insufferable for anything but intervals.
I find my indoor training goes by quite quickly when I’m doing structured intervals, because the effort is hard enough that it distracts me from how freakin’ boring it is.
But you can’t just do intervals, as that isn’t good training. Last night I did my weekly “easy” trainer ride, which I tried to keep around 28 KPH/100 RPM for an hour, with some TV from Netflix on the laptop to keep me occupied. Boy, I don’t think I’ve ever watched a longer episode of Battlestar Galactica EVER.
I’m going about all this without a coach or cycling sensei, but so far 2x a week on the trainer (one ride structured intervals, one not) and a good outdoor ride on the weekend with climbing is keeping me from at least sliding backwards as far fitness goes.
@snoov
It’s aimed FTP improvements my understanding of which is sustainable power.
One of my week areas is leg strength toward the end of longer rides, I get dropped at the merest hint of a hill so that one of my targets apart from just improving as a cyclist.
When we started putting training plans together, I sat down and identified a number of specifics that I’d like to achieve. The base plan is two sets of intervals, a set of hill reps and a 30-40km ride and a 70k plus ride. So far life has conspired against actually getting that down but we’re getting there.