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Race The Training Thread

Hi Andy,
I rode up from the Otari Onsen side as far as the gravel section last year. Its about 6km and 400 vert up from Otari Onsen.

Here's a vid of someone doing the road in a 4x4 from the Otari side. The gravel where I turned back is about 11:20. The tunnel at the top of the climb is 14:40. From there on the Myoko side it looks pretty rough all the way. It's the first time I've seen this video, but if I ever do it, it'll be on a mountain bike.


The road onward from the Ohnagiyama trailhead from the top of the marked Otari climb is gated off, but is probably passable with the odd landslide. It heads down to Himekawa Onsen and is also gravel at the start.
 
Hi Andy,
I rode up from the Otari Onsen side as far as the gravel section last year. Its about 6km and 400 vert up from Otari Onsen.

Here's a vid of someone doing the road in a 4x4 from the Otari side. The gravel where I turned back is about 11:20. The tunnel at the top of the climb is 14:40. From there on the Myoko side it looks pretty rough all the way. It's the first time I've seen this video, but if I ever do it, it'll be on a mountain bike.


The road onward from the Ohnagiyama trailhead from the top of the marked Otari climb is gated off, but is probably passable with the odd landslide. It heads down to Himekawa Onsen and is also gravel at the start.


Nice find!

Looks similar to some of the rindos here which keep cutting up my tyres!(today too!)

So agreed a MTB is probably better.

The free outdoor natural onsen on the Otari side would probably be a good place to start and finish!

Andy
 
Still fighting a cold this week. Didn't do much in terms of volume. But managed to do some worthwhile training all the same.

The usual weekly training blog link and cut and paste below.

Cheers, Andy




「two weeks down」

two weeks down with a cold
the first time to catch a cold this year
after the masters TT , I guess the timing is good

concentrate on rest
early nights
no asaren early morning training

*monday: CX nishiyama ridgeline
*tuesday: CX gravel
*wednesday: CX gravel
*thursday: gym
*friday: CX gravel
*saturday: gym
*sunday: CX kakuda trail (plan)

some off season weight training
85kg x 12 x 10 for the lunge at this point

in addition
some gravel riding to prepare for the rapha gravel race in two weeks time

the course remains a secret

on the course
two 10km gravel sections will be contested as a race

if it's flat or rolling I stand a chance

uphill or downhill and I'll just be making up the numbers...

still it gives me motivation to train
and enjoy getting dirty!

kakuda tomorrow!

fun fun fun!
 
Did a 3-hour ride last weekend, after a month of doing almost nothing (due to illness and travels). And I was surprised, I didn't feel I was going very hard, but still managed to average 290 W on a 26-minute climb (which is 94 % of my last tested FTP). I thought I had lost way more horses than that. My average speed wasn't impressive, but it was pretty windy yesterday and average and normalized power numbers were higher than what I was expecting. I plan to slowly restart my training cycle this week.
 
Did a 3-hour ride last weekend, after a month of doing almost nothing (due to illness and travels). And I was surprised, I didn't feel I was going very hard, but still managed to average 290 W on a 26-minute climb (which is 94 % of my last tested FTP). I thought I had lost way more horses than that. My average speed wasn't impressive, but it was pretty windy yesterday and average and normalized power numbers were higher than what I was expecting. I plan to slowly restart my training cycle this week.

It's said that you don't lose fitness that fast, you just lose blood plasma volume which makes the first few workouts you do after coming back very hard.
Wonder if I should get a respiratory trainer....
 
It's said that you don't lose fitness that fast, you just lose blood plasma volume which makes the first few workouts you do after coming back very hard.
Wonder if I should get a respiratory trainer....
Yeah, that sounds about right. I was literally on the floor, panting after I tried a sprint workout. 😅
 
I ordered a PowerBreathe Plus on a whim to see if training the respiratory muscles can reduce RPE.
 
I had my first regular workout today, which leads up to a 6-month long TrainerRoad training plan (I have a business trip coming up next week, and I want to get back slowly into training regularly). The workout itself was quite mellow, upper Zone 2 to lower Zone 3. Psychologically, it was a bit hard in the beginning, and took me a while to get used to turning the pedals on a trainer. I have (only) two more workouts scheduled this week, although I do have a better bike fit scheduled for Sunday (yay!). A guy from Shimano comes to the LBS regularly just to do bike fits apparently.
 
I had my first regular workout today, which leads up to a 6-month long TrainerRoad training plan (I have a business trip coming up next week, and I want to get back slowly into training regularly). The workout itself was quite mellow, upper Zone 2 to lower Zone 3. Psychologically, it was a bit hard in the beginning, and took me a while to get used to turning the pedals on a trainer. I have (only) two more workouts scheduled this week, although I do have a better bike fit scheduled for Sunday (yay!). A guy from Shimano comes to the LBS regularly just to do bike fits apparently.

Oh yeah, I forgot that Shimano had their own bike fitting system.

Today I remembered why I like sweet spot. Because the difficulty is..... right in the sweet spot. And you can do lot of kayjays. Tough, but not too tough.

I am glad I didn't get the "Red" PowerBreathe, since the Blue one is PLENTY hard even on the lower settings. Turns out it doesn't really train the exhalation muscles, but it does put a lot of strain on the inhalation muscles. If I try too hard I can feel my throat closing off on itself. Perhaps this will have some benefits in strengthening the vocal cords and other throat muscles to prevent this from happening.

I ordered new bibs.... another 170 bucks I would have preferred to spend on something else.
 
Oh yeah, I forgot that Shimano had their own bike fitting system.
I'm already looking forward to the suggestions and afraid of talking to my sponsor: narrower handlebars, shorter cranks and perhaps a new stem … or better yet, a new bike frame.
I am glad I didn't get the "Red" PowerBreathe, since the Blue one is PLENTY hard even on the lower settings. Turns out it doesn't really train the exhalation muscles, but it does put a lot of strain on the inhalation muscles. If I try too hard I can feel my throat closing off on itself. Perhaps this will have some benefits in strengthening the vocal cords and other throat muscles to prevent this from happening.
I haven't heard of such a device. What exactly do you think you can get out of them?
 
I'm already looking forward to the suggestions and afraid of talking to my sponsor: narrower handlebars, shorter cranks and perhaps a new stem … or better yet, a new bike frame.

I haven't heard of such a device. What exactly do you think you can get out of them?

I would think it would reduce the RPE of breathing (or at least inhaling). After doing 30 reps this morning (on setting 2 out of 10), breathing in suddenly felt effortless. Haha. Supposedly it takes about six weeks of two sessions a day to get the full benefit.

I figure the less mental effort that breathing requires, the more effort in my legs I can tolerate. That is free watts, as far as I can concerned.

Being able to breath in faster gives you more time to exhale properly, which should held at a pointy end of a ramp test or VO2max effort.
 
Really enjoying riding the local gravel recently. It's a far cry from Niigata's famous smooth tarmac. But the effort is the same.

The usual blog link and cut and paste below.

Cheers, Andy



「winter mode」

the temperature has finally dropped from the mid twenties

it finally feels like the off season now

last week's training

*monday: CX gravel, gym
*tuesday: CX gravel
*wednesday: CX gravel
*thursday: zwift, gym
*friday: CX gravel
*saturday: gym, zwift
*sunday: CX kakuda trail (plan)

three off season weight training sessions
95kg x 10 x 10 for the lunge

the first time to ride zwift in 7 months too
concetrating on TTs for 7 months
I have no top end sharpness!
still scrape through!

some gravel riding to prepare for the rapha gravel race next sunday

lots of different types of gravel can be ridden in kashiwazaki

flat, up or down
soft or hard
fine or coarse
wet or dry!

the course still remains a secret
so I do a bit of everything

the soft mud and sand of kakuda again tomorrow

3 weeks in a row

once a week over the winter will be great training

jumping into winter!
 
I went to a cycling event today (short but reasonably steep) and have a race in the same place tomorrow.

I always find I feel really good when I eat a nice breakfast (seven eleven bento, a canned coffee, an energy drink, and a nikuman).

Actually, it might be the caffeine, not the carbs. That, and some solid training this week.

I *almost* beat a conti pro to the top of a short hill...but like usual I wimped out a few seconds too early. Hehehe.
 
Almost exactly how I expected. I was second to last of the people who finished in my category, although the race was a mix of two different classes, so there were a few people who finished behind me.

I was struggling on the first climb even during the parade start and watched as the group sped off into the distance after the bike sped off. The race was basically three Z4 intervals separated by Z3 recoveries.

I think the guy who cheered me on during the last climb (I was actually just clearing my throat) before I passed him on the downhill came in last.

"Beginner" class is meaningless since there's so many sandbaggers.

NP was 276 which was three watts better than at the Japan Cup Challenge Race. Both were about the same length.
 
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Almost exactly how I expected. I was second to last of the people who finished in my category, although the race was a mix of two different classes, so there were a few people who finished behind me.

I was struggling on the first climb even during the parade start and watched as the group sped off into the distance after the bike sped off. The race was basically three Z4 intervals separated by Z3 recoveries.

I think the guy who cheered me on during the last climb (I was actually just clearing my throat) before I passed him on the downhill came in last.

"Beginner" class is meaningless since there's so many sandbaggers.

NP was 276 which was three watts better than at the Japan Cup Challenge Race. Both were about the same length.
As you told me, the racing scene in Japan is very competitive and 276 W normalized power is nothing to sneeze at. Keep it up!
 
Thanks. Hopefully once I get down to a reasonable weight I can focus more on increasing power.

Of course, the point of racing isn't to establish new NP records, but it can hurt the ego when your NP for a race that lasts less than an hour is less than your FTP. Although this time I "only" lost seven minutes to the winner instead of 13 like at the Japan Cup.

The descents look a lot scarier on video than they felt at the time. Haha.

After eating a bunch of carbs this weekend my weight was up two or three kilos yesterday.
 
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