3 August 2007
Brick Fuel Test - 62 mile bike
Posted by Brad Hefta-Gaub under: Cycle; Fitness; Ironman; brick; cycle; exercise; food; fuel; triathlon.
Today I wanted to do a second test run of my fuel test from last week. The goal this week was to do the same cycle course, at race effort, and then do a 10 mile run afterward. I also set up my bike with my aero bars, which I haven’t been riding with during my main “cycling season”… but now, since I’m 100% focused on my Ironman, it was time to start riding more in the aero position.
One important point… I don’t actually own a triathlon bike. I ride a road bike, that fits me great as a road bike, but it’s not exactly the right geometry for a TT or Triathlon bike. I do ride with my handle bars in a very low (aggressive) position… the lowest possible position of the head tube. But my frame is still stretched out a little bit too much, and my seat tube is angled a little too far back to be a true triathlon bike. And of course, I ride with standard road drops and integrated brake/shifters as opposed to having my shifters on my aero bars.
What does this mean?
Well, I won’t make excuses… but technically, it’s not nearly as comfortable to ride in the aero position on this bike as it would be on a proper tri bike, and I can’t remain in the aero position if I need to do any kind of shifting. Which makes rollers and smaller hills that I’d prefer to power up in a middle gear a bit of a pain, since I have to move my arms off the aero bars to shift, and then back to the aero bars to get back into position. Sometimes it’s easier to just ride it like a road bike.
Ok, so how did the fuel test go?
Well… In general… I was less pleased with today’s results. My first problem was traffic and construction on my route. So for the first 15 miles, I was not really able to get to race effort. I kept hitting red lights, and then a massive construction zone with one lane and traffic moving at about 10mphs… So my splits for the first 20 miles were much slower than last time.
I also fat fingered my computer after a water stop, and as a result lost 5 miles of GPS data for a section of the road in which I am pretty sure I was hauling ass! I estimated it at 22mph, but I may very well have been traveling much faster than that.
I felt stronger on the west side of Lake Samamish where last week I was dragging. This week I got clocked by two of the “Radar Integrated Speed Limit Signs” going 26mph and 29mph on a flat. Oh yeah!
I felt really comfortable in my aero bars… which is great news. I practiced eating my sandwiches while in full areo position and actually felt very comfortable. So that is good news.
Food wise, I took two sandwiches today. One was the good old Peanut Butter, Banana, and Honey; the other was a Turkey and Havarti. These are definitley comfort food for me… and I really enjoyed the Turkey sandwich. I am absolutely certain I am going to take these with me on race day. I also took some “Nut Butter Balls”.
I actually took 3 different Nut Butter Balls with me: Peanut Butter, Almond, and Spirulina Ginseng. I only ate the Peanut Butter one… and although tastey, I found the bag to be difficult to open and the ball to be too big to eat at once. I think I need to cut them into smaller pieces and put them in one of my easy open wax paper bags.
I didn’t get any of the Accelerade Protein Gels, so I stuck with my Gu Espresso Love. I only had 7 gels with me… and so I think I was a little conservative in eating them… as in I should have eaten more.
The final problem I experienced was that with my aero bars on, I have no place to mount my Garmin Forerunner. I need to get my Garmin Edge fixed so I can use it… after all, it’s a way better bike computer. I ended up wearing my Forerunner on my wrist… which meant I wasn’t looking at it and so I didn’t eat at my regular 5 mile intervals… and as a result I believe I under ate… although it didn’t show in my cycling… I sure felt it on the run. Which you can read about next.
Workout:
- Type: Cycle
- Date: 08/03/2007
- Time: 13:30:00
- Total Time: 3:17:35.00
- Average Heart rate: 149
- Max Heart rate: 169
- Calories: 2898
- Distance: 62.75 miles
- Average Speed: 19.06 mph
- Max Speed: 33.8 mph
- Average Cadence: 75
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