Hi there, I would like to join up too if its not too late :-)

Thanks - we've actually (re)filled the four teams at the moment, but there's still time for things to go pear-shaped, so while I can't offer a place at the moment, I'll happily add you into the "substitutes bench" - Sorry if it's been a lot of messing around for nothing, but I tried to make it clear from the outset it was a matter of "first-come, first-served" for any spaces.

So, if it's okay with you the substitutes bench looks like this at the moment


1. glenncomiskey
2. ScientificExplorerGirl
3.
4.
5.
...

as a 'cross kind of guy, i'd have thought this would have been more appropriate

Nice! Can you add it for me? #331

I've been messing around with spreadsheets and computers (either for work or to get the logging sheet going properly) most of the day - i'll sort it for you tomorrow AM mate, if that's ok...

Okay folks - I may have mentioned the "Logging Spreadsheet" occasionally.

Here it is

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1YhGj-P34GYYtd-IVhhnPQjBraKXfe2z3OFMBoOZO6AI/edit?usp=sharing

It's a big old beast, with quite a few little tricks and fancy bits, so I thought it may be time to give a bit of a users guide.


TABS
Along the bottom of the screen are a number of coloured tabs. Each of these present a different "view" of the data.

Yellow Tabs are "Numeric Data" information - Red Tabs are "Graphs" - Green Tabs are "Reference Data" and the plain White ones are "Raw Data"

Raw Data

These Tabs are labelled 3x1,3x2.... up to 3x9. Pretty self explanatory - check your race number, if it's 309 then look on the "3x9" tab and your information, as entered in the logging thread will be there. They're stacked 309,319,329,339 so you just scroll down until you hit your info.

This information is basically the only bit of the spreadsheet that gets data keyed into it. All the rest of the spreadsheet picks up from here. (So, for the people who DO have read-write access - PLEASE ONLY CHANGE FIGURES IN THIS BIT, and try not to bollox up any of the formulas :laugh:)

So, where does the info. trickle down to then...

Summary

First of the Yellow tabs, this is the main summary sheet, showing data in the three "jersey categories"

Yellow Section (for the GC) is probably the most involved. It begins with a column for Cumulative distance for the Challengers, which has a percentage of the overall total at its foot. Next is a Distance Total for the stage. If this is in Black, the stage distance has been achieved, if it's in red, then there's still some distance to cover. Next up is a column for each individual rider, all columns totalled at the bottom (with a smaller figure below in Miles, for the benefit of the metrically challenged). One other significant thing - rides that are officially logged should have a pale lemon background, unofficial ones (ie stuff I've just harvested from Strava are plain white - At the end of the challenge, I allow 2 days to get the final post entered, at that point, any provisional data not confirmed will be deleted - so don't think you can just let me enter your data for you!

Second up, the Green Section (for the Fast Movers) - Simple really, a column for each rider, showing average kph that stage, and overall.

Third is the Climbing Section (KoM) - very much in the same vein as the GC - theres a column for the Actual Tour Ascent, Challengers Total and individual Efforts.

Thats about it for this tab, so we'll go onto the next one...

Leaderboard

Self explanatory really - List of Names, 3 jersey categories, the data will generally be ordered by GC, the leader in each category will be highlighted appropriately to denote the "top man on the pole".

That's it for the numbers Tabs


Reference Data

Rosta

This is a simple look up table that shows race numbers, MFP Handle, Strava Handle, Strava URL, and columns of stuff for my personal reference (like if I've issued dossards, if the rider is away from the computer for a few days... stuff like that, so I don't have to try and remember it!)

Graphs

Yep, pretty pictures time

Distance by Team

Line Graph, where we can watch the four teams chasing the Yellow line of the overall distance. While ever your team is above the Yellow line at a given date, you're laughing, basically.

Distance by Rider

Four Hot linked pie charts, showing the contribution to the overall team distance by each rider. Wanted to show that every rider played their part, and that even a few rides can make a significant % contribution. And they're Pie Charts because... well, Pies are a real North of England Thing. Mmmm Pies....................






Sorry, where was I... Ah yes,

Ascent by Team

This one I really like. The Actual Overall Ascent for each days stage is represented by a shaded blue bar. Each teams ascent for the given stage is shown as a narrower coloured bar within that days Shading. If your teams climbing bar is higher than the Actual Tour Figures, then, frankly, Chapeau!


So - I hope that's been useful in some way. Right - I'm away for some breakfast and hopefully a ride out to see the riders pass by on Stage 2 this afternoon.

Fran,

Unless you live in an area where those kind of steep hills are a regular occurrence, they are always going to be leg-breakers. Around my local area they're few and far between - there's a couple of them that basically are all on the same geological fault line and they're stupid steep (12% - 20%) but only 100 yards long at worst... On those you can just give it everything and climb all over the bike to get it up, but it's not pleasant, and it's certainly not pretty.

As with everything in cycling, a lot of it is down to power/weight ratio - something that I get hammered on because of the weight side, and even at my fittest and lightest I was over 80kg - I'm currently a lot heavier - no make that a LOT heavier. I managed to grunt my way around a couple of the climbs from the first stage, but well - frankly, there's a part of me that wishes I'd walked more, and been able to bend my knee for the 3 days afterwards!!

But - an equal part of things is the attitude you take to climbing... I used to really hate it with a passion back in the day - partly because I knew it was the ***** in my armour as far as racing was concerned - but mainly because I was riding with lads of a completely different build and outlook to climbing... Of course, on the days when we went out into the flatlands east of Pontefract, and the wind was howling, I used to get my own back, but it didn't stop the hills from hurting.

Strangely, now I'm coming back to the sport, and actually getting a little fitter (not fit you understand, but a little fitter!) I've found that I actually don't particularly mind climbing anymore - primarily because I've given up measuring my own climbing performance against anyone else but me. On Sundays ride, I clocked up over double my normal ascent for a ride of that distance, and - on the way home - I actually found myself attacking one of the longer climbs, and amazingly I actually passed more riders going up it than passed me (and as you can imagine, there were quite a lot of people riding that route on that day...)

Basically, don't be too tough on yourself Fran - enjoy your riding, stick to the diet as much as possible, and treat your commutes as base mileage - nice steady spinning along... then have one day a week where you actually go and "give it the beans" and push yourself - it'll work, you'll move forwards and improve. And you'll enjoy yourself more than beating yourself up over things.

If I dwelt upon my speed or climbing abilities relative to what I used to be capable before my accident, I'd hang up my wheels. I don't even think of it - the only cyclist I need to try and be better than is the cyclist I was last week.