Road Cycling

Roady said:
Anyone with info/insight into car roof racks & thule bike mounts.
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I use Thule proride 598 and they are utterly flawless, literally takes less than 30 seconds to mount a bike with absolutely no fuss and they are rock solid. I got cheap mounts first time round and they were wobbly, a nightmare to mount the bike and made tonnes of noise on top of the car when driving. My 330d has integrated roof rails so I just got the cheapest box roof bars to attach the Thule mounts to the car.

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So I spent last week wondering why the **** I couldn't seem to hold power and put it down to be severely under-recovered due to quite a step up in cycling volume and also a moderate calorie deficit.

So I came back to maintenance/slight surplus for the last three to four days and spent a large proportion of the weekend resting after my club ride. Feeling fresh as a daisy and stuffed full of calories I decided to jump on the turbo last night and see if I'd beaten the demon...

I've not trained with power for long so I'm still establishing a feel for set levels but I do know that the warm up on TrainerRoad is feeling somewhat harder than expected. By the time the 5 minute stint at the end of the warm up arrives I'm already at Threshold HR and about 60% of power FTP :eek: It leaps up to simulate the power ranges for the workout for the next 5 minutes and within 1 my legs are grinding to a halt.

Having had enough of this I decide to check my pedals in the PowerTap App as maybe a setting somewhere has gone full derp on me...

Turns out that I'm not the only one this has happened to but despite not having used my Garmin since getting my Elemnt it's mysteriously set one of the crank arms to 110mm!

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The relief from my trainers ERG mode was like falling on to a freshly made bed :p

This means that all my TSS & IF as well as power figures & splits on Strava Segments are way off too, as is about a weeks worth of figures for my PMC :mad: I did think that they did seem a little on the low side but not having trained with & taken notice of power for more than a few weeks I wasn't certain. It does look odd on last Saturdays climb to only be 10s slower than the next best club member but be putting out half the power he was... live & learn.

Had a very sadistic over/unders session on the turbo last night with some new found enthusiasm :cool:
 
alexisonfire said:
I use Thule proride 598 and they are utterly flawless, literally takes less than 30 seconds to mount a bike with absolutely no fuss and they are rock solid. I got cheap mounts first time round and they were wobbly, a nightmare to mount the bike and made tonnes of noise on top of the car when driving. My 330d has integrated roof rails so I just got the cheapest box roof bars to attach the Thule mounts to the car.

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Great info, thanks mate :)

There's so many options with Thule and they all review well so fairly sure I'm going that route. My biggest concern/problem is the lack of mount points on my fiesta which I don't think there is much I can do about. Have spotted this on the ford site which includes the Thule 591 carrier. It is slightly unclear if the Fiesta 3-door price (£279) includes the 'roof ditch mouldings' (mentioned for other Fords, I think 4x4's) as part of that or not (it's not mentioned as required for other car types). The 591 is £85 on the Halfords site, so I'm assuming it does.
BennyC said:
Turns out that I'm not the only one this has happened to but despite not having used my Garmin since getting my Elemnt it's mysteriously set one of the crank arms to 110mm!
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WTF! Hahaha, madness! Glad you found it but gutted it took so long (so you're left with pretty duff data).

Is that from the Garmin app/Powertap or Wahoo?
 
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Roady said:
Is that from the Garmin app/Powertap or Wahoo?
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The Garmin borked it. I specifically checked the crank length settings when first setting them up & updating firmware with my 500. And power readings remained normal when switching to the Elemnt. I haven't used my 500 with them since so lord knows how it managed to cause such a derp...

Powertap have their own App which you can record activites on but also acts as a utility for checking firmware, installing updates and tweaking settings. The pedals default to 172.5mm.
 
Hi all i am planning to surprise my gf to a trip around cotswold for a few days and it will involve some cycling!

my question is, is there any famous routes i can take that is not too challenging(say a 20-30mile cycle ) with very scenic route we can stop and take pics on the way?
 
BennyC said:
I haven't used my 500 with them since so lord knows how it managed to cause such a derp...
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Major derp!

Find it weird that an old version of Garmin firmware can derp the crank length, sync it to Garmin Connect that then somehow sync's with Strava(?) and modifies ride data uploaded from the ELEMNT to Strava (via a Wahoo app?) Or are you using Garmin Connect with the ELEMNT? Still, utterly bizarre! :eek::rolleyes:

God bless the internet and someone else finding/reporting/fixing a problem before you encounter it! :cool:
randomshenans said:
I rode today for the first time in weeks. I thought I'd die. Which was nice. I need to rack up some KMs now though, I ate all of the US.
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I hope your reasoning for missing good cycling weather was because you were following Le Tour!? ;):p

Kids on summer hols now, some leisurely rides for you to ease back in, or are there different holidays with you guys?
jonneymendoza said:
Hi all i am planning to surprise my gf to a trip around cotswold for a few days and it will involve some cycling!

my question is, is there any famous routes i can take that is not too challenging(say a 20-30mile cycle ) with very scenic route we can stop and take pics on the way?
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Unless you want to track down some of the 'Top 100 UK Climbs' you're best seeing if you can contact someone local or a few local cycling clubs to suggest routes. You could also google around to see what Sportives are run around the area and then look at their routes/Strava rides to get an idea of popular places. Although most of them will probably be climbs/coffee stops.

EDIT: FT has a friend who lives near Cheltenham (but unsure if he/she cycles). I've got someone in Bristol I could ask (and another blog guy who lives in the Mendips but I know he hunts down climbs). I'll ask around my club guys as well as some of the climbs/routes I might be interested in myself at some point as I'm only a couple of hours away in Hereford.
 
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Is it quite a flat area or lots of hills? i have a few options.

we could take the train from london to oxford and cycle from there?

Or i can drive all the way to cotswold area with a bike rack(any recommendations for a nissan Micra?) and go from there?

Should i take my road bike or mountain bike? I am not sure what the terrain is like over there and if its doable by road bike or not.
 
Roady said:
Major derp!

Find it weird that an old version of Garmin firmware can derp the crank length, sync it to Garmin Connect that then somehow sync's with Strava(?) and modifies ride data uploaded from the ELEMNT to Strava (via a Wahoo app?) Or are you using Garmin Connect with the ELEMNT? Still, utterly bizarre! :eek::rolleyes:
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Lord knows but I don't need to use GC anymore and can't see much point uploading to it now anyway, especially as Garmin are restricting their API for auto-uploads shortly.

Strava & TrainingPeaks does me fine :)
 
BennyC said:
Lord knows but I don't need to use GC anymore and can't see much point uploading to it now anyway, especially as Garmin are restricting their API for auto-uploads shortly.

Strava & TrainingPeaks does me fine :)
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So what does the ELEMNT use to sync/upload to Strava? I imagine a Wahoo app on your %mobile%?

Just 'normal' Bluetooth (PIM? The same way my 810 does to my android, then GC to upload/sync to Strava) or does it upload directly to something else (unlikely)?

Just asking as I'm getting persuaded more and more by the ELEMNT! ;)

jonneymendoza said:
Is it quite a flat area or lots of hills? i have a few options.

we could take the train from london to oxford and cycle from there?

Or i can drive all the way to cotswold area with a bike rack(any recommendations for a nissan Micra?) and go from there?

Should i take my road bike or mountain bike? I am not sure what the terrain is like over there and if its doable by road bike or not.
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It's quite hilly, if you're coming from London then you'll find it very very hilly! But then that's why you're coming there! You can't get views without climbing some hills first lol ;)

Stow-on-the-wold has some ok hills around it, I only mention that from driving through there. I really don't know of many other places around there as it's not an area I visit. The Cotswolds proper are probably 30-40 miles from Oxford, Stow is more like 20-30. Each way. Depending on routes of course!

It's a big area so without some exact positions/places it's hard to advise but you should be fine on road bikes.
 
Thanks for the advice about the powermeter guys, decided to go for a single sided one. Managed to get the Stages meter that fits my crank delivered to a mate in America for £300 (even with current exchange rates). He's over next month so can't wait to give it a go!
 
So, estimated calorie burn without HR or power data. Just how far off is it or is that one of those how long is a piece of string type questions? I tend to use calorie data from my riding to try and keep my eating in check and basically have two figures. Garmin Connect which tends to be silly high and Strava which is generally about 3/5 of the GC figure unless I'm riding off road. Obviously I use the Strava one for pie offset duties but recently I've been wondering how different the numbers might be if I was to wear a HR monitor? Has anyone ever been able to make a comparison between Strava estimated calories and those generated when using a HR monitor?

I have no other interest in HR data beyond calorie burn so I'm struggling to justify getting one as I'd need a new cycle computer as well. If Strava is within 20% with its guesstimate I may as well keep on as I am.
 
Yup.

Hit a bump when on the largest cog, must've been enough flex to get raked into the spokes :( Locked the rear up solid and ruined my tyre also.

£15 hanger, £40 rear mech, £35 tyre and some new spokes needed :(

Probably a new chain while I'm at it. Bah!
 
Evening all,

Need some help with a really annoying front wheel hub (I think)


It's that double clicking sound, the wheel itself isn't catching on the brake/frame which makes me think its the hub.

They're Dura Ace 9000 hubs with the cone and cup style bearings. I took them apart and I couldn't see anything wrong but then I'm not the most technical. All the vids I've seem have the bearings "free moving" whereas these are set inside what appears to be a plastic unit to keep each bearing in place.

Edit: Should've said it only makes the sound when I'm riding, not if I just spin the wheel without weight on.
 
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