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Monday, June 24

Ride by the Numbers

Two rides over the weekend.  Both of them recorded on my (still) new Wahoo Elemnt, so they both indeed happened... although my STRAVA is still set to private.  This information (for the most part) is for me, not bored lookie-loos.

I'm still trying to get a hang of this... and figure out what to do with "data."

Saturday's ride was less than inspired.  I wanted to make the most of the day, so I loaded up and drove over to the USNWC.  Trail status was open when I left the house, and with its 45+ miles plus of trails, I should be able to get all I could eat.

Pull up in line to pay to park... and I can see the "trails closed" red flag waving in the wind.  Make a quick u turn... pull out my phone... check Twitter.

Closed eight minutes ago.

Fuck all.

Go home.  Decide to ride the Backyard Trails less then a half mile from my house, almost an hour of my day wasted in the car.

Head out, hit some trail, some greenway, some more trail... just tryna enjoy the day before the predicted storms fuck everything up.  Stop to raise my seat post... break the end of my 3mm allen off inside the bolt.  Dammit.  Feel something else hinky down in my cranks... wobble, wobble, wobble.  I can move them back and forth inside the bottom bracket.

Head home.  Address "things."

That was the first time I'd ridden the Vertigo Meatplow V.7 since the TSE.  I guess my post-race once over needed a twice over.  That said, I guess I'm lucky that the Greenway Classic was postponed a couple weeks ago.  Woulda been a frustrating fifty miles.

Sunday's ride.  Kangalangamangus had asked me to go with him earlier in the week.  I assumed the ride was off with the potential storms that were predicted.

It was not.  After the turd of a ride I had Saturday, I was in.

I made the right call.

A loop of favorites in the North Mills area.  Upper Trace is getting super gnarly.  Sooooo worth it, and a good crew to boot.

On the wall at the Mexican restaurant mountain bikers don't go to... because?

This.

Anyways, the Wahoo stuff I'm tryna figure out now that I have it.

My Backyard/Greenway ride:
1:55 riding and I had the auto-pause turned on.  I was surprised that I could stay in the Hard zone as much as I did on a flat greenway with a 32X18.  I also ran with Boppit for a bit, went back and hit a couple of my favorite jumps (old and new), and mebbe did some putzing about.  The other surprise was that most of the time that I was on actual trail, I was in that Peak zone... and I don't know how riding a bike on a local trail would be fun going much slower.

The Pisgah ride:

With the auto-pause turned off, that's 4:15 run time, but only 2:11 ride time.  Out of that, I was Peak for almost half of the time riding, and Hard to Peak for all but twenty minutes of riding.

Once again, I don't know how I'd ride this any differently.

You gotta get up to get down, and I'm amazed that when I'm actually going down, my heart rate is easily in the 140s or higher.

So, I guess my question is... what's the take away here?  Is there one?

Dunno.  Money pissed away, a digital distraction, or useful information (if I can only figure out what to do with it)?

11 comments:

Anonymous said...

Methinks the default heart rate zones on the Wahoo gps machines are off. Got a bolt recently & had to reset them because numbers matter but I'm allergic to maths.

jacobtubbs said...

Everybody got their own kinda use for bike computers, but IMO the highest and best use of them, especially the Wahoo - because the auto-upload just works without me having to F around with it, is that it creates (on whatever platform I use) an automatic entry of where I rode, when. I love looking back and finding random Pisgah rides I did 4 years ago, or that time I got lost at Bent Creek, or that time I met Watts at MonsterCross and told him I was boned and couldn't trade pulls with him but it turns out I could and did, or the time I did Bull and Jake and almost died from hornets or whatever. The data is great if you're "training" or whatever, but the digital record of "I went here, then, and here's a note to myself about what happened" is super valuable to me. Like a weird little photo album with pictures of my ugly little rides, just for me.

dicky said...

jacobtubbs

Like a blerhg just a lot less work!

Anonymous said...

What do you see in that wall paint chip? Face facing right, no torso, legs walking left, necktie in the breeze?

Vertigo Cycles said...

I love this stuff. My favorite part of cycle computing is seeing that my friends all climb 400-600ft more than I do on any given ride. I choose to believe that it's not due to an altimeter error - it's because I know all the best lines.

Also, I see the same thing you're seeing - super high HR on DH sections. There are two longish DH sections on my normal ride that, depending on how much terror I induce, see my HR at 175 give or take.

George Michael said...

"Gotta get up to get down" RIP Fast Love, one of my faves from too long ago!!

Kyler! said...

I'm with the first anonymous I believe the default HR Zones are off. HR Zones are not one size fits all with Age, Weight and Resting HR. To get a true HR Zone match up you need to do a full out stress test and lactic threshold test. These test are not cheap if done privately but I will say Furman University here in Greenville has a Health Sciences Dept. where grad students are always looking for test subjects on these types of test. They have all the bells and whistles and its free if you volunteer. I know it sounds like a lot of effort just to get HR zones to match up but I did this years ago and it was night and day difference with my HR zones when I was actually training.

FourMat said...

You ask questions like that, and you're going down the rabbit hole. Take the red pill and you're in for an FTP test, which is a decent way to set your HR zones. Take the blue pill and now you're wondering what this Zwift thing is all about when all the trails are closed in the winter. Do you really want to go there?

dicky said...

FourMat,

no.

Anonymous said...

El chapala is el crapola compared to other options that are perfectly convenient to a “local” who doesn’t have to boogie back to Charlotte-like a Walmart, only going to spend $ there if it’s my only option.

dicky said...

We ended up north of the highway for foodings. Pleasantly surprised and 10/10 would go back. No novelty sized beers and they were outta Dos Equis tho.