Ultradistance Cycling?

Options
1235»

Replies

  • mjbnj0001
    mjbnj0001 Posts: 1,087 Member
    Options
    Machka9 wrote: »
    Another weekend ... another training ride ...

    Saturday we cycled 100.2 km on Bruny Island. We drove out to Kettering, caught an early ferry and spent the day on the island.

    First we cycled out to Adventure Bay, and we stopped along the way for a few photos. In Adventure Bay we had an excellent lunch ... panini sandwiches and a large slice of carrot cake. Then we cycled to Alonnah, and on our way, we stopped and bought some fudge. And then we cycled back to the ferry again.

    The day was fairly relaxed with a goal of covering 100 km without stress, and testing a few things.

    One of the things I was testing was my new helmet. My previous helmet just hasn't been quite right, especially with a thick headband under it. It was either strangling me or blocking my vision and I was finishing rides with a really stiff neck and shoulders. Today I rode with my new helmet, and it was good! Hardly noticed it was there and my neck and shoulders feel normal. :)

    Rowan was testing narrower handlebars, which seemed to pass the test.

    I was testing a raised saddle height because it seems I've done something to my right knee which might be related to my new boots. Raising the saddle height does seem to be better, but it might need to come up a little bit more.

    And we were testing Bushells Coffee and Chicory Essence. We mixed up a bottle with Ensure and a decent amount of Bushells Coffee and Chicory Essence which contains 66 mg of caffeine for every 20 ml (2 tablespoons). Well ... it tasted good and I (who drank most of it) felt awake and energetic by the end of the ride! :D

    It was about 10°C on the ferry going over ... and cooled to about 8°C at one point along the way out. But it did warm again to near 10°C in the middle of the ride. With the bright sunshine, which made a rare and welcome appearance, it felt quite a bit warmer than that. Toward the end of the day, it dropped to about 6°C ... and that's when my feet started getting cold again. I need to solve that problem soon!

    Overall, it was a really good ride ... first one in this recent batch of training where I've felt really comfortable on the bicycle, like I could keep riding.

    Distance: 100.2 km
    Elevation: 1154 metres (3786 feet)
    Moving Time: 5:38:49
    Elapsed Time: 7:16:34

    Photos: https://www.flickr.com/photos/machka-bb/albums/72157668975966700

    28366627160_b1f15d2224_c.jpg


    28562388292_59fe387fa0_c.jpg


    28636718986_b15090558c_c.jpg

    Inspiring! I recently began riding again after 20+ yrs layoff for a lot of reasons, but which include (with my wife) ambitions for some sort of long-distance retirement cruising on our sailboat (that's our other, and continuously current, pursuit). Our far fantasies include South Pacific, Aus, NZ, Tasmania [didn't realize you were there]. I've seen some of your recent your bike-oriented posts. If you don't mind, I clipped the bike/harbor pic out of this post to be my new laptop desktop background to spur us on. Might never make it that far, but that's the value of having dreams and ambitions - to get you somewhere down the road.
  • deannalfisher
    deannalfisher Posts: 5,600 Member
    Options
    i'm seriously considering doing RAGBRAI this year - its 7 days of riding, approx 60-70 miles i day
  • Machka9
    Machka9 Posts: 24,884 Member
    Options
    BNB 200K - Hot Hot Hot

    We decided to do our first 200 kilometre Audax cycling event, since the one we did in Canada in June, on mainland Australia in Victoria this weekend. As some of you know, my cycling club is Audax Australia, and Audax cycling or Randonneuring is timed ultradistance cycling. Some of our events are a bit shorter 50 km or 100 km ... those are often warm-up events early in the season, or winter events later in the season. But then the bigger events start with the 200 km distance, and go up from there.

    This particular event is called a 200K but that's a minimum designation. They can be a bit longer than that, and this one was 215 kilometres. But whatever the distance, it still has to be completed in 13 hours and 30 minutes.

    We've cycled some of the roads included on this event before, so we had some idea what to expect, but we've done it under cooler conditions. This ended up being a very hot ride!! Our on-bike thermometres were recording over 40C out there on the road in the sun and the recorded high (always recorded in the shade) was 33C. Fortunately, the clouds did gather toward the end of the day, and the last 50 kilometres were somewhat cooler ... with a threatening storm and a decent tailwind!

    There were so many birds ... living in Tasmania, I miss the melodic magpies of the mainland. And there was one large kangaroo.

    And now I look like Australia ... I blend right in! I'm very reddish brown like the Australian soil.

    Distance: 215.47 km
    Elevation: 1,484 m
    Moving Time: 10:55:56
    Elapsed Time:12:34:18
    Speed: Avg: 19.7 km/h | Max: 49.7 km/h

Categories