Another Overhaul of the Felt F1 Sprint

The Sprint bike was overhauled again before Greece but I'm just not getting around to posting pic.

frameset- 2008 Felt F1 Sprint Team edition size 54
bars/seatpost- shimano pro vibe white
brakeshifters- dura ace 7900
front/rear derailleurs- dura ace 7900
crankset- dura ace 7900 172.5mm 52/39T
bottom bracket- fsa ceramic red megaExo
cassette/chain- dura ace 7900
brakes- ultegra SL 6600
hoops- zipp 404 clinchers with tufo elite-C tubeless clinchers
data management- powertap SL+

additional pics: http://sports.webshots.com/album/578641913VsPGKP

Anniversary Get-a-way

We left friday after work to head to St. Augustine taking us about 2 hours and checked into our hotel. This place is beauitful: The Renaissance Resolt at World Golf Village about 15mins away from the tourist downtown area. It was worth being a little removed from that area and stay at such a nice place. After dropping our bikes off in our room, we headed to dinner at a local sushi restaurant: Fusion Point. Great prices, taste, and atmosphere. Weird thing was, it didn't seem like any of the people that worked there were asian until we further investigated and determined the sushi chefs were half asian/half something. lol

The next morning we woke up for a casual bike ride. This would be the first time in a long time that Desiree and I got the opportunity to ride together because of my training schedule. We just headed east on Int'l Golf Pkwy that deadend into US1 but crossed over into a beautiful neighborhood Palencia and checked out the beautiful houses. After the bike ride was out fun in the sun. We ventured to a beach not before grabbing to subs and goodies from Publix and settled there for ~3 hours.

Back to the hotel room to get cleaned up and head into town following some of the historic areas and the heading to church at the Cathedral Basillica- The first/oldest Catholic Church. We The found an awesome seafood restaurant for dinner at O.C. White's seafood. Deisree had a seared salmon dish and I, a coconut curry mahi. We continued to tour the downtown/historic area before becoming exausted and crashing for the night.

Sunday morning we decided to head to the pool and relax before grabbing lunch at a local buritto mexican restaurant and did some shopping at the outlets.

A great weekend for a great occasion. Thank you Desiree for a wonderful time and to Anh Vu and Darcey for their trolley pass gift. Unfortunately we didn't have time to use, however it another excuse to return to St. Augustine.

More pics: http://travel.webshots.com/album/578637833yoVEdy

it seems promising

I ordered cleat wedges last week and they came in on Tuesday and had them in for my ride this morning. The use of cleat wedges are to correct anatomic faults with your bike fit. My left leg (which is the leg that has been giving me problems for the past 3 weeks) is valgus on the bike. Meaning that it laterally "bends" in towards the top tube of the bike. This is less then ideal as it decreases the direct force during the pedal stroke. It can also and often causes medial knee pain. This is nothing new to me, but i figure that I would change what I could giving my knee's current condition.
My ride this AM went pain free. I did a few 2-3 min efforts in the saddle at ~300watts and had no problems. High cadance intervals- all good. Not doing full on efforts or out of the saddle efforts, but needless to say, I am very happy with the ride. To compliment that, no pain or tendon problems being on my feet all day at work today. Tomorrow morning is another test to see how the knee feels.

Happy 1 Year!

A Happy 1 Year Anniversary to Desiree and myself this past Tuesday. With our busy work schedule, we haven't had the opportunity to celebrate yet, but St. Augustine sounds like the perfect getaway for a perfect occasion.
All smiles!

Oops I crapped my pants...or could have

5:45AM wake up to sit on the can, eat breakfast, and get ready to sit on the saddle for a training ride. I'm out the door by 6:15 and there is just a pinch of light existance. I'm heading out the back entrance to my neighborhood and I do a couple times a week. There is a turnpike overpass just after you turn out where bats commonly congregate. You can hear and smell them under there. As I approach the underpass, I can see flying objects in the near distance through the faint light or upcoming daylight. As I am passing under the overpass, the sounds of the bats are heard through my headphones and I felt an object hit the right side of my chin and land in my lap. I'm swatting at my lap and manage to dislodge what ended up being a bat that hit me in the face. I could have crapped my pants but fortunately didn't and fortunatelly was able to keep the rubber side down. My heart probably raised at least 15 beats and felt like it took some time to reach normalcy.
That could have been bad! Oh the joys of saddle diaries.
Me: 1; bats: 0. Let keep it that way with the bats score at goose eggs.

fundamentals, training, evaluation, recovery

After 2 1/2 weeks of getting back to basics and working on the fundamental pedal stroke, I wanted to see how that work payed off. A full circular pattern isn't automatic yet, but comfortable to sustain even at high cadance. It's not so tough anymore to sustain 200+ watts on the flats with a cadance of 100+rpms. Power feels smooth and consistent thru the whole pedal stroke. My quads and VMOs don't get as fatigues and are spared for very high intensity efforts.

My interval session last week evaluated all the work that was done and there was impressive data. I did 6 x 1min efforts in the saddle. Past intervals: 400-450watt averages. This session was 450-500watts. That about a 10% increase in sustained power. Possible explination are the 2 1/2 week break from all the hard training allowed my body to rest and recover. In addition, the pedal stroke and cadance work allows for more consistent output of power thru the whole power stroke and not letting my quads fatigue and activating other support muscles.

Unfortunately, a couple days after my interval training, I began experiencing posterior knee pain on the left possibly from biceps femoris strain and associated semimembranosus/semitendinosus compensation and pain. I think this was due to the fact that the bike that I did the pedal stroke training on was different bike than the bike that I resumed my intense training and intervals which I think the saddle heigh was a couple millimeters higher. This has caused me to reduce my intensity and scale down my workout, seek soft tissue work, and sit out of upcoming races.

Today's ride is the 1st time in a week where I felt almost back to normal ~90%. I had one incident of hamstring dysfunction while climbing out of the saddle at a relatively fast turnover. I was able to have multiple moderate efforts holding 25+ mph and high cadance.

So for now, I miss keep the intensity moderate until I am able to have a training session without and strain or awareness then it'll be back to threshold and interval training, spin ups, and climbing efforts.

What shape are you? D, O, □

I had an epiphany last week after talking to my teammate. He just had a lactate threshold performance test with Robbie Ventura a day after Ventura returned to the states from the Tour.
He told Benjamin lots of things about his form. One thing important is that Benjamin wasn't firing his hamstrings during his pedal stroke. Meaning he only pedals on the down stroke- 2-6 o'clock.

I evaluated my pedal stroke and realized that I pretty much have the same pattern. This equates to being about 40% efficient as you do not have consistent power throughout your whole stroke. Your cranks are circular, why isn't your pedal stroke the same?

If you're only activating your quads through the stroke, you really only have a downward pattern. If you pull up as well, your stroke is a square pattern. If you think of providing consistent power through he whole stroke, then you are more circular eliminating as much passive stroke as possible. You will build more stabilizer and hamstring strength and have a more consistent turnover.

So for the next 2 weeks, my focus will be working on pedal stroke and turnover until it is habituated and I don't have to think about circles. Putting the interval and threshold training on hold because there's no point if you do get the basics correct.

*images above from: Biomechanics of Sport, by Christopher L. Vaughan