Road Cycling

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New bike arrived last night. Nice little ride in this morning. Seat was too low, so felt that, but first time in clip ins and it was all good.

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James07 said:
1e41ft.jpg
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Which overshoes and socks are those? DHB ones?

grudas said:
seem to average around 80rpm guess that's quite low?
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Keep pushing! :p

Although looking at your SS your RPM is mostly around 85-90 RPM when you're doing ~20mph on the longer stretches - which sounds about right for a speed demon like you. Shows you got your gearing spot on! :)

Shamrock said:
Leith Hill claimed a life yesterday.
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Shame to hear that, especially after my mate was there. He said loads of people stopped so the marshals stopped everyone for safety. RIP.

James07 said:
First 100 mile ride!
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Congrats and well done again! Go careful with your ankle/knee though!

Thomas. PLease. said:
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Still makes me drool when I see that S3, I'm not usually a fan of really aero looking bikes, nor of red, but the combination of colours and the shape of the S3 really appeals!


Wet commute in this morning, legs struggling slightly after saturday's ride and then hammering it yesterday (stupid, stupid stupid!).


Ordered some bits from Wiggle in the 'Sale' (:rolleyes:) including a pair of Castelli bibs to try again now I've lost some weight. Ordered some knee warmers and a gilet too.

I'm unsure what to do about tyres, I'm running my GP 4Seasons after finding a cut in my pro4e's sidewall but quite cautious about 'wearing them out' as I originally wanted 2 or more winters from them. Pro4e's in 25mm are getting rare and not quite the bargain they used to be, with the V2 Endurance and Service Course being £36 for 25mm I'm looking elsewhere. On wiggle currently the GP4000S are £35 and the GP4S are £32. Making both expensive, what does everyone recommend for a ~£25 tyre?

I'm looking at the Durano but also spotted the cheapy Ultra Sport II. The original GP's are around this price too and the majority of all the Continental tyres are compared to them, are they the best cheap alternative to the GP4000S?

I ride a mix of commuting and leisure on fairly normal UK roads (with their fair share of dirt and potholes).
 
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SDK^ said:
In my opinion average ride power is useless if zero values are ignored - If you have zero values ignored and you're only pedaling for xx% of your ride then your average power won't be the full duration of the ride; only the time you were pedaling (producing power).
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That's fine but we're talking about cadence :p
 
Who needs a personal trainer when you have grudas following you ;)

Robzere31 said:
One of the reasons me & the wife don't have a joint account ! :D
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Agreed! Although mine commented a few days ago 'I don't know how you save any money you're always on Wiggle.' :rolleyes:

It's because I don't spend £250 on 2 coats and a handbag love

She does enough shopping yet can't grasp my 'window shopping' :confused:

James07 said:
These are the overshoes.
http://www.wiggle.co.uk/bbb-heavyduty-overshoes/?sku=5360595790

The socks are wiggles own but they've been discontinued now :( shame really as they're brilliant!
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Ahhh good shout on the BBB's. Neoprene? I've got some DHB neoprene which I'm wearing into the ground. They've been fantastic. Bought a pair of PlanetX ones (same cost as the DHB) and they're quite poor fitting and badly designed in comparison.

Socks, I've worn DHB Coolmax up until now (except in the winter of course, I wear PX Flanders merino's). Considering getting more colours to at least match some of my gear more... See me in the middle of this pic playing with my garmin (in the red/blue/black Northwave). But is getting colour matching socks just too tarty?! :confused::eek:

Cleats & Shoes.

I've been running SPD's since starting clipless but I feel I should be heading towards SPD-SL when looking at my next shoes (probably not until next year). A few months back I bought a pair of SPD winter GTX boots for the wet weather... Will feel slightly silly only getting 1 winter out of them so what are my options? They don't appear to have cutouts to fit SPD-SL cleats, are there adaptors you can get? Drill holes in them and fit my own plates?
 
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250 quid on two coats and a handbag?! Pretty good value, I'll swap you! ;)


I managed to order the wrong size tyres from Wiggle, so gotta sell them local or pay $15 restocking fee.

And my Assos lobsters have damage after two wears! They have a rubber Vermeer over a cloth layer on the palm, the rubber has split where your thumb and fingers bend and meet. Emailed the factory outlet to see if they will do anything.

Aside from that, my legs were dead this morning, and I was late for the bunch, had to chase on with local hard man, asked him to take it easy and I wheel sucked him good. Still averaged 300w for 16 minutes..,
 
grudas said:
balls... so no guaranteed place!

got a cadence sensor! for the lols -;

SS flat out -; https://www.strava.com/activities/360131966/overview -150rpm max lol.
Carby -; https://www.strava.com/activities/360132002/overview

seem to average around 80rpm guess that's quite low?
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Ignore the average and ignore the extremes. Strava presents probably the least useful info from your cadence sensor. There are too many factors which will slow your average - freewheeling but turning the pedals slowly, dealing with traffic and slowing/speeding up at lights etc.

Two things you're probably interested in as far as cadence goes are 1. what's it like on the flat 2. what's it like on a hill of x% gradient.

So find a section of your ride where you have a long flat stretch with no interruptions - what was your average like there? That'll give a better insight into how you actually ride.

Then look at a section of your ride where there's a long steady gradient with no interruptions. That'll give you an idea of how you pedal on a climb.

General riding is just too changeable to take meaningful info from. Compare a normal commute for me, where it's very stop/start and lots of different things impact the ride (dog walkers, cars, lights etc). My ave is generally down around 80 ish.

https://www.strava.com/activities/315003679

Then compare that to a TT, where although it's quite lumpy and reasonably technical course it's a constant effort level. Easily 90 average, but around 100 consistently on long straight sections:

https://www.strava.com/activities/169501582
 
platypus said:
Yer that worked until we got married and then moved to a joint bank account :p.
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I've ridden with a guy who wanted a new frame from Planet-X but didn't have SWMBO approval. He paid cash, and arranged for them to send him a letter saying he'd won a new frame in a competition :eek: :D
 
tedmaul said:
Ignore the average and ignore the extremes. Strava presents probably the least useful info from your cadence sensor. There are too many factors which will slow your average - freewheeling but turning the pedals slowly, dealing with traffic and slowing/speeding up at lights etc.

Two things you're probably interested in as far as cadence goes are 1. what's it like on the flat 2. what's it like on a hill of x% gradient.

So find a section of your ride where you have a long flat stretch with no interruptions - what was your average like there? That'll give a better insight into how you actually ride.

Then look at a section of your ride where there's a long steady gradient with no interruptions. That'll give you an idea of how you pedal on a climb.

General riding is just too changeable to take meaningful info from. Compare a normal commute for me, where it's very stop/start and lots of different things impact the ride (dog walkers, cars, lights etc). My ave is generally down around 80 ish.

https://www.strava.com/activities/315003679

Then compare that to a TT, where although it's quite lumpy and reasonably technical course it's a constant effort level. Easily 90 average, but around 100 consistently on long straight sections:

https://www.strava.com/activities/169501582
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I agree for the most part. In this case though the extreme end of the cadence looks quite legit - it's a slow ramp up to 150 rather than a sudden spike. Normally I'd treat it exactly as you've said however.
 
FrenchTart said:
I agree for the most part. In this case though the extreme end of the cadence looks quite legit - it's a slow ramp up to 150 rather than a sudden spike. Normally I'd treat it exactly as you've said however.
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I wasn't so much meaning it wasn't legit - ie that it didn't actually happen. It probably did happen. My point was more that it's kind of meaningless from an analysis point of view - the extreme ranges of the data generally only happen for a split second and don't really tell you anything about how someone pedals.

If you want to find out something like 'what is the fastest i can pedal without bouncing' you'd need to wind it up fast and hold it for a few minutes to assess where your limits are.
 
#Chri5# said:
I've ridden with a guy who wanted a new frame from Planet-X but didn't have SWMBO approval. He paid cash, and arranged for them to send him a letter saying he'd won a new frame in a competition :eek: :D
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haha - I've got a "client" (cough cough) who I deal with who always seems to have spare stuff to give me just lying around his house. That's what I tell the wife.

She thinks the new Rose bike I got, I just paid for the frame and my client build the rest Di2, wheels etc - and just gave me them!!:p:p

Amazing the wife hasn't twigged yet - spare old credit card I have and pay off over time.
 
Roady said:
Cleats & Shoes.

I've been running SPD's since starting clipless but I feel I should be heading towards SPD-SL when looking at my next shoes (probably not until next year). A few months back I bought a pair of SPD winter GTX boots for the wet weather... Will feel slightly silly only getting 1 winter out of them so what are my options? They don't appear to have cutouts to fit SPD-SL cleats, are there adaptors you can get? Drill holes in them and fit my own plates?
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just run different pedals in the winter
 
tedmaul said:
I wasn't so much meaning it wasn't legit - ie that it didn't actually happen. It probably did happen. My point was more that it's kind of meaningless from an analysis point of view - the extreme ranges of the data generally only happen for a split second and don't really tell you anything about how someone pedals.

If you want to find out something like 'what is the fastest i can pedal without bouncing' you'd need to wind it up fast and hold it for a few minutes to assess where your limits are.
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Sorry - I wasn't meaning to suggest you were saying "lol, no way you peddled that fast" more that I often see random spikes in my Strava cadence/etc data that are clearly bogus. I assumed you were talking about that kind of thing.

I agree that you should look at trends such as those you mentioned.
 
Roady said:
Cleats & Shoes.

I've been running SPD's since starting clipless but I feel I should be heading towards SPD-SL when looking at my next shoes (probably not until next year). A few months back I bought a pair of SPD winter GTX boots for the wet weather... Will feel slightly silly only getting 1 winter out of them so what are my options? They don't appear to have cutouts to fit SPD-SL cleats, are there adaptors you can get? Drill holes in them and fit my own plates?
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I really don't see any point in switching to SLs. Switch to peddles with less float and/or shoes with stiffer soles and you'll get virtually all the benefits on SL without all the drawbacks.
 
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