TTT

[Parrott]

Bloody politics .

Glad we don't have that shi'ite here

...oh well.I went for my first ever ride with clip ons ...only been racing bikes for 15 years .
Boy they make a difference.

Now ride a TT bike and find the same difference again.... then go for aero wheels, skin suit, helmet etc .

Sounds like you'll be smashing those 3 cat 1 riders

[toolonglegs]

Sounds like you'll be smashing those 3 cat 1 riders

Except I won't be aloud to ride...next year hopefully,plus I will be riding Cat 1 next year .

Mike changing club because my old club has lost nearly everyone racing and has turned into a total cyclo-tourist club.No help or anything with races...no team mates in my grade or Cat 1.Everyone left for the new club...so thats where I am going now.
Doctor's cert is needed for all competitive sports.

[Grant W]

Sorry to hear you can't compete TooLong that sux and i'd be !! BAN ME NOW FOR SWEARING !! too.

I posted this a while back,
I'd love a TT bike but, like alot of us they are alot of money to use occasionally.

I have a second bike which was my first road bike an "orbea" Aqua Dauphine 09 not the greatest bike but a good alloy frame.

I spent $600
185 on a second hand set of aerobars of e-bay with brake levers
200 on new shimano dura ace bar end shifters
200 on a thomson set post with the kink (reversed the kink forward to bring the seat over the cranks to duplicate the greater seat tube angle).

I have changed this bike from TT to road on two occasions and the second time took me half an hour with most of that time re- setting the brake and gear lever wires.

Just a thought for the future

I love riding this bike, I am looking at a second hand set of wheels disk rear and 404 front but the budget is lacking with the purchase of a power tap at the moment.

You like riding in a group, i love the TT's it's a pity we don't have more of them.

Good luck with the new club

Grant

[toolonglegs]

Cheers Grant...yes I did see your post before.It is an option to just have a set of bars etc....but maybe those super cheap caynon's maybe the go as well.
But seeings as it is about 10 months till the next TT I have time to think ...and put aside some pennies.808's with powertap are next on the list...although powertap is still away in UK I don't feel so keen on buying another!.

[Grant W]

808's with PT, NICE
Ordered mine today, hopefully see it in a week.

Brought an i aero but it is hard to configure and was giving me power readings of in excess of 800W going down hill free spinning with no pressure on the cranks

spent the last few months on bike exchange looking at second hand TT bikes or cheaper new one's. What to do????
With a new baby on the way, the baby bonus could be spent pretty damn quick

[Parrott]

Our club has TT's of varying length every tues evening in the summer series. They are very popular. The vice president of the club has made up a jig that measures the nose of saddle to bottom bracket set back of min 5 cm and the aerobar to nose of saddle distance so that the bike complies with uci rules. I had the clip on aerobar set up and saddle set forward as far as possible ( didn't need a special seat post to achieve this) on my regular road bike. I am only a local hack but found a tt bike was still heaps faster than what I could achieve on my road bike set up. There are now about 10 tt bikes and everyone is faster on the tt bike than they were on the road bike. Don't really know why, maybe we are all going harder to convince ourselves we haven't wasted our money

[toolonglegs]

Hey Grant what were you measuring those numbers you put up in the training post the other day?...345w av for 90 minutes is pretty good especially with sprint efforts thrown in (FTP around 360w or so?)...well unless you weigh around what I do that is .My FTP is about 350w but my power to weight sucks...about 3.6w per kilo ...hope to get that to 4.5w per kilo next year but that will take a ftp of 380w and losing 12 kilos.The weight I can do...the ftp improvement I am not so sure.

Parrot what is the measurement of aero bar - saddle?...and where are they taken from?.My seat as standard is 7.9cm behind bb so I could easily bring it forward.But I suppose the thing is you need to train on the TT position quite a lot as well to get the muscle memory etc...hence the big advantage of having a TT bike.I might try and find some TT course in the region and test myself on them sometime in the next 6 months.If I can do OK times I may think of a TT bike...I can put out the power for sure but I am not aero.I could get pretty low etc but I am always going to have a pretty big frontal mass.I do love doing my 20min efforts...my fav work out by far so you never know .

[Parrott]

UCI site here.



This article is alot easier to read though.

I'm going to train on my tt bike alot more this season and see how that goes. When I'm doing my spinervals sessions though I drop my forearms across the top of the handlebars on my roadbike and that gets closeish to the aero position on the tt bike. I've had the tt bike in the trainer a few times and it is heaps stiffer and more comfortable stay aero on but it's carbon and I don't think it's designed with trainer use in mind, might explode too. I might see what Alex can come up with as a programme for tt's soon also

As I said I'm only a local club level rider and not very experienced either but going by your race reports you seem to make solo breaks etc which would indicate you can produce a high power and sustain it? Bit like Fabian Cancellara who in pro peleton terms is not a small bloke either Anyway they're good fun, no tactics, no one sitting on, just go as hard as you can and see how you go.

[toolonglegs]

Turning into a comedy of errors...yesterday I really really smashed my legs,got the call up as soon as I got home from training to replace someone who had come off.Fine I say but I am also trashed...not to worry they say.
So I go down stairs to rebuild the race bike...go to take off the steerer cap and the bolt brakes ...HOW DO YOU GET A STAR BOLT OUT OF A CARBOn STEERER!!!...well put it this way I didn't...I drilled out the old center but the rest is hardened steel so I hit it in a bit more a fitted a new one.Dropped the bars /shoved saddle forward etc etc.Then I realise my chain wont go thru the rear mech...seized bearing in the jockey wheel...make a 9 speed one fit without the orings....fingers crossed...wonder if someone is trying to tell me something?...any went out this morning and my legs really are cooked...not sure how much caffeine will help today ....oh well I will know in a few hours!!!.

[toolonglegs]

That was fun ...my legs felt OK ...we started with 4 but after 400m!!! one of the guys snapped a spoke on his Kysrium SL rear...so we were down to 3 straight away...then we past another team who jumped on and wouldn't f...off!.Took a while to get rid of them...then it started to appear that even thou I was with two Cat 1 riders on full TT rigs (me road bike)...it wasn't me who was struggling ...in the end I was soft pedalling because no one could hold my wheel...come on!...I am a bloody bus to follow!!.
So we finished 39ish km's in 58m...40.something av...the best time was a Swiss Pro Cont Team who had a 49av (course wasn't flat!) .So I really enjoyed myself but would have liked to dig a lot deeper...maybe next time.

[Grant W]

Hey Grant what were you measuring those numbers you put up in the training post the other day?...345w av for 90 minutes is pretty good especially with sprint efforts thrown in (FTP around 360w or so?)...well unless you weigh around what I do that is .My FTP is about 350w but my power to weight sucks...about 3.6w per kilo ...hope to get that to 4.5w per kilo next year but that will take a ftp of 380w and losing 12 kilos.The weight I can do...the ftp improvement I am not so sure.

Parrot what is the measurement of aero bar - saddle?...and where are they taken from?.My seat as standard is 7.9cm behind bb so I could easily bring it forward.But I suppose the thing is you need to train on the TT position quite a lot as well to get the muscle memory etc...hence the big advantage of having a TT bike.I might try and find some TT course in the region and test myself on them sometime in the next 6 months.If I can do OK times I may think of a TT bike...I can put out the power for sure but I am not aero.I could get pretty low etc but I am always going to have a pretty big frontal mass.I do love doing my 20min efforts...my fav work out by far so you never know .

I think I brought my power meter from a poker machine salesman, push the button and hope for a good result.
i Aero
In MY personal view it was $800 I could of spent elswhere
I posted those results on the first day that I had it on the bike, the other day I was riding down a hill that I train on, riding around 55-60km/h not pedaling and the Watt's was "0" which is what I would expect. I started turning the cranks over to burn off a bit of acid, no pressure just spinning and the wattage went to 850 whith a HR of 120 up hills mashing the pedals watt's are low riding down hill, easy the watts sky rocket.

The only thing I trust on that thing now is the HR and cadence, hence this is why I have not posted further power readouts.

Ordered the PT a week ago, but they had to back order it and the other day I got a letter from my banck saying that the transaction was cancelled due to the fact that it was an International purchase via credit card which I didn't pre arrange with them (fraud prevention, which I organised idiot)

But I am sort of happy that happened because I am thinking of upgrading to the SL+DD wheel combo, the wireless combination will make it easier to swap between tt and road bike..

Has anyone used both, or had any advise

[twizzle]

i Aero
In MY personal view it was $800 I could of spent elswhere

More expensive than a wired powertap built into a rim and shipped to Australia....

[twizzle]

it wasn't me who was struggling ...in the end I was soft pedalling because no one could hold my wheel

Congratulations, looks like you don't need to spend the money on a TT bike now.

[Alex Simmons/RST]

I think I brought my power meter from a poker machine salesman, push the button and hope for a good result.
i Aero
In MY personal view it was $800 I could of spent elswhere

The iAero will receive an ANT+ signal from a wireless PT and in fact might be an excellent choice of CPU to pair with the PT.
I would however also get the standard Cervo CPU with the PT.

there's always e-bay

[Alex Simmons/RST]

That was fun ...my legs felt OK ...we started with 4 but after 400m!!! one of the guys snapped a spoke on his Kysrium SL rear...so we were down to 3 straight away...then we past another team who jumped on and wouldn't f...off!.Took a while to get rid of them...then it started to appear that even thou I was with two Cat 1 riders on full TT rigs (me road bike)...it wasn't me who was struggling ...in the end I was soft pedalling because no one could hold my wheel...come on!...I am a bloody bus to follow!!.
So we finished 39ish km's in 58m...40.something av...the best time was a Swiss Pro Cont Team who had a 49av (course wasn't flat!) .So I really enjoyed myself but would have liked to dig a lot deeper...maybe next time.

you're just an animal

[toolonglegs]

Animal...I wish. 297w av and 319w NP as you know is probably 50-60w under what I could hold...but you can only do what you can do .

The bike porn was pretty special....360 riders and some seriously nice bikes.Even in my team!.I will try and put away the pennies for a TT bike for mid next year...still have a few two man TT's I am going to try this month before everyone puts their bikes away.

[philip]

Hey that's awesome tll, well done - imagine if you hadn't done the massive effort the day before! The guys on your team must be pleased they called you up!

[toolonglegs]

hehe...I am not so sure one of them was pleased at the end...I think he spent quite a bit of time being sick in the car park after finishing .
But it was fun...it was good to finish the first 19.5km lap and know I could smash it as hard as I wanted on the 2nd as I was feeling so good...I think I spent 50% of the time on the front for the 2nd lap.

[mikesbytes]

Too fast for me mate.

I'm going to test out some old velocity clip-ons that I scored off Toff, tonight at the velodrome

[Grant W]

I think I brought my power meter from a poker machine salesman, push the button and hope for a good result.
i Aero
In MY personal view it was $800 I could of spent elswhere

The iAero will receive an ANT+ signal from a wireless PT and in fact might be an excellent choice of CPU to pair with the PT.
I would however also get the standard Cervo CPU with the PT.

there's always e-bay

REALLY! That's great Alex,
There are a few features of the i areo That I like if I could use the head and the PT hub that would be great. I'd still get the PT head though.
Thanks In think I'll get the wireless PT.

Is there a big difference between the SL+ and the PRO? forget weight, performance/ utilities?

[pine]

in the end I was soft pedalling because no one could hold my wheel...come on!...I am a bloody bus to follow!!.
So we finished 39ish km's in 58m...40.something av...the best time was a Swiss Pro Cont Team who had a 49av (course wasn't flat!) .So I really enjoyed myself but would have liked to dig a lot deeper...maybe next time.

Well here we go; this answers my question in the other tread. You say you are a bus but you climb better than some of the anorexic riders, so if you are too thin power is low and it can back fire. It must work both ways.
Is that right or am I not understanding this.
Wow to you.
Ps: sorry to cut into your tread but it was great reading.

[toolonglegs]

Well the climbs wern't long or steep....I hardly ever got out of the saddle or the aero bars.So they were pure power climbs and didn't require dropping below 32-35kmph.
Probably the hardest climb was similar to the very top of McCarrs creek road by the restaurant...nothing over 3 or 4%.I had to tell the smallest rider to "calme calme" over it the 1st lap....2nd lap all I yelled from the front was "ça va?,ça va?"

[pine]

Thanks for that great report. You give me motivation. (even at my age) I find climbing hills easier than losing weight, what I need to do is go on a detox diet.

[toolonglegs]

I'm getting on a bit too ...40 this year.But aiming to get my weight down for next year.I am 97 kgs at the moment and would love to be 85 by the start of season March next year...then I could really be confident moving to Cat 1.
Eating is my curse .

[pine]

We should start a biggest loser thread and weekly weigh ins. Do you think it will motivate us? I wonder if anyone else would like to join in.