IMC RR #1
Finally typing this up. Had to delay this a week due to scheduling and some bike changes that I wanted to have dialed in.
Went with 246 as my FTP, guesstimated 6hrs, chose 69%, so predicted TSS of 286. Gears were 161/170/178/187
I was planning to ride the GWN 1/2 IM course I'm familiar with but have recently been riding a few stretches of road north of the city (St. Albert) that are smooth and safe, so went there instead.
I parked in front of a friend's house, left a cooler in my car and set out to do some impromptu "loops" that I've worked out over the last few rides. Nothing too crazy from an elevation perspective, but a few hills here and there that keep you honest.
Did the first loop in ~3hrs, then back to the car to reload. Did the 2nd loop in 3:01:50 (ok, I admit, I went the extra time just so I could see 180km on the odometer - I wasn't going to stop at 179!)
3 pit stops during the ride, plus reload nutrition/hyrdation at the car was about 10 minutes worth of stopped time.
The run afterwards was enlightening. I tried to run the first 500m slow without checking my Garmin. WAY TOO FAST. Even with my Garmin (which didn't help last race...sigh), I am now strongly considering running out of T2 wearing a sandwich board that says "Tell me to slow down!" that I will only discard after the first few km.
Was running the new cage/standard water bottle between the aerobars, concentrated infinit on the downtube and extra water in the jersey - LOVE the setup. Based on a bit of a sore stomach afterwards on the run, I think I maybe overdid nutrition a bit (~260 cals an hour). I think I needed to back off the calories a bit or perhaps more to the point increase water intake due to the heat. Stomach trouble could have been exacerbated by the indian buffet followed by movie popcorn the night before (date night > optimal RR meal).
The main problem on the run was the heat - it was an exposed route and it was hot (almost 30?). When I mentioned this to my buddy after the run (while sitting in his house with a bag of ice on my head), he said "hate to say it, but IMC was hotter last year".
New bike felt even better than last time. Shoulders/upper body were a little sore but much better than the Sunday before (which was only a 3 hr ride) so my body is adjusting to the new position.
Despite the shiny new speedplays and shoes sitting on my shelf, I resisted the urge to change them. So, as predicted, I did have some hot spots on the outside front part of my feet. Again, not as bad as the weekend before, so in a pinch I could get by with my old shoes/pedals. I'll try out the new combo on future rides and see how it goes - hopefully better, but if not I can always go back to old reliable.
All in all, I was pretty happy with the effort. 6 hrs for the 180km, no real rough spots, felt reasonably good getting off the bike. The tale of the tape is a bit different, though:
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Duration: 6:01:50
Work: 3110 kJ
TSS: 233.9 (intensity factor 0.623)
Norm Power: 156
VI: 1.09
Pw:HR: 9.53%
Pa:HR: 4.06%
Distance: 111.823 mi
Elevation Gain: 2318 ft
Elevation Loss: 2183 ft
Grade: 0.0 % (140 ft)
Min Max Avg
Power: 0 393 143 watts
Heart Rate: 89 217 141 bpm
Cadence: 30 191 88 rpm
Speed: 0 36 18.5 mph
Pace 1:40 0:00 3:15 min/mi
Altitude: 2117 2636 2330 ft
Crank Torque: 0 898 138 lb-in
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I was trying to go easy but it looks like I went a bit too easy and then to top it off didn't finish strong. Other negatives were peak 1hr being in the first half of the ride (ok, first third...ok, first hour) and I didn't negative split the halves, so I need to work on that.
The VI is artificially high because I don't stop my Garmin when I biobreak/refuel, but I still need to work on hitting the downhills a bit harder.
Could definitely be worse I suppose, but looking forward to correcting things in RR2.
Let me know if anything jumps out at you!
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Comments
PS- you totally made the right call on date night :-)
Craig,
Nice job on the RR. A couple comments/ thoughts in no particular order:
1) 260 calories/ hour were these all from infinit or were you using gels/ other food? I assume infinit. I have found that when I don't take in adequate water after my stomach has been letting me know that I should be drining more. This has been with infinit and even gatorade during running. I have also only been using a 167 cal X2 infinit solution. Another trade off with more water has been the use of salt stick. I have found upping the salt stick has really helped, typically I just run <2 hours without and use some on the longer bikes 3+ with bricks. </p>
Add this to the higher temperature that we will see in Penticton and this electrolytes need to be watched carefully as well as the calories. I find that as it gets hotter the HR goes up slightly for the same PE and I don't process calories as well. This may also have been the case with you as well.
2) The heat, were you dumping water on you head during the run? I find that I don't do this as much in training as in races for some reason to help cool me down.
3) If you get another RR in the stomach issues may allow you to get your IF closer to your goal of .69, but that's a way's away from .63 that you just did. Also consider that you guesstimate may have to come down and factor in temperature if we get a blistering day in Penticton.
4) Hopefully if you have another date night before RR2 you get to pick the restaurant this time.
Gordon
You probably already know this: Bike special needs at IMC is around mile 70 and not at the half way point. So if you plan on picking up another bottle of concentrated Infinit at SN's, make sure to account for the extra calories you may need on the first and longer part of the ride before you get to there.
@Eric/Nemo - thanks, will indeed tweak nutrition for RR2 and see how it goes.