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| Owner:
mas Member Member#: 7693 Location: Registered: 29-06-2008 Diary Entries: 381 |
14th July 2020 Windsurfing: Ipswich to Trimley Wind Direction: NW Wind Stength: 6kts Surf / Sea State: n/a Air Temperature: warm Sea Temperature: n/a Weather: Sunny / cloud Max Speed: 28.4 mph (knots - unless stated otherwise) Distance Covered: 30 miles (Nautical Miles - unless stated otherwise) Nice day for an evening ride. I have been doing short rides (10/20M) to improve speed, but not noticed any difference so chose 30 miles today. I have been comparing riding a full race 2014 Carbon bike bought from a racer who had too many bikes and my 10 year MTB also bought from a local racer who also used it for commute. Both were expensive bikes in their heyday. I repaired the Carbon bike and used it in the racers setup with Continental slick 4000 tyres bone crunching seat, and a ridiculous riding angle to set my PB's for 5 to 40 miles, before I modified everything to make it user friendly for me probably increasing the weight by 50%. The bike is still ultra light even though the puncture resist Scwalbe marathon plus tires weight a twice as much as the slicks. I have never been able to match the PB's since lol, but the comfort level is better, although compared to the alloy MTB it’s horrendous. The MTB I have also tamed and with the setup I have now, I can now ride that bike 40 miles at around 13mph average, with no stops taking around 3 hrs, where as when I use the Road bike the time is similar - which is weird - I should be faster by a mph or so and should be averaging 14 mph! Makes no sense, till I started looking at comfort levels on both bikes as well as the setups. The saddle is my enemy on the road bike as am forever fidgeting trying to find a new position that’s not painful. On the MTB / hybrid seat I just sit and pedal. Although I have raised the road bike handle bar and made several adjustments to mimic the MTB, it’s OK but not real comfortable. Think that’s a work in progress and I have used my own scientific bike fit – against a professional all be it short bike fit from a bike shop demo day. My stats were remarkably similar – keeping in mind I did the setup for comfort. Choose the MTB today to test speed against the road bike and started straight out matching / bettered the 5/10 mile stretch! HR was still only 105 and I felt I had plenty left! Along the Sproughton to Claydon 3 mile part was riding on level road at 15 / 17mph which is top line for me over that stretch, so the MTB isn't dropping speed in the cruising area and in fact gained on road bike, PB going up my worst hill rising from river level to North Ipswich high ground. Gained 3 minutes on PB which was now getting silly. Its the comfort of the bike and the setup that matters more, for sure. I have a wider seat which has a dampened adjustable seat post which is set to soft and the Rock Shoxs on the forks set to medium, running 38mm tyres with little thread bumps only at the sides. The bike is great off road on dirt (dry) so am now looking at why I wanted a road bike. Fitting a Jones USA handle bar (a brilliant bar!) to the MTB offers me 5 different hand positions on a tour ride which is also the reason for comfort, as opposed to the hood / bar or drops handle- and of course no suspension. I was now 5 minutes up on my PB for 30 miles course with 5 miles to go and down slope to come, when the back wheel started to feel a bit bumpy. I should have stopped but pressed on when there was an almighty blow out of the rear tyre which looked to have perished. It was several years old. The tube was OK, but I had left the pump and the gas canister in the road bike! All good things come to an end, and with a partner that cant drive it was a walk of shame, compounded by walking the 5 miles in clipless shoe. I checked with the local taxi company for a transit style wheel chair taxi but that was an hour wait plus they wanted £20, so the thought of burning more calories (total was 3105) and saving money - win win. Going to now fit another set off Scwalbe bullet proof marathon plus on this bike and drop down to 35mm with slime tubes, like the road bike. If that combo is successful the road bike goes! Next stop my 50 / 60 mile targets! Average to 25 mls was 14.2 |
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