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Today - May 2011

First time up the Azami line to the 5th station on Fuji this year. It's still an absolute BEAST of a climb.

About an hour to get up; 12 minutes (!!!!) to get down.
 
As I was feeling stronger this last week, hit 45.7 coming back into town (not seen that for ages, but sadly wasn`t for 20k or into a headwind) thought I`d test myself with an all-out effort on my favourite climb. But blew up without even geting as far as last time, and was only on the same overall time :( I repeated it at a slower pace on the bottom and ended up quicker but still short of my best time. Tried one more time, with a slighly faster bottom section than second time, but only ended up spotting the same time as the 2nd attempt. So overall, :thumb1: But for three combined attemps it took 3 minutes of my previous best so there is some improvement there on the endurance side and managed to put it on the big chain ring for the lower gradient sections for the last climb. So, hopefully haven`t started to plateau yet :pray: the day after, tried again and bettered any of the times, but still short of the best time so just carried on climbing til my system said `no more` :rescue: Hence, yesterday`s recovery commuting and today`s rest day, but should be good to go tomorrow.
 
Awesome! I will do this sometime next week. BTW - what average gearing did you settle on? I saw Naomi's cheese grater rig :eek: I'm thinking 39/23 , but even that may be too high - and need to look at 34 /23 as my 'go to' for this event.

First time up the Azami line to the 5th station on Fuji this year. It's still an absolute BEAST of a climb.

About an hour to get up; 12 minutes (!!!!) to get down.
 
Awesome! I will do this sometime next week. BTW - what average gearing did you settle on? I saw Naomi's cheese grater rig :eek: I'm thinking 39/23 , but even that may be too high - and need to look at 34 /23 as my 'go to' for this event.

34/27 is my lowest gear. The highest I used in training on this climb was 34/19 so I think 34/23 is probably a good bet for you. Alternatively, use 'walkable' shoes like MTB spds and run up the steep sections, cyclo cross style!

You might want to put two brakes on to come down, even for training. The descent is a brake and wheel killer: Mike cooked one of his rims after last year's race, and other people have had wheels fail completely. If you've only got one brake it's going to take even more heat. I was alternating brakes and braking very late/hard to keep the heat down.
 
I hadn't visited the forums since 27 April. :eek: But that doesn't mean I haven't been riding; 7 wonderful days in Shikoku over Golden Week, sandwiched by DIY projects didn't leave much time for reading.

Glad to be back. Looking forward to Sado Longride on Sunday, whatever the weather.
 
I've been trying out some new vittoria diamante pros for the past couple of weeks. Didn't really need any new tires but the price was 1900 yen so couldn't resist. I had my doubts for cornering , since they are 700x20s, but much to my surprise they were really grabbing the road on hairpins. I was also able to record a personal best max speed on one of my favorite descents. Just wondering if the 700x23s would be better... Unfortunately, they were not on sale.:bike:


Now, if I could just get myself ascending faster:climb02:
 
Thanks Alan! I've been doing some hard mashing training specifically - very heavy gear and effort over sustained time. I'll go up this week and try the 34 /23. BTW - good idea about the cyclocross mode - as it happens, I have Time ATAC's and Specialized CX shoes - so I can very quickly dismount /mount and run easily on any surface. I just need to reverse my cleats so they pop out asymmetrically ( I usually mount from leftside)

Tim

34/27 is my lowest gear. The highest I used in training on this climb was 34/19 so I think 34/23 is probably a good bet for you. Alternatively, use 'walkable' shoes like MTB spds and run up the steep sections, cyclo cross style!

You might want to put two brakes on to come down, even for training. The descent is a brake and wheel killer: Mike cooked one of his rims after last year's race, and other people have had wheels fail completely. If you've only got one brake it's going to take even more heat. I was alternating brakes and braking very late/hard to keep the heat down.
 
Tim, also keep meaning to say excellent performance in the Tour de Kusatsu. I read your post from the year before about how you wanted to knock 10 minutes off your time and to achieve that improvement takes consistency, dedication and pure hard work and not many people manage to keep it up for any prolonged length of time, so many congrats. :clap: Look forward to reading your report next year detailing how you won your age group. :no1:
 
Had two WTF moments these past few days. Sunday, tried out a new mountain I`d been eyeing for a while and about 1/4 of the way up got distracted by a dog rushing out from the side. Took a while to confirm it was chained and couldn`t reach out and get me but once I`d gone past it, paid more attention to the road and noticed something in the middle. As I looked down I realised I had just narrowly avoided a snake (literally, a few inches!) WTF! :eek: Not kidding, but was about 2-3 feet long. Haven`t seen one that big outside of a cage before. Had snake bites in the inner tubes, but never tyres and certainly not my legs. Thankfully, wasn`t there when I came back down.

On Monday`s commute, passed a kid (male 14-16?) on the pavement riding a Cervelo, presumably to school... WTF! Was too busy watching the traffic to tell for sure, but think it was an old R3 (poss RS) judging from the paint scheme. Some people have more money than sense...:hammer:
 
Was looking forward to commuting Tue, Wed & today but the rain scared me away. Today I had fun in the pool. Will now go to the pool every Wed or Thu by car or bike...depending on weather...
 
nice sunny but windy day up here, had to really push between gigs this morning on the SS. Cadence was high and felt good, total traveled 43kms of up and downs. Knees and thighs are feeling it so gotta be good!:thumb:
 
awesome video of shikoku tour mike..... nice to see the old crew out

I was also out on shimanami on may2 (going to matsuyama), then to Kochi, then to Takamatsu. 3 day jaunt. ended up taking inland roads through shikoku by accident - only to find some of the most stunning riding through river gorges... sorry to mis you guys...
 
Was looking forward to commuting Tue, Wed & today but the rain scared me away. Today I had fun in the pool. Will now go to the pool every Wed or Thu by car or bike...depending on weather...

Same rain here, did 40min (maybe 42 laps) after work. School pool, so it's only a couple minutes from my office.
 
Was looking forward to commuting Tue, Wed & today but the rain scared me away. Today I had fun in the pool. Will now go to the pool every Wed or Thu by car or bike...depending on weather...

So you didn`t want to ride in the rain, but went to the pool instead and got wet??? :confused:

Anyway, some of us don`t have a choice but to commute in the rain and on the way back, added in some hill repeats, and saw a guy going up on this as I was coming down. Man, those tyres are some big *******.

BK3181.jpg

Surly Pugsley
 
So you didn`t want to ride in the rain, but went to the pool instead and got wet??? :confused:
Surly Pugsley

Was a nice wet, with nice scenery to the left as I was breathing :eek: ...nice hot showers too.

I don't mind riding in the rain, but my wet weather bike needs a bit of maintenance. (I just know it's going to puncture the next time I use it ).
 
Rode to work and back today (as I do every day).

Yesterday was pretty rank, as it was the first proper day of rain and the water coming off the road was FILTHY.

Took me ages to drain and clean my bike (with my Ksyriums on James, before you get the electrodes out)

Today was wet again, but the roads were a lot cleaner, as the rain from yesterday had washed a lot of the toxic-shite away. Enjoyed the feeling of warmish rain on me combined with looking down at my bike and it being wet but not splattered in black water.

Had a nice OCD session cleaning it all up, with towels, smooth cloths, eco-friendly degreaser, Finish-Line stuff, The Orb on my iPod.

Almost looking forward to getting it all dirty again tomorrow, so I can clean her up again.

Phwoar.

(I also managed to get Jack Server synced up between native and Wine audio gear, including Midi control, so I now have VST and VSTi ability in Linux)
 
papachari & kyukanbi

rode my パパチャリ for the first time to work today. This aluminum beast with iron fork weighs probably 15kg but somehow I managed the same average speed as on my titanium roadracer of almost half the weight...a sign of my peak form for TOITO ? ...sure hope so :warau: !

As further TOITO preparations, starting today until next Saturday, I'm going to give my liver a rest...meaning eight (8) 休肝日 kyukanbis in a row (the toughest part about TOITO) !!
 
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