Full range of motion with long cranks.

If you’ve ever done squats in the weights room – you’ll know that you can cheat by not squatting all the way.  You can seemingly lift more weight – but it’s a false economy as you don’t get the full strength gains that a deep squat can give.

So what’s this got to do with cycling?  Well for me it’s the difference between 175mm cranks and the 210mm cranks that are proportional to my size on my Zinn.  I’ve been adding a few interval sessions to my training lately – and one in particular is seated big gear climbs…  Where I find a gentle (ish) climb and put it in the big chain ring and climb with a low cadence.   It’s very much like doing weights on the bike.  Certainly makes you strong.  But also – it’s something where I feel I can make even better gains because of the long cranks on my bike.  Full range of motion can only help strength development.  The long levers of the Zinn custom cranks enable me to really develop the advantage I already have with the long levers of my body.  Means I can really get into the nooks and crannies of strength development – so to speak…

So what else have I been doing?

Well – we’ve had an awesome summer down here in New Zealand.  So, just as things are starting to cool down, I pick that as the time to ramp up my training.  Seems like I’m doing things backwards…

But – though it’s nice to go for a ride on a beautiful day – there is some perverse satisfaction to be had from gutsing it out into a stiff breeze in the dark on a long commute home.

I’m slowly but surely picking up my training volume.   I’m very mindful of the fact that when I last did a long lead in to an event I was training for – that I had a hiccup – in that I trained like a demon to start with and was making fantastic progress – only to be stopped in my tracks with a mystery illness that put a major dent in my training.  Whether or not that was caused by the training I was doing is hard to know – but I’m taking a bit more of a measured approach this time.

I’m adding volume by adding midweek rides.  I work 50km from home so I’m adding 1 or 2 one way trips (in the dark) to my schedule as work allows.  And I’m increasing the distance of my Sunday rides (that are normally done with a group) – pushing that out to 80 to 100km.    And I’ve started adding a few of those interval sessions.

Intervals are something I really enjoy – in a twisted sort of way.  Sure they hurt and you want to puke sometimes – but I love them.  I guess it’s some sort of learned hardship that I picked up from my rugby playing days – where we did a lot of interval training.  I know that my body seems to respond well to intervals –so they are something that will always be a part of my regime…

But they hurt bad when you haven’t done them for a while – and when your aerobic base isn’t what it was

So anyway – I’m increasing volume – and slowly introducing some interval work.  There is a Winter Series of races coming up in 6 weeks or so – so I’ll be targeting that as my first hit out with some intensity.  And will be racing as often as I can from then on in…

205 days till my first major goal which is the Taupo Cycle Challenge – so – steady as she goes….

Adrian

Back into it with Pupose…

This year – as a Team Zinn member – I’m going to regularly post short blogs about me and my Dolomite Ti’s advances towards my goals for this year.

I’ve been in a bit of a holding pattern – still riding regurlarly – but only enough really to keep a level of fitness up.  Work and Family have been a priority for the last year – so as needs must – cycling has taken a back seat.

But with things settling down to manageble levels at work – I’ve decided to set some goals and really get into it again…  (Family is still the biggest priority – but they will benifit from a fit Husband and Dad – so all good there).

So – I’ve set a couple of goals this year…

1. A 4 hours 30 something ride at the 160km Taupo Cycle Challenge – in November.
2. A 40km TT in under an hour – before the year is out.

Yikes!

These are lofty goals.  Both of them will be new personal bests.

I’m starting from a position of reasonable – but not spectacular – fitness.  And a bodywieght that’s about 10-15kg too much too much to achieve my goal at Taupo – which has a lot of hills in the first 80km and a biggish one at the 120km mark.  So I have a lot of work to do.  We are heading into Autumn down here in New Zealand – so I’ll be riding and training through our winter – so I can acheive these goals in our spring.

Along the way – I will race in road races and TT’s as much as I can fit in – and generally get involved as much as time allows in the local cycling scene here in Kapiti, New Zealand.

And it’ll all be on my beautiful custom Zinn Dolomite Ti bike – that I’m as excited about riding as the day I got it a few years back.

This is a photo of me racing a few weeks back (one of the only races I entered this summer) – I doctored the photo via snapseed as it helps to hide the weight I’d been dropped when this photo was taken and in a world of hurt.  Good reminder that I need to work harder.

I’ll try to post a blog a couple of times a month about how I’m doing – or just cycling in general on my Zinn…

Adrian.

Zinn Travel bike tours Italy

6/13
93k /1093mt/5hr.      58 mi/3856 vert ft

Wow.      So, this is where Michelangelo went to conceive his imagination, and give birth to a great sculpture.
The ride was pretty flat for about 30k, then the climb began. Firs gentle 4-8% (that’s gentle now), then it kicked up to 10 -15% for about 4k. It let up a little going through some towns. But the climb to the last town was steady over1 2% for 1.5k. Well, at. The turn for the town (which is a dead end on a point, I saw the sign for the “cave”, the marble mine. There’s actually several, but I think the approaches are all the same. So, there I was climbing 20% switchbacks, about 30-40 meters each. I made it  half way  up the 4th, really feeling it, when two mining trucks came, one up, behind me, and one down. I pulled into the flowers on the right and stopped , watching the trucks pass each other in a dance they must repeat all day long. The concierge told me that when they get to the top turns, there’s no room to even turn one truck so they have a place at each turn where they go into and then go up backwards, repeating this until they reach the mine. I was slightly above my destination town (see photo), and I turn and went down, but couldn’t resist going up to the town, which felt “easy” now at 6-10%. And there was a great fountain at the top! ( see photo ). So these are the white topped mountains I’ve been seeing froths distance all week if it were snow, you’ll need to bring your rock skis. home was supposed to be all downhill then a long 20k flat run home, avoiding the beach traffic. What the guide book said was when you get to the STOP sign at the bottom of the hill, in Carrara, make a left turn toward Massa. What the guide book didn’t say was as you approach the bottom get into a low gear, because when you make that left, from a full stop, your facing a 500 meter 8% uphill climb, before you reach that flat section.  Oy. The ride back to Viareggio on the alternate route was busy with traffic anyway. When I got to town, I immediately went to my new favorite Gelateria, for a dark chocolate mixed with dark cherry, and another wonderful flor that I haven’t identified yet. I’ll ask tomorrow. I cleaned and lube Sally for another ride tomorrow. Dinner at a grey restaurant. Chef’s choice, fixed price meal. Just what I was craving. Lots of fish. Pasta vongole, with clams and lots of mussels. And a mixed grilled fish and vegetables dish. I’m full, and I only had one piece of bread. Oh, and a carafe of very good house wine. I feel full, and I feel fine.
Time for. Bed soon. I’ll try to load some photos for you.

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Zinn Dolomite road bike goes into TT mode…

My day at the New Zealand Road Nationals Time Trial was the culmination of a year’s worth of focus.

I'd made huge advances with my Zinn - so wanted to now see how far I could go with some serious work.

A year ago I’d decided to take on a coach – train seriously – aimed at the Nationals TT –  and see what I could do.  I’d only ever ridden in a handful of TT’s at that stage – but figured that would be a good place to aim – as it takes the size element out of the equation to a degree.

So this was it!

Not quite do or die – as apart from me – no one would really care a jot about how I went.  But it was going to be a serious test of my years’ worth of work.

And I was worried about how I’d go.

I’d made really big gains in the first half of my year – which showed up in the difference in the test results from the start and then halfway through the year.  But then I’d hit problems.  I had a big performance drop – which saw me heading to the doctors for a full round of medical test.  Tests came back fine – but showed that I had very high blood pressure – which we dealt with via medication.  This didn’t really explain the drop in performance however and in the end it looked like the probable cause was some sort of virus.  Anyhow it took me a long time to come right from that – and it was only in the weeks leading up to the Nationals that I was starting to feel like I did at the time of the previous test just before things went haywire.

And in the TT rides I’d done up to the nationals – I hadn’t gone as well as I would have liked.  One of the early markers that I’d set myself was to break a 40km/hr average in a TT – and this was something I thought I would’ve cracked pretty quickly with training.  But here I was at the Nationals – still having not got past the elusive 40km/hr in a TT.  I was seriously beginning to think that maybe it was beyond me.

So how did I go?…

There were 2 of in our club having a crack in the TT – and we drove up together on the day.  We met up with Bob and Derek, who were the officials from our club, at their motel.

I’d woken up that day feeling pretty nervous and this was building as I got closer to start time.  But it was that good sort of nervous energy that I hadn’t experienced since my days playing in big rugby matches.  So I took this as a good sign.  We got changed at the motel and performed all the pre ride rituals – pinning the number on the jersey – checking the bike – pre ride meal etc etc.

Nerves, nerves, nerves!

How would I go?  Would I come last? It wouldn’t really matter if I did come last – but please don’t let me come last!!!

So with these sorts of thoughts going through my head – we headed over to the course.  I’d already figured I was going to commit a big no no – in changing what I normally did.  My plan was to do a long warm up of 1.5 hrs.  I’d never warmed up for that length of time before – but I’d never really had the chance as most of the TT’s I’d done up to now were evening events after work – so no opportunity to warm up for that amount of time.  And I know I often struggled early on in races and got more comfortable as things progressed – so I figured I’d do a long warmup that started slow and build the intensity into the last half hour.

So that’s what I did – and it was absolutely the right thing to do.   Spent best part of an hour just going for a ride – nice and relaxed.  I stayed pretty close to the Start/Finish just in case I had any bike problems – and I tried not to see all the very flash TT specific bikes and the riders with the skinsuits and all the TT bling.  It’s the rider that counts the most right?

Then with a little over half an hour to go – I came back to the club trailer and Bob and Derek swapped the wheels on my bike over to the quick SRAM S80 wheels that I’d borrowed for the event.  (a bit of bling of my own).  Put on my borrowed TT helmet – and headed off again to build a bit of intensity and get a real sweat up.

Intervals went well – wheels sounded cool (very important J) and  before I knew it – it was time to head to the start.

Still feeling nervous – but still good nervous – amped, focussed, buzzing, ready to go…

Had to get through the scrutineering – where they measured my bike to make sure it complied with UCI regulations.   If you’ve read the rest of my blog you will know that as I’m 6’7” and have a custom built bike – no – it didn’t meet with the UCI’s restrictive regulations (specifically the front half of the bike was too long and the bottom bracket was too high off the ground).  But I’d made sure that I’d complied as much as I possibly could – especially in the setup of the handlebars and seat.  I’d been in touch with the commissairs before the event to let them know my circumstances and they’d told me that if my bike didn’t comply – they’d let me ride but that I wouldn’t be an official part of the results.  They also then went on to tell me how my bike was all wrong and had very strange geometry – which I didn’t appreciate as I wasn’t asking them what they thought of my bike – I was asking if it complied with their rules.  By now I’m used to people questioning the validity of the design.  It’s nice to let the results speak for themselves…

So as I rolled up – the commisaire said “So this is the famous bike”.  Here we go I thought.

In TT mode. Managed to get the seat forward with seatpost turned backwards - so the offset was forward.

He put it up against their jig and saw that the bars and seat were inside the prescribed measurements – and told me that I’d done well to make it comply – off you go…  Wow!   The measurements that my bike fails on – weren’t even on the jig!!!

So I was going to be part of the results…

So that left me with a 5 min wait until my start – in the start box (once you’ve been measured – you can’t leave the start area).  They offered me a seat – but I couldn’t sit – had to keep moving.  Bob came and was a calming influence – focussing on the process I was about to start.

Bob and I in the pre-start area. I think the bike's a little too big for him

Got on the bike with about 30 seconds to go – there was a starter counting me down – and a guy to hold my bike.  I reminded him that I was probably double the weight of most of the other riders – so make sure you get a good hold…

Bob was talking to me as the clock counted down – which was really good stuff – breathing, focus, power etc etc

5, 4, 3, 2, 1, GO!

The plan – that my coach and I had come up with – was to start in a controlled fashion for the first few km.  In the past I’d been guilty of going out too fast too soon and blowing up.  I’d done that in the Wellington Centre TT Champs only a few weeks previously – and had come second in a TT I should have won.  So – start in a biggish gear and keep the heart rate down a bit just to settle in – and then give it death!

And the course played into this plan for me – as just after getting up to speed from the start – it headed slightly downhill for a good bit and this let me comfortably get in a big gear and settle in without pushing too hard.

It’s a fine line however…

I knew the course – which helped – I’d come up a few weeks previously and had ridden it.  It was an out and back that followed the river upstream in the first half.  So was slightly uphill on the way out – but I knew that it was really a series of flats with short steps up in between.  So push hard on the steps and back under control on the flats.

And it went fantastically well on the way out.  I wasn’t riding with either a heart rate monitor or a speedo – but I knew I felt good and comfortable and that I was pushing a big gear – even on the slightly uphill bits.  And I also saw that I could see the rider that started a minute in front of me and that I was slowly catching him!  Cool – I had someone to chase.  Turns out I caught this guy easily – and he was in fact the guy that had started 2 mins ahead of me – and he’d already been caught by the guy in front of me.   It really is the best feeling to blast by someone – and it also meant something very important – I wasn’t the slowest!

Then I started seeing another rider up ahead – my minute man.  And I was catching him too – not as fast – but definitely catching.  Yeee Haaa!

At the turnaround – I was about 20secs behind him – and had 12.5km of slightly downhill to go.  And when you are my size – slightly downhill is your friend…

I caught him with about 6km to go.  He had a beautiful TT bike, skinsuit and all the bling – so it was a nice feeling to pass him on my road bike with clipon TT bars.

Then it was a matter of hanging on.  I was tiring – and finally had to change down a gear – but I knew I was going way faster than I ever had before.   I died a bit on the uphill bits before the finish – and had absolutely nothing left for a sprint.

I finished in 36:08 – and an average speed of 41.5km/hr!  (click here to see results)  Very very happy – didn’t just break the seemingly unbreakable 40km/hr barrier – but absolutely smashed it!

Looking back now – I think I had the perfect day.  I really don’t think I could have gone any faster.  Terry Gyde (my coach) really did a great job preparing me – especially in the last few weeks.  He’d told me a few weeks before the event – that I would average between 41 and 42 – and I didn’t believe him.  I guess that’s why he’s the coach.

To be sure – I think I can definitely go faster – but that will take more training, hard work and focus.  And Terry agrees “I’m picking you have a lot more development left in you”.  He and I are working together again to see what I can do in the Masters 3 division.

I’d love to have a TT bike for the next one – but I don’t think it’s going to happen (I’m still buying the lottery tickets).  But my beautiful Zinn once again proved itself the perfect vehicle for me to get power down on the road.  I know as a rule people seem to ride longer cranks in TT’s – but I bet not many are riding 210mm beauty’s!  Being a road bike – It’s certainly not the ideal platform for TT’s – and I will need to figure a way to get the bars lower still so I can get more aero.  But I think the proportional length cranks more than made up for any shortcomings.   When I do go for a TT bike – it’ll definitely be a custom built Zinn – so I can take advantage of the proportional cranks…  No brainer for me.  Can do things on the Zinn I could never have done before.   Did a seriously competitive time on a road bike with clip on aero bars!  And as far as I could see – I was the only one in my grade not on a TT bike.    So that bike geometry is not so silly after all

Rugby player to cyclist?

My quest to turn myself from a rugby player into a half decent Time Trialist continues…

Making progress.

I’ve just updated my blog with a whole lot of valuable information from Lennard Zinn about TT positioning and what I can do to turn my beautiful Project Big Dolomite Ti bike into a makeshift TT rig.

What I have to do to it – getting the seat a whole lot further forward – isn’t pretty – but it’s certainly working…..

I’ve still got a lot of things to change – but progress is happening.  And I’m learning what a beautiful – stable – versatile platform my Zinn is.  I’ve had the bike for over a year now and have been racing on it constantly – and it hasn’t missed a beat.

I honestly still get that “I’ve got a cool new bike” feeling every time I get on it.

Quite a few people have been asking me how I’m getting on with the bike now that I’ve had it for a while – and the short answer is that i still absolutely love it.  The long answer will come in the form of another review – which I’ll do shortly for this blog.

But in the meantime – if you want to find out more about the TT’ing – check out this latest over at my blog…

Cheers

Adrian.

Zinn Cycles Backcountry Ski day

After a couple feet of snow fell around the front range last weekend, Lennard and I thought it would be a good idea to skin up the El Dora ski area and take some laps on the Corona Bowl. While in the parking lot gearing up, we were informed that that was not allowed. We decided to take a backcountry tour into the Indian Peaks wilderness. After breaking trail through heavy snow for 3 miles, we were finally at the base of our run. We ascended the 600 vertical feet through the slush to the top where we were greeted by a great north-facing tree run that was un-tracked.

A Zinn in action

Thought I’d post a shot taken at my club’s mixed ability Team Time Trial…

I know I’m bigger than the other guys – but this shot makes me look enormous

The mixed ability TTT is a bi-annual event for our club where the handicapper puts together riders of varying levels of ability.  Great way for people who don’t normally ride together to get to know each other.  You don’t know you’re team until you get to the start line. Usually won by the team that gels the best and quickly figures out the best way to organize themselves.

This bike’s meant that I’ve gone from a follower to a leader in this event.  Was able to sit on the front for much of the night.

Now I know why they love to draft behind me…

Doing a few things I couldn’t before…

Hi

Had a few great performances on my Zinn lately.  This bike has definitely helped  me to another level.

Tuesday night racing

Since getting my Zinn at the end November – I’ve been getting better and better results.  It’s one of those success breeds success stories.  The thing is an absolute joy to ride and I look forward to every time on it.  I’ve had time to get used to the 210mm cranks and it’s meant an amazing jump in performance for me. Which has made me want to ride more – which has started off a nice little vicious circle!  Six months ago I was a pretty average club rider – riding in Break 3 – but no longer.

So I figured I’d have a crack at the 154km Taranaki Cycle Challenge on the 30th of Jan.

The form had been good – putting in some good long rides with the club – where I felt strong. And I knew that Taranaki’s profile would suit my 123kgs a bit better than most.  It’s a relatively flat ride round Mount Taranaki which is a large volcano on the  North Island of New Zealand.  There were hills – but they were more of the rolling hill farming country type rather than the long steep variety.  So I figured – what the hell – I’ll line up on the start in the front group and see what happens.

Was pretty nervous as I’d never tried to ride with the fastest guys before on any ride (nor been capable of it).

Went amazingly well and I finished where I was pretty much the whole day – at the back of the leading pack.  Stopped the clock in 3hrs 53mins for the 154kms (around 97 miles) only 30secs behind the winner.  Was a very happy man!

Bolstered by that success – I lined up a week later on the start of the Wanganui to Palmerston North ride.  This one was shorter at 95kms – but it had a few significant hills at the start – and was flat after that.   I tried to hang with the weight weenies through those hills – but couldn’t keep up with the little buggers – and got dropped on the last climb.  But a group of us got together, got organised and worked very hard – and caught the leading bunch!  Took us about 20kms to do it – and was a hugely satisfying effort.  I can report that they were none too pleased to see us.

Still feeling good coming into the finish – I thought “nothing ventured – nothing gained” – and had a crack at winning – by jumping away with about 800 meters to go.  I got a good jump and with 200m to go I was still leading – but alas – they rolled me and I ended up 9th.  A top 10 finish!!!!  Wow!  Did this in 2hrs 23!

So – an amazing couple of weeks for me – and all facilitated by an amazing bike!

Below are a few shots of  our Tuesday night racing from this week.  (It’s a hot summer here at the moment)

Be nice if there were someone my size to draft behind!

At least I can see up the road when I'm not on the front

Onwards and upwards!

Cheers

Adrian McKenzie