http://www.cycleanywhere.com/blog/index.php Road Cycling Journal, Iwakuni, Japan en http://backend.userland.com/rss092 http://www.cycleanywhere.com/blog/index.php?id=196 http://www.cycleanywhere.com/blog/index.php?id=195 QUOTE:
Nov 12th Wow. Positive TSB after a pretty soft week last week. Must be a semi-peak physically because this did not feel at all like a 267 Pnorm workout. The legs felt great all day. Rocked a good soild endurance day, holding steady watts on the flats but not climbing much out of zone 4 ( a little into zone 5 on some of the steeper climbs ). [quote] Nov 16th Expected this route to take me quite a bit longer than it did, but weather was cooperative and a great ride was in the making. Legs felt great and for the first time in a couple weeks the knee felt no pain throughout the ride. I never really stretched it out very hard, but I did ..]]> http://www.cycleanywhere.com/blog/index.php?id=194 http://www.cycleanywhere.com/blog/index.php?id=193 http://www.cycleanywhere.com/blog/index.php?id=192 The fields would actually be filled with LOTUS. The lotus flower is a plant which is almost entirely edible. To learn more about the lotus flower, readers (and I!) can wander over to http://www.khandro.net/nature_plants_lotus.htm And now... some quick training updates: The 3rd of November is the "28 day" mark of the new season's training plan. My average TSS/day for the first 28 days is around 146 right now. My CTL has nudged it's way into the 140's a couple times, and Sunday it peaked out at 142.03 - my all time high. I'm certainly gaining some PE changes in my efforts in all ranges. My L1 work feels almost "recovery like" when riding in the 240s at the lop of L1, so I tend to ride 250-260 for most of that time. My "L2" riding used to be normalized in the upper 260's-low 270's for 2-3 hours of tempo riding. I use normalized here as a comparison because I usually take the L2 chance to get short/steep rollers into the workout and the ups and downs really throw average power around. I'm normalizing in the 280's pretty consistently now. My MIET/SST workouts have been feeling fantastic. I'm seeing a good slide in power distribution on that as well into the 310-320 range. This week's main session was 2 hours right at 90% of threshold and it was definitely not "all out" at the end of 2 hours to get it done. This week's VO2max wo ..]]> http://www.cycleanywhere.com/blog/index.php?id=191 http://www.cycleiwakuni.com/blog/files/tom_DraffenTom10242007.wko One of the nice things about this time of year is the fantastic weather. Another nice thing about my work in Japan is the schedule that allows me a lot of ride time while the kids are in school during good daytime hours. Combine these and you get a lot of great mid-day riding in fantastic weather. I thought I'd take the camera along with me today on a 4 hour training ride and let folks see some of the roads and narrate a training ride. So... let's go for a ride. After getting set up in the house and dressed we head out the door and grab our trusty steed. Well... not so trusty yet, with 4 rides under the frame. (483 km after today) This time of year we're only taking one full water bottle. The other water bottle holder is carrying tube/tools/rag/CO2. Nice for the temps to be able to go up to 2 hours on one water bottle again. Out the gate we head. Today the plan was to head southbound and wrap around Oshima Island. This will total 135 km once I've added a little distance to wrap up the 4 hours. The first thing we ride through are the locust fields just south of the base. In the late summer months, the locust field plants are covered with locust flowers and are quite a sight. This time of year, the plants are dying and the fields are starting to get cleaned out. In spring time, the fields are vast empty mud plots. When the locust plants start to grow, they explode from small stems ..]]> http://www.cycleanywhere.com/blog/index.php?id=190 Specs: Name: Felt F55 Height - 58CM Weight - 18.3 lbs (8.3 kg) Shimano Ultegra Cranks, BB, 11x23 cassette Shimano Duraace Front/Rear Derailleurs and shifters/cables/chains Shimano Dual Pivot SL Brakes Stock Saddle - soon to be changed to the Selle Italia SLK to match the Roubaix's Felt Alloy Handlebars, we'll see how those go. After the pics were taken, I changed to a Specialized 120mm -16 deg stem (bit on the heavy side until I can find a better one, had this one in the parts box) Wheels as pictured - Velocity Aerohead's with the Powertap SL on the rear, 28H rear/24H front Will change the bar tape to red this weekend. ]]> http://www.cycleanywhere.com/blog/index.php?id=188 "the off season had begun" I set some goals. Let's quickly review those: 1. Zenitsubo Hill Climb in under 30 minutes - I pretty much shattered this goal. In November I rode 29:54. In the course of the year, my new best time is 27:06. (other times are 28:10 and 27:15) I expect to be sub 27 for sure when the 2007 Zenitsuboyama Hill Climb event happens at the end of the coming November. 2. Solo century in under 5 hours - I've done two sub-5 hour solo centuries in the last 10 months. I've done two other rides 170+ km that the first 160km were under 5 hours. This would now be "the norm" for distances going out that far when I'm alone. 3. Tour de Kunisaki in under 4 hours 45 minutes - The idea was to make the top 10 for my spring peak event. I placed 5th/4th. Great ride, great race, great vacation. 4. Sub 1 hr 40km TT - While I can do this on my own, the course selection from MCAS Iwakuni is pretty poor for this event. I still maintained the fastest bike time of the day on the course for 2007, but fell short of this goal by 2 1/2 minutes on "Team The Big Kahuna." 5. Podium @ Okayama Int'l Circuit - Crushed it! Top of the podium. Veni, Vidi, Vici! Other goals sat out there, and I'm on them all. 1. Weight - I wanted to break the 77 kg mark. I've done that by making 75kg, and am holding steady there now. 2. Functional Threshold Power - 350 was my goal. I haven't tested in a while, but perceived exertion tells me I've probably made this. I started training with power last October sitting @ 315 watts / 83 kg. A year later, if I've flattened @ 345 and 75 kg, that's a huge improvement for one year. 3. Category upgrade - I worked i ..]]> http://www.cycleanywhere.com/blog/index.php?id=187 DraffenTom1082007.wko The countdown started Oct 9th, 2006. I crossed the line in 11th place at the Okayama Int'l Circuit 2 hr Enduro. The race was exhilarating on a fast 3 km loop. The course map is a bunch of turns, in the wrong condition it could be pretty dangerous. That was today. But, for the leadup... Saturday we're driving up to Okayama to camp for the night to get some relaxation on Sunday. Half-way up, BAM! Flat tire on the RV. We sat in Fukuyama service area for 2 1/2 hrs waiting for the base to send someone up to change the tire, as they were nice enough to leave a very TINY lug wrench to take off the pneumatically installed lug nuts. By the time we left, it was well past our chance to get into the intended campground, so we camped in the next closest service area to the course and called it a night. Sunday morning we were up and stopped nearby the course. I needed to get a pre-race day spin in and we were going to hit the onsen to get cleaned up. The bike path that goes from Bizen north was gorgeous. I got out and would normally have done 2 hrs of recovery zone spinning with some intervals but the legs felt SO good, I bumped to the bottom of Z1. The temps were great in the low 70's and a gorgeous multi-use path. I hit up my intervals and 60 km later, called it a morning. I knew then that the legs were in form. There's just something you feel. Onsen, lunch, groceries and a trip up to the course. We settled down for the evening outside the gate. Weather had been gorgeous so far, even though the forecast was rain before we left to the circuit. We woke up in the morning, gates open at 5 am to get to parking and setup. Pouring rain! Ahhh.. Fast forward through setting up our area, picking up race packages for me and the four kids. The kids got started with races and participated for the fun of it. Oldest came in "pack fodder" in ..]]> http://www.cycleanywhere.com/blog/index.php?id=186