I didn’t have anything in my calendar today although I do have a high intensity group ride later but given it was so nice I popped out for a quick gravel ride over lunch.
Hopefully the new normal will continue to allow me to WfH some days, as I am enjoying these short gravel bike rides. Just how much I would enjoy them when it isn’t great weather though
Before heading through the park to cool down. Where I stopped to take a picture of twilight. Bizarrely for some reason the picture with the bike made it look like daylight but when I raised the phone camera it focused on the background and got the light right.
I love my R-Jack I’ve had it about 3 years and 15,000miles I think. It handles well, is comfortable and performs well too. I wanted something a bit more aero than my old Ti Kinesis and I think I definitely made the right choice.
I opted at the time to go for caliper brake and I still mostly think that was the right choice lighter, simpler maintenance (well for me) and plenty of stopping power but with the rise of gravel riding part of me for a while wished I had gone disk brake. But I have scratched that itch now and bought a gravel bike so I feel comfortable in my original caliper brake choice.
I have a CAAD12 at the moment that I love but doing anything above 2.5h is a PITA - literally.
Because I love my Cannondale, the R Jack feels great, but the Jack is sooo comfortable and it accepts wider tyres that I could do with for some light gravel too.
The R it’s a lot smother than my CAAD12 already but it’s “too racey” - great feel but not so much versatility.
Now that all my events are done for the year (all two of them, neither of which did I train for, mind you despite the aspirations and TR plan prodding me) and I’m tired of my glide slope, it’s time to get back at it. This means a return to predawn riding, which I stopped not just because dawn came really early in summer but because I was lazy and stopped riding early, and lunchtime riding, which I largely stopped because I was lazy and lunchtime was about the only time I had to sit down with the wife because of her schedule.
Yesterday was a lunch ride, just 14 miles & 2k’ on mostly trail. After the ride, Strava reminded me how lazy I’ve been:
(I’ve done the meat of this route many times, but there are three options to vary it up in the last third.)
Tuesday morning was a quicky made more enjoyable because I saw the dog team. They just finished their 3km pulling their wheeled sledge and are two weeks into their pre-season training. They normally race in Sweden but, for obvious reasons, didn’t last year. It’s hard to tell, but the fella in the back is 1yr old and just getting his first real taste of it. (The temp was about 13C.)
This morning was a bit longer, but still hampered by getting back into the groove of the early rise necessary to be home in time to be in the kitchen by 6:30a.
Spotted these mornings so far have been frogs and a fox. No badgers, deer, or owls. The smaller-than-palm size frogs on the trail increase focus on the trail, though often not in a good way. I’m focusing on leaves just in case it isn’t a leaf as I don’t want to run over one of the little amphibians or, worse, have one leap into my spokes (whether on accident or otherwise).
I forget what he has (as he has so many top end bikes) but a mate of mine I think has a Cervello and the Jack in his collection but on most rides he’ll opt for his Jack and goes down the wider tyre route too occasionally. I could be wrong I think the R-Jack smoothness etc out performs the Jack but the Jack is certainly no slouch
I test road bikes one after the other. The set of tyres where different so not exact science but the Jack feels very stable (maybe to much?) and I was literally looking for cracks in the tarmac and it is incredible how smooth it is.
The R felt snappy and still with a great smoothness but not at the same level. The version I tested was limited to 28c with fenders.
It’s important to say though that the R was equipped tubeless 28c and the Jack 34c.
A short ride down to Oundle to test the changes I made to my elbow pads on the TT bike. I basically put an old pair of pads under my current pads to stop banging my not so funny bone. I wanted to check that this didn’t feel weird, it didn’t I also met some mates for coffee.
Need some help from the forum to check if I’m missing anything. Use the same powermeter for inside and outside and Zero’d it this morning.
Only been back riding for just under a year after 15 yrs away…totally off the couch…my initial FTP was 147. Today was the first organized ride where I thought my fitness gave me a chance to stay with the front group of local racers doing the 104 mile Nut Roll in Albany GA. Did just that, made the selection into that group of 8…dying a 1000 deaths after 85 miles, but I hung in there and gritted it out. Great ride, fast ride. Proud of my performance.
Here’s where I need help: My NP and IF are off the chart which leads me obviously to think it’s time to do a Ramp Test (last tests: August 6th @ 280w, July 6th @ 274w, June 22 @ 271w). I’m not scheduled for another Ramp until October 5th. With an NP of 262w and an IF of .94 for just over 4 1/2 hrs, it leads me to think I should expect a sizeable jump in FTP whenever I next test or am I wrong? Today is not a one-off result as last weekend I had a 70mi gravel ride that was an NP of 253w for 4:04 and an IF of .90…am I missing something obvious or have I somehow managed to (probably) add a bunch of watts all of the sudden to my FTP where I was just kind of creeping along incrementally for the 3 previous Ramp Tests?
which was great!
