Lonely day at the track. Five standing laps. Three on 92" two on a 94". Felt sluggish in the beginning but felt good by the last one. Scared away some douche on a gas powered skate board by vomiting over the rail after one of the efforts.

Need some advice.  My speed play cleat snapped this weekend and I'm thinking it was from using the cleats on my fixed gear....I am putting brakes on the bike because I want to train on the road and not die....anybdy having issues using speedplay x series pedals and cleats with a fixie?  I was thinking that the breaking may have been stressing the cleat and that adding breaks would alleviate it.  $40 for new cleats can get expensive.

Yacks, 

Yacks,

Andrew Da Silva said:

Lonely day at the track. Five standing laps. Three on 92" two on a 94". Felt sluggish in the beginning but felt good by the last one. Scared away some douche on a gas powered skate board by vomiting over the rail after one of the efforts.

I'm afraid I simultaneously lol-ed, went "good job" and felt sorry for you all at the same time. As I've told several of you before, if you don't feel like you're going to vomit at the end of a sprint effort on the track, you're not trying hard enough ;-) Good job Andy - both on the effort front and scaring away the d-bag motorized skate board dick (can't believe he's back again).

I've not lost my "vomit cherry" at Kissena yet. Sort of looking forward to it in a disgusting kinda way. Quite proud of my previous vomiting track record: heaved at 5 different tracks (Manchester, Newport, Wolverhampton, Moscow, Athens). Manchester was the funniest. Felt like I was going to be sick after the last flying 500 of a session, couldn't make it to the bathroom, went for the nearest litter bin, missed (cos it had a sideways entrance) and got most of it on the floor. Then they made me clean it up. Something of a low.

^File under "TMI"

Here's a snapshot from my weekend's training. Quite different from the usual grunting at Kissena. Borrowed my friend's cross bike and racked up some miles on beautiful country roads in my home county, Shropshire. Peace and quiet and fresh air made for a welcome change. Did 63km on Sunday, WTF?! ;-)

I like that Kinesis...they make really nice stuff...at a sensible price.  I'm currently having a Jones for this one...and it is an even more obnoxious color than my current whip...

@yacks - WTF is with that head tube?!

That head tube is a sprinters dream !!!
My fixie...now with life saving brakes.

A picture from the year 2000 just turned up...Dura Ace 9 speed and O-riginal Kysriums !

Aaaand Speedplays exactly as they appear today.

those are the same pedals....40,000 + miles on them....still going 

Anyone feel like heading over to Kissena this weekend?

Yes! Planning on going there Sat and Sun, assuming I'm feeling ok (a little under the weather). Andy is too. Maybe Sat afternoon and Sun morning. Tbd. Be great if you were going to come down!

Nice.  Kayt and I discussed heading out there the other day, but didn't get into details.  What time Saturday?

Since Saturday will be CX workshop, I'll be at Kissena on Sunday morning.

I'm looking doubtful for Sat at least - I finally succumbed to this virus I've been fighting all week. Funnily enough I think racing on Wed night might have not been such a great idea from a fighting illness perspective! Woke up today feeling awful and called in sick to work. Maybe Sunday, will depend on how much I can recover today and tomorrow.

Yikes, sounds nasty.  Get well soon and maybe see you on Sunday morning.

@Kayt most likely I'll be driving over to the inlaw's place first before heading to Kissena, so will have to meet you there.  Meet there around 9?

Ok Kieran, the gauntlet has been thrown for 2014...!

Haha, cheers Jules! I'm way off Baranoski and even Espinoza I'm afraid (anything sub-11 outdoors is quick though). 5th to 7th would be more realistic. The gap between 4th and 5th to the rest is crazy though - 0.5 secs is a lot.

Btw, where'd you see that?

It's also odd and slightly disappointing that Nationals can only muster 11 riders for the sprint! You wonder where all the other decent riders are: Gideon Massie, Michael Blatchford, Jimmy Watkins (sic. the dude who went to London 2012) to name a few.

There's a guy in that race named Jeffrey Whiteman.

Jeffrey White said:

There's a guy in that race named Jeffrey Whiteman.

Hello, my name is Mr...Snrub...

Aaron, I'll be there around 9a.

Running late, but will be there.

Good times with Aaron. CX hurt me bad so had little in the legs for multiple drills. Had a great time tho, still really love doing the flying 200. Aaron and I exchange a few standing starts and I almost ralphed after mine.

Post track milkshakes and iced coffee rounded out the excellent morning!

40 miles on the track bike today, does that count?

Good work chaps! Hope you made some impressive faces in the SS. Glad you found time for the post-training BR/DD recovery drinks too, haha!

Sorry I couldn't be there, was still trying to recovery from annoying illness. Still a little wheezy, but seem to have got over the worst of it (e.g. can walk 10 mins without then needing to take a nap for an hr).

David Yang said:

Good times with Aaron. CX hurt me bad so had little in the legs for multiple drills. Had a great time tho, still really love doing the flying 200. Aaron and I exchange a few standing starts and I almost ralphed after mine. Post track milkshakes and iced coffee rounded out the excellent morning!

Today my back hurts. Overspeed training down stateline is a killer.

To any of you doing the State Champs on Sept 15: between now and then (only really two weeks of productive training time), you should be trying to nail as much speed work as you can.

Here's a few useful speed drills you can do. You wanna do at least two of these sessions a week.

Non-track

Rollers sprints. 4x20 sec sprints on 88" (49x15 / 46 x 14). 10 min warm up. 6 mins between sprints. It's all about max leg speed and maintaining it for as long as poss!
OR 4x30 sec sprints on 86". Same as above. More emphasis on speed endurance.

Downhill sprints. Use road bike. Find a nice hill to ride down, preferably long, straight, quiet and not too steep (maybe 8%). Ride easy to the top. Then, in about 52x17 (equivalent to 87"), start riding down at about 60rpm. Then let rip for 20 secs. You get some KRAZY rpm, but you gotta keep pedalling aggressively. 15 mins off / easy. Then repeat x 4. Cavaet: Not tried this since living in NYC. Might be hard to do here without endangering your own (and others) lives...Thought about doing it at PP but too many people around. I used to do this on a country road in the UK. Hit 80 to 84 kph, so you see what I mean about the road needing to be quiet etc...That said, it's a great drill.

Track

4x Flying 200m, 88". 20 mins off in between. Concentrate on getting as fast as possible entry (i.e. hitting 200m line at full speed).
OR
4 x Flying 100m, 92". 20 mins off in between. Concentrate on getting as fast as possible entry (i.e. hitting 200m line at full speed).
OR
4x Flying 500m, 86". 25 mins off in between. Concentrate on getting as fast as possible entry (i.e. hitting 200m line at full speed).

There's a few others too, but that should keep you busy for now

Who's down for the track this weekend? Late notice I know, but I'm heading there Sat morning - prob get there for 11ish. No Star Track prog at mo. Planning to do some long-ish flying efforts.

Then Sun afternoon most probably. Standing laps or rolling accelerations.

Hit me up if interested 917 679 0927.