6 Weeks to go!!

Time flies when your having fun, so they say... Well the time has certainly flown for this challenge.

My stats to date are:

Date	Distance	Time
October	395.68	25.71
November	365.3	22.72
December	120.15	7.23
January	316.7	17.97
February	245.69	16.95
March	547.22	35.84
April	506.67	33.87
May	412.26	28.48
Total	2909.67	188.77

An average of 15.4 mph but there are still some miles to go!
so I have approximately 140 miles a week to go but I'm not planning to ride all the way up to the race date but give myself a little bit of a taper down to the event.  So the next couple of weeks of regular commuting and I'll try and fit in another couple of 'mock Galibier's' on my turbo trainer in the shed.

http://alzbikechallenge.blogspot.com/2011/05/practice-makes-perfect.html

Practice makes perfect

8 weeks to go!!

My challenge feels only around the corner. Over the past months I have noticed real improvement in my fitness and training.

This weekend I have forgone riding outside in favour of the shed and the turbo training. The purpose of my turbo training sessions. Have been to mimic the route that I will be riding. In July. Yesterday (Saturday) I set the trainer to mimic the climbs of the Telegraphe and the Galibier. Yesterdays attempt took me 2, 1/2hours to ride the 32km of the climb.

Today I rode the same again with the variation to include the 17km 'warm up' that will be from Modane to the foot of the Telegraphe. I also paid particular attention to my timings and pace notes (http://alzbikechallenge.blogspot.com/2011/04/more-detailed-etape-info-received.html)

Today the ride took just over 3hrs to cover the required 48.5pm to get me to the secondelmination zone. I reached this point with an hour in hand.

It was a hard ride especially focussing on maintaining a steady rhythm and trying not to grind away at the peddles.

I feel more confident now in my ability to get myself over the mountains, the challenge is going to come from the weather conditions, it will be in the 30's and also the possibility of bottle necks forming atthefootofeach climb.

My First Century

It's been a great week on the bikecthis week, all topped off with my first century ride yesterday.

Following last weeks effort in the club time trial I found my commutes this week a little easier. I think knowing what I can manage in a sustained effort allowed me to push a little harder. So I have now completed my first commute to the office in under an hour!!

My first century ride - Yesterday I joined 3 fellow wheelers for a ride down to Brighton. The weather started with a spot of rain and then brightened up to good day where I even caught a bit of colour. We took the same route I rode in March and made it down to the coast in little under 4 hrs, including a successful ascent of the Beacon.

As Before we headed to the Regency Cafe opposite the abandoned pier for much needed fish and chips.

The return leg was competed by 3 of us and was a much flatter and smoother route.

It was a greet day and a good hard ride, in total riding 115 miles.

http://app.strava.com/rides/brighton-run-return-525542