Getting spoiled by all this great cycling weather the last couple of weeks.
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A short flat active recovery ride for me at lunchtime. I had originally planned to loop round by Holme alone but it finally feels like summer so I looped round Connington Airfield. Its a very small commercial/leisure airfield these days but I think it had some importance during WW2.
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My road trip is almost at an end. Yesterday was the big drive from southern Queensland to Melbourne, hence only getting to this today. My friend who was hosting me at the Granite Belt area of Qld had something to go to on Friday during the day so I took the opportinity for a sightseeing tour around the area. I hate sightseeing from a car window but do rather enjoy it from a bike seat.
Headed in towards Stanthorpe on some back roads that were signposted as a cycle route, stopped at a café.
Did the local hill climb, Mount Marlay. Not much in terms of altitude gain but multiple steep pinches.
Toured around the creek a bit
Then headed back via Storm King Dam…
… through Girraween…
… past the pyramids & roos …
… & back in on the main highway because I couldn’t be stuffed to find the cycle route. Triceratops statue is at the Ballandean train station.
Edit because I forgot the map n stats. 
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My club are trying to relaunch their Cathedral Square group rides so I went out with them in the morning they had a social ride to Oundle. I probably could have dropped of at circa 40miles but I stayed chatting and cycled to the homes of the other riders circa 53miles. Lol, I popped in for a quick drink in the back garden of one rider and was there for over an hour. When I finally got away I needed to go to the pub, that was 37miles away but I only had a shandy today so I wasn’t too wobbly for the 14.5miles home 
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C&O Canal
Went on a bike packing (sort of) trip with my 13yo son and some of his friends. We camped at the Brunswick Family Campground and did out-and-back day trips on Saturday and Sunday.
Saturday
Went “uphill” to Shepherdstown for lunch at a highly recommended Mexican restaurant and then returned to the campground. The restaurant did not disappoint! It rained hard for almost 12 hours before our ride, then fortunately tapered off over the first hour. The trail was a puddle-filled, sloppy mess, though. Luckily the campground had a bike wash station!
Sunday
Went “downhill” to Whites Ferry for lunch at the Grille. Unfortunately, one of the boys’ front wheels slipped out and he cut one hand and sprained the other wrist. He powered through another 40 minutes to the lunch stop but wasn’t going to be able to make it back to the campground. So … did some high tempo / low sweet spot intervals to get to the car and come get him. Fortunately he’s ok, and I got some intervals done in what would have otherwise been a Z1 day.
The two pics are before the fall. There is a tradition on the canal to take your pic with the mile marker of your age. I did the same on the Northern Rail Trail in NH back in September. Cheesy maybe … but here you go anyway.
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Maria’s, excellent choice (lived on German Street until a few months ago)
Sounds like an awesome trip.
From Sept '21 weekend we told my parents we were expecting, and the last time she touched her bike until a trainer ride yesterday haha… She has a 70.3 in 2 months.
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That looks beautiful !!! 
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I’ve been away from the TR forum for a fair while but great to return and see the same names still posting amazing rides on this thread (@FrankTuna / @HLaB / @rkoswald / @WindWarrior ). 
My own effort from last weekend was a prep ride for the Dragon Sportive in late June, so around 60% of the target elevation and distance I will ride on the day of the event. Didn’t feel too bad - need to work on nutrition and pacing (must go faster 
).
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And my effort from the weekend before last …
Obliterating my previous PR for my local road bike 10-mile TT. As covered already in detail in a separate thread on this forum, along with a link to YouTube video summary:
Real world proof TR works for average older riders - Training - TrainerRoad
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Rode Tour of the Battenkill in NY last weekend. I did it in 2022 but couldn’t in 2023 because I’d just gotten over an illness. It was a perfect day to ride…not too hot and the ~17 miles of mild gravel was pretty dry. I was 2.4 mph faster this year which was pretty encouraging since since the route was a few miles longer with an extra 1200 ft of elevation 
My Roubaix was the perfect bike for this kind of ride too.
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nice to have you back! Although I’ve mostly been posting amazing backyard pics 
This weekend I spent close to 15 hours getting the backyard ready for entertaining this summer. Not going to lie, all that physical labor and I’m a little sore this morning. Massage chair time and then back to swinging the kettlebell and 90 minutes on the bike.
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New tires
and cut 4 seconds off my KOM, down from 3:57 to 3:53:
similar wind
better paced, and versus 2023 that bike had Cinturato slow rear tire, and S-Works 2BR T2/T5 front tire. Today was running GP5000 S TR front and rear, that measure out to 32.8mm on 35mm external front and 31mm external rear wheels.
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Did a big day in the saddle with 3 somewhat big climbs in preperation for the Marmotte. Started in Lucerne and rode to the first Climb the Aechelipass It only goes to 1400m but it is 10km at 9.8% with the first 5km at nearly 12% with a km at nearly 14%, was pretty hard and the low cadence was leg sapping. it “levels” out a bit to 7-10% in the later stages. The Downhil was steep on a very tight road for the first part. Also my front Derailleur decided to come loose like 4 times during the ride and I had to re tighten it again and again. After a short 10k Valley it was time for the next Climb the Glaubielenpass, 12K at a bit over 9% the climb is mostly steady at around 9-10% with some pinches above 14%, made it to the top power was still ok but it got really hard towards the top. Then it was a Downhill for the next 35km to Entlebuch and the last climb for the day the Glaubenberg, this was a stepped climb of 16km at 5.1 but most of the climbing bits were between 6-10% and a flat bit in-between and some other false flat uphill sections. Suffered up there but was still ok from a power perspective. Then it was back to Lucerne which was mostly flat after the downhil, all in all a nice ride of 150k and 3500m of elevation. Now to some pics.
View from the lower slopes of the Aechelipass
View towards the top, on the upper slopes.
View on to the Alp and a Sliver of lake lucerne in the background.
My Bike and the view from the Top of the Aechelipass
View on the lake Sarnen from Giswil.
View on lake Sarnen from the lower slopes of the Glaubielenpass
View towards the top of the Glaubielenpass
View from the Glaubenberg
View from the Glaubenberg a bit further down.
Lake lucerne
Lucerne City
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I’m 6 seconds off a KOM I’ve been trying for, using GP5000 AS TR 28’s. Maybe I need those tires 
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lol I dunno, this wasn’t side-by-side testing. For one thing a big difference in temperature. Another was the pacing. Last night was evenly paced - see lower chart for 30-sec power… yellow was last night, and green from Feb 2023:
Last night there was a nasty crosswind on the 2nd half and I kept losing speed versus my previous 2023 effort on slower tires. But I kept the power steady as I wasn’t trying to beat myself.
Pirelli Cinturato are 20W on BRR, and 14W for the S-Works T2/T5. Conti S TR about 10.5 at 60psi.
Rolling resistance 2023 was 34W and last night 21W.
Temperature 2023 was 53F and last night 80F. Big difference.
+10W in 2023 for about the same time (+4 seconds) considering differences in pacing (worse in 2023), rolling resistance (about +21W), temperature (?? for 27F diff), and slightly different winds (better tailwind in 2023).
Still, it does add up although at the pressures I run, and if I had 28s, it would be a total of +6W on AS TR.
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Not the best club TT for me tonight. I realised after I started I’d forgotten to stick the garmin display onto the power screen, but it was a good tail wind start so I just focussed on accelerating through the gears. Note to self don’t take the acute corner in top gear you’re liable to drop a chain which got me to the only marshalled corner at the right (wrong) time to meet a queue of car. There’s no visibility to anything other than the marshal and the slow queue of car at the junction so there was a lot of soft pedaling. Fortunately, just when I was about to unclip the marshal waived me into a gap. After that I didn’t bother changing my Garmin screen and just did the race on feel 
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