Friday 28 June 2013

It's aliiiiiive!

And by 'it', I mean 'me'.



Nice little ride this morning, up one of my favourite short, steep climbs in the area - it looked like it might rain so this was the obvious choice of early morning route.

Especially interesting, though, was what I was wearing on my wrist - a Polar RC3GPS watch - or perhaps more acurately, what I was wearing around my chest: a Polar Heart Rate Monitor (HRM) strap. I have the unit on 'loan' to test, although I'm hoping I get to keep it. As it stands, I am seriously impressed.

In a nutshell:

1) It has GPS, so I am no longer a slave to my iPhone's battery when I want to record my rides (and it's far more accurate).

2) I've never used HRM before, but being able to see your heart rate and which zone you are in, in real time, makes you more aware of how much you're pushing and how sustainable that is.

3) You can get all kinds of amazing details out of it after a ride, of which I am sure I'm just scratching the surface.

4) Unlike a Garmin bike computer (I've been looking at the Edge 500 recently), it works both for cycling and other activities (running, hiking, etc). I'm looking forward to taking it on hikes, without the HRM strap.

5) It really is exceptionally orange.

Polar's data export system is a bit wonky so you have to merge two files (.gpx and .hrm) together before you can upload to Strava, but that's a minor hiccup. It's a very impressive bit of kit, being no larger than a regular digital watch.


I wasn't kidding about the 'orange' thing.

Altitude (grey) and heart rate (red) data, plus zone analysis, for this morning's ride.

There are some big rides coming up and I'm hoping that using this I can start training more efficiently within specific HR zones, which should give me a big improvement in riding fitness. Time will tell!

Monday 24 June 2013

The perfect ride, take two: more perfect than perfect?

Another day, another ride...




Only this ride was exactly the same as the preceding one, except just with the company of Grecia this time around. No bad thing, though - the route was once again absolutely stunning, and this time we hit the restaurant at Hiyoshi Dam. Sadly (or perhaps thankfully) the famous all-you-can-eat buffet wasn't being served, but the food was still excellent and a (singular!) delicious local beer made the second half of the ride go by much faster. Not that I could possibly condone drinking and riding, of course...



We left the restaurant and as we were about to pull out of the parking area, it began to rain. Pretty heavily. The obvious solution to this problem was to wait it out in the free foot hot-spring.



An hour later, the rain finally started to clear, so we set off. It came back occasionally and we got pretty wet (besides, the roads were soaked) but the weather was warm enough that it was actually quite enjoyable. The views more than made up for it, too.



What a phenomenal route.

The ride also saw the final day of the fi'zi:k Tour Tune-Up challenge. I didn't make the 30 hour completion mark, but I did pass 20 hours, which I'm fairly happy with, netting a nice little badge in the process. Meanwhile my riding is all building towards Rapha Rising, which starts in about 3 weeks. I'm feeling confident, but the more training rides I can get in beforehand, the better!


Saturday 22 June 2013

The perfect ride

After weeks of obnoxiously hot weather, the last week has been obnoxiously wet. Heavy rain, solidly, for days.

This morning I woke up and found the perfect cycling day: cool, crisp, cloudy. Too good to pass up.

I met up with Ross and Adriano and off we went on a new route of Ross' making, which turned out to be probably the nicest route I've ever ridden. A bit of everything: tricky climbs, ripping descents, rolling countryside. Almost total solitude. Really amazing.

The weather held. Cloud cover kept the temperatures down around 20C - a rare pleasure at this time of the year! We rode in and out of low clouds, through occasional sprinklings of drizzle... relishing each refreshing second.

This... this was one of those rides that reminds you why you love cycling. It was PERFECT.





At the top of the first major climb out of Arashiyama.

Rice paddies up in the mountains.

On the bridge before Hiyoshi Dam.

Hiyoshi Dam.

Adriano posing in front of Hiyoshi Dam, looking way too happy!

...and Ross, looking way too serious...

The route is so good, in fact, that I've offered to ride it again with Grecia tomorrow. I forsee pain in my future!

Tuesday 18 June 2013

BANG!

Had to cut a nice ride short on Sunday because my front tyre exploded. Literally exploded, with a loud bang. Scary moment because a front blowout causes you to lose control rather, and I was doing about 50+ km/h at the time...



Managed to boot it and limp home (and it was still bulging THROUGH the boot!) but yesterday brought a lengthy and rather painful tyre replacement day.

This is AFTER I booted it and got home. Huge cut, right through the casing.

New set of Challenge Criterium 320s (yes my wheels are filthy).

Hopefully I'll get more than 1500 km and 2 months out of these. A little underwhelmed by those Vittoria Open Corsa CXs - supposedly the best open tubular on the market. I'm back to Challenge Criteriums again - they were great last time until I wore them down too far and started getting punctures galore (and then the final rear blowout). I'll be more mindful of the wear on them this time!

Sunday 16 June 2013

Rapha Rising - finally!

Recent challenges have been a bit of a let-down, either requiring a time commitment I couldn't give or coinciding with a huge heat spike. Annoying, but finally the challenge I've been waiting for all year has come around: Rapha Rising.

Rapha run two challenges each year and both come with the reward of an actual woven patch on completion. The first is Festive 500, which I completed last year (ride 500 km between Christmas Eve and New Year's Eve). The second is Rapha Rising, requiring you to climb the combined elevation of several mountain stages of Le Tour De France in 8 days (coincident with the Tour).

Kyoto mountains? Plenty more time to acclimatise to the heat as best I can before it begins?

I can do this one...



Friday 14 June 2013

Sweat & Flies Breakfast Ride

This morning's ride in a nutshell:

Sweat lost: entirely too much
Flies eaten: entirely too many
Flies smeared in and all over ear: one

Water dumped over head, arms, legs, etc at top of climb: 2 bidons' worth (luckily there's an icy cold natural spring right at the top)

Perfect.




We left at 6:45am and it was STILL absolutely roasting... and humid and sunny, to boot. Mid 20s when we left and surely high 20s when we returned.

The average daily high temperature at this time of the year is apparently 27-28C. It's actually getting up to 34-35C. The rainy season has failed to materialise and we seem to just be in summer already, a good month to two months early.

Awful.

Thursday 13 June 2013

Heatwave

Well, Japan is currently wrapped up in something of a heatwave - it's about 6 Celcius hotter than it should be at this time of year. The rainy season is a total no-show and has been replaced by intense heat and sunshine instead. Great.

It is, consequently, just too damn hot to ride. Just how much have I ridden this week?

I haven't ridden at all.

This looks like continuing for several more days, too. Not impressed...





Last Sunday I did actually manage a short trip, early in the morning before it became so oppressively hot (and it was overcast most of the day). Grecia and I headed up to Kibune and Kurama by bike, then did a short (~6-7km) hike, then returned by bike. It was actually really nice to fit in some sightseeing and mix it up a bit for a change. I think we'll be doing that more often.


Tuesday 4 June 2013

Hello, heat...




Rode a quick, early morning loop with Grecia this morning, then decided to carry on for a bit because it was a glorious day. After dropping in to Otsu over Hieizan (one of my favourite 'test' climbs) I decided to head south and do the East side of the Omine Forest Road climb, the other side of which we did on February's Rapha Cycle Club ride. Turns out it's less steep from this side, and the descent is absolutely stunning. I'll try to record it sometime. Definitely one of my favourites now!


Hot day...

The heat started really messing with me a couple of hours into my solo venture. I was trying a new hydration approach but it's just hard to drink enough when it's this hot. I tried bringing one bottle of pure water, which I would drink from frequently and could easily refill, and a bottle of super (x3) concentrated energy/electrolyte drink, which I would drink from about every 15 minutes and wash down with water.


Labelled bottles: left, water (W); right, electrolytes/energy (E)

My scheme seemed to work well and I stayed feeling relatively good right up until maybe the last hour, but my performance on the climbs wasn't great. There's only so much you can drink! Not sure what else to try - I'm thinking that riding in these conditions is just going to be more endurance than KOM-grabbing...


Cold coconut milk with tapioca beads - really good mid-ride refreshment!

Top of the Omine Forest Road climb.

Uncontrollable sweating makes for the best photos, I find.

We're just getting to summer. It's only going to get worse from here.

God help us here in Kyoto...

Monday 3 June 2013

Hello, rain!

Well, June is officially the 'rainy season' in Japan. It seems to have come a week or so early this year, because this last week has been terrible (and by comparison, this week looks great!). It's also hot (up to 30C already) and humid (80%, ugh). Rides now have to start at 7am to avoid the worst of it...

Last week I got one single ride in, on Sunday. Short (well, around 70km) but fairly intense, and a new route that turned out to be very nice. Nice group ride too, with quite a few people, including a few new faces.





Steve leading the charge up the final (steep!) climb

Peter (in white) and myself (in blue/black) coming up the same climb

Solomon (in bright colours) pulling up the hill on a fixed gear - maniac!

Grecia (in red) leading Matty to the top

Here's to a busier next week... if I can fit in any riding around my work...