Alport Challenge

So I was having a bad day, I couldn't be bothered!

However these days often (for me) turn out to be the best days after sitting doing nothing for a while I get thinking a bit and remember what I want to achive resulting in me getting quite fired up. What better way to reinstall confidence back in yourself is there than to go out in the rain and have a real good hard session. "just get out on the bike and get it done" So I decided I would try a few threshold efforts and see if I had improved much from the first block of training at loughborough. Alport heights challenge, an 'egoseg' - chatsworth north and beeley moor.

http://app.strava.com/activities/64264386

I seem to be able to go pretty hard for 20 minutes, and can go into the red a couple of times too during that time without blowing up, so I set off upto alport at a rather strong pace averaging 5.8w/kg or 380watts for the first part and 5 minutes untill the first flat/down segment, the trick is here to accelerate over the top of the hill getting up to speed quickly and then recovering whilst at tempo. A lot of people see the top of the hill and start to try recover... The middle section is pretty fast with a couple of inclines, just short enough for me to power over not loosing too much speed so in the drops I had it in a large gear head down trying to stay out of the strange wind there was that day. untill I got to chequer lane and shottle, where I can really put some work down on the steeper gradients, by this time you are starting to feel pretty tired and I just tried to push on knowing there was a brief downhill section to recover again just after the steepest bit staying seated to save my legs for the uphill finish sprint. I hate the top bit to the finish it has two parts and the first bit zapps all energy from your legs, then you have to do it again! Next time I may be more conservative on the first part.. My time was 19:35 and i felt i had given it my best effort so I was happy with that. My average HR had been higher than I usually would get for 20 mins. My power was similar to that in Windley TT's so I believe i could go quicker as this was 6/7 mins shorter than the TT.

I certainly felt I had improved from the previous months training, maybe not in the form of 20min efforts but the intervals had clearly helped with doing a hard 30sec - 1min effort and recovering quickly after it. overall I estimate an increase of around 15-20 watts for most times. A pb on beeley even in the rain and the wind certainly not im my favour seemed to back this up. Yet to have a real hard go up beeley, (one for nicer weather I think)