Show us your.......newbie progress! [4 Sep 2012 - 4 Oct 2014]

[Mo1959]

@Mo1959

I have it here now happily charging away!

Re Strava - you never know! Although age has rendered the fiercely competitive Young Spokey Dokey into a pale shadow of his former self when it comes to one-upmanship!

Ha, ha. Age doesn't seem to have much to do with being sensible and non-competitive

I am sure you will find it does everything you need......just ignore the downhill segments if you see any sheep!

Saw the physio today and he was reasonably pleased with my range of movement in my shoulder and has given me some more exercises to do. He is just back from the Commonwealth Games where he was one of the physios for the track cycling team so I am in good hands.

 

[Arualsti]

Finally managed an average speed of above 10mph! It was for a fairly short ride though, about 6 miles, not sure i'll be able to do it on a longer ride.

Also had my first accident on my bike. Tried cycling up a very steep canal bridge and came off my bike as it started rolling backwards. Got a small graze and a puncture for my troubles. Decided to replace the entire tire and it was pretty knackered before I even got the bike.

 

[Nigelnaturist]

@Arualsti you will in time manage greater speeds over greater distances, well done, just keep riding.

 

[SpokeyDokey]

If any Newbie wants a Cateye Velo Wireless (mint) mine is for sale v.cheap in the classifieds section.

 

[fivepence]

A flat one for a change , last time I did this loop in similar weather I avg 17.7mph so happy enough with results this evening

http://www.strava.com/activities/176933206

 

[Nigelnaturist]

If any Newbie wants a Cateye Velo Wireless (mint) mine is for sale v.cheap in the classifieds section.

I still have my Specialized Speedzone Elite cost me £15 back in Aug 2012, does cad and temp, and the other basic stuff, the new versions do alititude

Not used since I got the Bryton (after the Edge 500 was stolen) and its only two mins slow (bar it being on GMT), I have the black one.

 

[moo]

Just completed my slowest ride in 7 months - recovery and rest day. Amusingly the zero effort ride is faster than I could manage back then at full pelt.

http://www.strava.com/activities/177038458

It's hard forcing yourself to go slow

 

[SpokeyDokey]

Sat up till about 2pm last night playing with my Edge Thingy - too tired to ride a bike now.

I rather like the Garmin Connect interface - got some bad press in places; maybe users of the old Classic style?

 

[SatNavSaysStraightOn]

Just completed my slowest ride in 7 months - recovery and rest day. Amusingly the zero effort ride is faster than I could manage back then at full pelt.

http://www.strava.com/activities/177038458

It's hard forcing yourself to go slow

and whenever I try to ease up and go slowly, I seem to just set new PB after new PB!

 

[bpsmith]

Sometimes focussing on going faster has a negative effect. You use up your energy and then ride slower on other sections. On a calm day, chilling out, you can often get surprised by the speeds you achieve.

On the flip side, when I do casually ride, I find myself doing about 10mph with my mind on another planet and kind of wake up and wonder why I am not pedalling. Lol. Zoning out at times is good for the mind I am told though.

 

[SatNavSaysStraightOn]

Sometimes focussing on going faster has a negative effect. You use up your energy and then ride slower on other sections. On a calm day, chilling out, you can often get surprised by the speeds you achieve.

On the flip side, when I do casually ride, I find myself doing about 10mph with my mind on another planet and kind of wake up and wonder why I am not pedalling. Lol. Zoning out at times is good for the mind I am told though.

What I didn't quite get was the fact that yesterday morning I had 45 mins of rain on the first half of my commute and could see the oil leaking out of the roads, so was taking it easy and until my disagreement with the chain and gravity (massive chain slip as I tried to pull away at a busy main road junction resulted in gravity taking over and one too many bruises) I had set 2 * 2nd fastest PB's on very long segments and my overall ride time to get to my destination was my 2nd fastest as well at 1hr 37 mins which for a wet commute and a tumble appears backwards... (no plans for another tumble today to test this theory. I have enough bruises and am looking at a torrential rain/thunder storm for the return journey so expect to do the princess and the pea act at the front door when I get home).

 

[bpsmith]

Sometimes it's just unexplainable! Hopefully the fall didn't cause too much damage to person or equipment?

 

[Nigelnaturist]

Sometimes focussing on going faster has a negative effect. You use up your energy and then ride slower on other sections. On a calm day, chilling out, you can often get surprised by the speeds you achieve.

.

This is why I work on cadence (and also why I am still searching for the correct gear ratios), I can easily manage 90-100 on the flat, working on getting that better on the hills though its not far off 90. Now I wasn't working terribly hard so it seemed yesterday but I set 38 p.b.'s with 18 of them on new segments, I actually put it down to the lack of wind where I rode yesterday, because for me it was quite a hilly ride at 61ft/mile (strava) 56ft a mile (rwgps) an avg speed of 15.4 over the 42.58 miles.
http://app.strava.com/activities/176849488

 

[Steady]

This week hasn't seen me cycling much, but it's finally a relief to be able to get a ride in.

My Dad went in hospital for a total laryngectomy which is frustrating, never smoked and gets cancer of the larynx, taken it's toil emotionally so cycling today finally dulled a lot of the nervous energy/anger surrounding that for a while.

http://www.strava.com/activities/177198759 Amazing how therapeutic cycling can be and how the mind just lets everything go.

 

[Trevor_P]

I find out hard to get going again after cake stops, can be four or five miles before I feel comfortable again. A quick stop eat and drink then get going again within a couple of minutes seems to work much better for me.