Official P&b Cycling Thread

[ark loyal]

It's been nice in the past few weeks to get the bike off the turbo and head out for a good few rides on real roads.  Was somewhat forced into it due to some motor problems and got the bike out for the commute a couple of times.  It was still a little cold for my liking to be out on the bike at that point.

Then I had a week in Lanzarote and managed to get out a few times and got about 150 miles in and up most of the islands popular climbs.  Nice to ride on some roads that weren't littered with potholes.  As much as I wouldn't want to complain about the weather over there...  the wind certainly made some of the descents interesting.

In the week since I've been back I've got out for a couple of wee group rides.  The winters training on the turbo seems to have paid off a bit, took 30 seconds off my previous best on my go to hill rep climb. 

 

[oldbitterandgrumpy]

11 hours ago, welshbairn said:

A friend's doing it this year and I was wondering if there's anyway of monitoring their location online? A cousin ran the Budapest marathon last year and we could check where she was through the race. 

Glympse. Works for me. Syncs your location on Google Maps in real time. Even tells whoever's watching what speed you're doing.

[dorlomin]

11 hours ago, jupe1407 said:

What kind of strength work have you been doing? I've been fannying about the 14mph average for fucking ages now. It'd be useful to build something else into my routine than might help. 

You might want too look at sprints on the bike or tabata\fartlek in the gym.  Generally it will be something called "functional threshold power" that you want to focus on to go faster that is the power you can output over an hour. 

These are HIIT or " high intensity interval training" protocols. They aim to allow you to deliver more power over a full hour than simply building 

 

 

Tabata is to warm out then nail it for about 20 seconds where your heart rate is at 909% of maximum then dial back for 40 seconds before repeating it for about 4 minutes. 

Fartlek is more like Warming up then hitting something like 75% of maximum heart rate or about 120% of functional threshold power for about 4 minutes and resting for about 3 minutes before hitting it with a cycle of 4 peak outputs, there are many other variations on these. 

 

There are many variations of these. 

Other training techniques can including going out and training "tempo" 

How you raise your BPM is up to you, but some find it hard to do on the open road with all the distractions so spin cycles, cross trainers and even running can do this. 

 

Squats and deadlifts will give you more power in the legs/engine but its the heart and lungs, the carburettor where the air burns the fuel. that is where most people lag. 

GCN show covers some ideas: 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited April 15, 2018 by dorlomin

[dorlomin]

8 hours ago, statts1976uk said:

Been working squats, leg presses etc. There was a really good article in cycling weekly a couple of weeks ago but I started in January. I had never really bought into the protein shakes, supplements etc and maybe it’s had an effect maybe it’s the placebo effect but that with a change in diet seems to have helped.

There is a general rule of "20% 80%" for most training about 80% of your gains will come from about 20% of the efforts. To improve to about 80% of your potential just takes the first steps on an road to training the so called 20%. Hitting the gym for muslce building, training for a marathon or bike ride for amateurs is about getting the basic 20-% training right. 

If you are very carefully managing your "macros" or macronutrients vs energy expended then a protein shake is the 80% for the final 20% of gains. For most cyclists just getting a decent amount of protein will be ok.  Unless you are sprinting or perhaps BMX or something most muscle will be excess weight. Getting a healthy diet of unprocessed foods, low in salt, saturated fats and something in the order of half a gram of protein per pound of body weight should be in the ball park for retaining lean tissue mass. If you are looking to put on muscle then upping this to closer to 1g protein per pound body fat should do it with ease. When you are a 100kg body builder with about 220 pounds of body weight and trying to get about 220grams of protein in maybe 3000kcal per day then protein shakes really matter. Perhaps if you are an advanced amateur cyclist carefully managing your weight or you have limited access to unprocessed foods etc then protein shakes might matter. 

For cycling (as I understand it) your leg work should focus of explosiveness and total power so you should be looking at 3-6 reps per set and something like 3 or more sets per exercise with the idea you are close to failure or at failure for your final rep regularly. Higher reps per set will be more for body building that is larger muscles than more power in the muscle This will increase the bodies creating fast twitch\powerful cells. Endurance (slow twitch cells) will generally be trained on the bike itself. 

 

The recommended diets for cyclists focus on foods high in fibre and protein as they help you feel fuller for longer.  This should help you reduce total body mass, body fat mass and increasing slightly, your lean tissue mass. That is reducing the percentage of your body that is fat while increasing your muscle. 

 

Sorry if this answer is over kill or inappropriate. 

Edited April 15, 2018 by dorlomin

[statts1976uk]

10 hours ago, dorlomin said:

There is a general rule of "20% 80%" for most training about 80% of your gains will come from about 20% of the efforts. To improve to about 80% of your potential just takes the first steps on an road to training the so called 20%. Hitting the gym for muslce building, training for a marathon or bike ride for amateurs is about getting the basic 20-% training right. 

If you are very carefully managing your "macros" or macronutrients vs energy expended then a protein shake is the 80% for the final 20% of gains. For most cyclists just getting a decent amount of protein will be ok.  Unless you are sprinting or perhaps BMX or something most muscle will be excess weight. Getting a healthy diet of unprocessed foods, low in salt, saturated fats and something in the order of half a gram of protein per pound of body weight should be in the ball park for retaining lean tissue mass. If you are looking to put on muscle then upping this to closer to 1g protein per pound body fat should do it with ease. When you are a 100kg body builder with about 220 pounds of body weight and trying to get about 220grams of protein in maybe 3000kcal per day then protein shakes really matter. Perhaps if you are an advanced amateur cyclist carefully managing your weight or you have limited access to unprocessed foods etc then protein shakes might matter. 

For cycling (as I understand it) your leg work should focus of explosiveness and total power so you should be looking at 3-6 reps per set and something like 3 or more sets per exercise with the idea you are close to failure or at failure for your final rep regularly. Higher reps per set will be more for body building that is larger muscles than more power in the muscle This will increase the bodies creating fast twitch\powerful cells. Endurance (slow twitch cells) will generally be trained on the bike itself. 

 

The recommended diets for cyclists focus on foods high in fibre and protein as they help you feel fuller for longer.  This should help you reduce total body mass, body fat mass and increasing slightly, your lean tissue mass. That is reducing the percentage of your body that is fat while increasing your muscle. 

 

Sorry if this answer is over kill or inappropriate. 

Thanks @dorlomin, definitely not overkill in fact quite the opposite. I’m going to bookmark this page so I know where to find that post in future. Definitely very informative and something I’m going to use in future!

[keptie]

First cycling work commute this year Arbroath to Dundee and I was just thinking beforehand I've not had a puncture for ages....bad thought.. got the inevitable puncture 6 miles in grrr. Good to get a good cycle in though and the decent weather makes it so much nicer, roll on summer.

[Dindeleux]

Don't think I've;posted this link for a couple of years but its quite a good tool if you use Strava http://www.jonathanokeeffe.com/strava/map.php

[Dindeleux]

Don’t know if anyone has heard of Sean Conway (he ran Britain a couple of years ago).

He is attempting to cycle from Portugal to Russia in 25 days.

https://www.yellowjersey.co.uk/sean-conway-cycling-world-record-attempt/

[Newbornbairn]

Probably faster than a Kia could do it in.

[welshbairn]

2 hours ago, Dindeleux said:

Don’t know if anyone has heard of Sean Conway (he ran Britain a couple of years ago).

He is attempting to cycle from Portugal to Russia in 25 days.

https://www.yellowjersey.co.uk/sean-conway-cycling-world-record-attempt/

Bet he's feeling a bit fucked at the moment, just beginning to climb the Pyrenees. 

[dorlomin]

After a long UK winter that was some utterly fucking blissful weather over the past week. Bit of July in April. 

[Dindeleux]

I caused a crash yesterday 

 

Well not really a crash but I pulled out of a junction when I shouldn't have (wasn't enough of a gap before the car came) causing the car to swerve onto the other side of the road.  This then led to a bit of a chain reaction where a car coming the other way had to brake quite hard and the car behind it was then forced to jump up onto the kerb and kind of bumped into one of those plastic bollard things at the side of the road.

Like any good cyclist I quickly fired down a wee lane next to the school and disappeared.

[Benjamin_Nevis]

I caused a crash yesterday 
 
Well not really a crash but I pulled out of a junction when I shouldn't have (wasn't enough of a gap before the car came) causing the car to swerve onto the other side of the road.  This then led to a bit of a chain reaction where a car coming the other way had to brake quite hard and the car behind it was then forced to jump up onto the kerb and kind of bumped into one of those plastic bollard things at the side of the road.
Like any good cyclist I quickly fired down a wee lane next to the school and disappeared.

Driver going too fast IMO

[Dindeleux]

Driver going too fast IMO

Never actually thought of it this way. The driver who hit the bollard should never have been close enough to the car in front that he had to swerve off the road into the bollard at the school.

I mean, it’s a school, a child or anything could’ve ran out.

[Benjamin_Nevis]

Never actually thought of it this way. The driver who hit the bollard should never have been close enough to the car in front that he had to swerve off the road into the bollard at the school.

I mean, it’s a school, a child or anything could’ve ran out.

Was this in a built up area? A car shouldn't be close enough or travelling fast enough to require such evasive action.

[Dindeleux]

8 minutes ago, jupe1407 said:

12 minutes ago, Dindeleux said:

Never actually thought of it this way. The driver who hit the bollard should never have been close enough to the car in front that he had to swerve off the road into the bollard at the school.

I mean, it’s a school, a child or anything could’ve ran out.

Was this in a built up area? A car shouldn't be close enough or travelling fast enough to require such evasive action.

Yes a very built up area including traffic calming measures.  

Although I agree that the car shouldn't have been going that quick it was one of those times where you are glad you don't have a registration plate on the back of your bike.  I won't be back in that town again for a while just in case  .

[Benjamin_Nevis]

Yes a very built up area including traffic calming measures.  
Although I agree that the car shouldn't have been going that quick it was one of those times where you are glad you don't have a registration plate on the back of your bike.  I won't be back in that town again for a while just in case  .

Be tough to attribute fault imo, but best to be on safe side I guess.

[keptie]

6 hours ago, jupe1407 said:

Be tough to attribute fault imo, but best to be on safe side I guess.

Clearly the drivers fault going by the account given by  Dindeluex the roads really should  be a kept clear of  motors for cyclists to safely go about their business .

Edited April 26, 2018 by keptie

[Dee Man]

8 hours ago, Dindeleux said:

I caused a crash yesterday 

 

Well not really a crash but I pulled out of a junction when I shouldn't have (wasn't enough of a gap before the car came) causing the car to swerve onto the other side of the road.  This then led to a bit of a chain reaction where a car coming the other way had to brake quite hard and the car behind it was then forced to jump up onto the kerb and kind of bumped into one of those plastic bollard things at the side of the road.

Like any good cyclist I quickly fired down a wee lane next to the school and disappeared.

@PB 4.2

[Unleash The Nade]

10 hours ago, Dindeleux said:

I caused a crash yesterday 

 

Well not really a crash but I pulled out of a junction when I shouldn't have (wasn't enough of a gap before the car came) causing the car to swerve onto the other side of the road.  This then led to a bit of a chain reaction where a car coming the other way had to brake quite hard and the car behind it was then forced to jump up onto the kerb and kind of bumped into one of those plastic bollard things at the side of the road.

Like any good cyclist I quickly fired down a wee lane next to the school and disappeared.

If the car that hit the plastic bollard was a Kia, I’m assuming it was a write off ?