Cycling uphill

Egoscue method for cycling

April 23, 2018 by tejvan

The latest thing I am trying is the Egoscue method – ‘Health through Motion.‘

If nothing else, I quite like the philosophy. In summary, it goes something like this.

The human body is beautifully engineered and designed to work in harmony.
The human body is designed for motion. The early hunter-gatherers didn’t spend several hours in a chair
Modern life has meant we spend a lot of time sitting down – hunched over a car wheel, desk, computer. This means that certain muscles become atrophied.
If some muscles become weak because they are not activated – then other muscles carry a greater burden. This can lead to dysfunction.
The body starts to lose symmetry – with problems such as everted feet, rolling hips and the back losing its natural arc.

With these dysfunctions, we start to get pain in different parts of the body. If our shoulders are weak, it can cause problems in our hips. If our hips are misaligned, it can cause problems in the knee e.t.c.

When we get knee pain, we seek to treat the pain – with painkillers, surgery and the like. But, this is only treating the symptoms and not tackling the cause which are the various dysfunctions in different parts of the body.

In philosophy, it is a continuation of physiotherapy which is seeking to strengthen certain muscles. However, Egoscue adds more exercises – which work on realigning parts of the body. One exercise is simply lying on the floor with legs on a chair at 90 degrees – the aim is to feel the hips and back sinking into the floor.

Another part of the philosophy is that the patient has to take responsibility for his health. It is doing the right exercises, looking after posture that you will get better long-term health. It is not just a matter of going to a doctor and waiting for the right pill and drug.

Does it work?

I only started a few days ago, but I get a good feeling and hope it will work. The good weather is certainly a strong motivating factor to try and get back on the bike. When it’s wet and cold in February, being off the bike didn’t seem so bad.

If nothing else, it is quite a thought-provoking read. We all spend hours sitting and can easily get into bad postures. Even as I write this in a cafe, I am getting up after 30 minutes to walk around.

Related

Egoscue method at Amazon

Non-economic Note – New Economic Book

Whilst I am making links to Amazon. I have a new economics book published.

What Would Keynes do? – with fascinating questions like “If you like drinking beer – what is the optimal quantity of beer to drink?”

Buying first road bike

September 28, 2020March 30, 2018 by tejvan

If you are considering getting your first road bike, ideally you would be able to spend a minimum of £400 – £500. This would be enough to get you a decent entry level bike and give you a few options. Many companies, start their ‘entry level’ road bike around this price of £500. For example, for around £400-£500 – you could buy a Specialized Allez C2, GT GTS2 bike, Boardman Sport and quite a few others.

road-bike-reynolds-501-640 — My first road bike from Ellis Briggs, Shipley. It cost £270 and was about three combined birthday / Christmas presents. It was a Raleigh 501 steel frame with now obsolete Shimano RX100. By the way, I wasn’t fat as a kid – I just shoved about 3 maps down my front and a jumper in the back. The king of the Mountains jersey was absolutely my favourite.

If you can spend £1,000 then you can get quite a significant improvement on these £500 entry level bikes. The range £500-£1,000 is very competitive these days, and you can start to get carbon frames and good groupsets.

Although, you can spend several thousands of pounds on a road bike, the difference between a £1,000 bike and £4,000 bike is not that significant for an amateur who is just doing some general riding / sportives. If you are a newcomer to the sport of cycle races, your results will not be significantly better for spending an extra £4,000 – at least in the beginning.

Aero Water Bottles – Review

May 11, 2020March 11, 2018 by tejvan

It has been hard work finding an aero water bottle. My first one kept falling out, which makes it no good. I’ve recently bought an X-Lab Aero TT bottle, which hopefully will stay put, and save the odd couple of watts.

Specialized S-Works Aero Water Bottle

This was a very cheap way to improve aerodynamics. Only £14.99 for bottle and cage. It’s quite thin and fits on to frame nicely. The capacity is 600ml, which is fine for most time trials. Though on longer ones like 100 mile time trial, you may prefer 800ml which will reduce the need to pick up bottles.

It was easy and intuitive to pick out of bottle cage and just as easy to put back in. It felt fairly solid, but then on two occasions, it jumped out on a bumpy descent. As I often race on bumpy roads (which UK roads are not bumpy?) I couldn’t trust this bottle. Also, on one occasion when jumping out, it got smashed. I think I ended up buying a second one, but this one jumped out too, so I’ve completely given up on this bottle.

Specialized S-Works at Evans – only £10.99

‘X-Lab Aero TT’

I bought this X-Lab Aero TT because it had good reviews for staying in place. You can definitely understand why it stays in place – it is actually hard to pull the bottle out of its cage. The first time, I thought this is pretty difficult. However, there is a good trick for getting the bottle out, you have to lift the black cap at the top of the bottle, and then it comes out OK. Putting the bottle back in, also, requires practice. You have to put the end in first and then push it down. I’m confident of its ability to stay in place, I’m less confident of my ability to seamlessly get the bottle out during the pressure of a race (when racing, taking a drink is often really hard work). It is made in the US and comes with those outdated US imperial measurements of 20 oz (or as we say in the rest of the world 585ml.)

X-Lab Aero TT

Cycling comeback delayed

February 26, 2018 by tejvan

I am still cycling after a fashion. Different physios and doctors have suggested riding through the mild pain and discomfort. It sounds good advice. The problem is after 18 months of doing this, it’s hard to muster up much enthusiasm. Especially in cold weather, I have to really force myself to go out once or twice a week to avoid complete physical stagnation. It feels a bit like taking medicine, you know it’s probably a good thing to do, but you really have to make yourself go out and do it.

This weekend, some friends planned a trip to Broadway in the Cotswolds. In the days of long-distance cycling and 12-hour time trial training, cycling from Oxford to Broadway was a mere pre-breakfast warm-up. But, now it’s more of a car journey.

For a long time, I mentally decided that this weekend would be the start of the great come back. I could feel it in the bones, the past 18 months of difficulties were going to start melting away with the warming spring sunshine of the Cotswold. I envisaged cycling moderately fast up Dover’s Hill (venue of 2010 National Hill climb championship) and other similar climbs.

The weather was beautiful and packing the bike in the car, reminded me of old race days.

Alas, the great comeback stopped was brought to a halt as I got out of the car in Broadway. I felt a twinge in the left-hand side of the right knee just as I placed the foot on the floor. It seemed a perfect symmetry to long-running problems on the right-hand side of the right leg. So the bike stayed in the car for the weekend, and the comeback trail didn’t materialise.

Cycling statistics in UK

February 7, 2018 by tejvan

Some selected cycling statistics.

It would be interesting to go back further in time. Other includes cycling and walking.

Share of transport 2016

Source for many of graphs: 2016 National Travel Survey (released 27 July 2017)

An updated stat to show cycling accounts for just 2% of journeys in England.

Cycle rates by country

Britain still lags behind countries with similar weather, population density and geography.

According to this EU survey (2013) 4% of UK respondants say they cycle at least once a day. This compares to

Netherland – 43%
Denmark – 30%
Finland 28%
Hungary 25%

Though UK is higher than the US where the figure is more like 1%

China still has the most bicycles of any country with annual sales of around 60 million units (Statista)

How many rest days are needed in cycle training?

February 5, 2018 by tejvan

When training, I used to frequently asking myself – how much do I need to rest before the next hard training session? The amount of rest is a key factor in determining the quality and efficiency of training. If you gave insufficient rest, training will become counter-productive. Take too much rest and you never stretch yourself satisfactorily.

Pro Perspectives

Bradley Wiggins said that the best preparation for riding the Olympic Time trial (2012) was riding the three week Tour de France – finishing nine days before. The Tour de France has two ‘rest days’. But for Wiggins a rest day meant a three hour ride with an alpine climb – not my kind of rest day.

In the nine days between the Tour de France and the time trial, Wiggins was riding hard – including burying himself in the 250,m road race. Many less capable cyclists would have turned up to that time trial – not in a peak state of fitness, but complete exhaustion. During this particular racing period, Wiggins is taking very little rest.

Obree method

At the other end of the spectrum, in Graeme Obree’s training manual – he states that after a really hard training session, it could take him up to four days to fully recover before the next full-on training session. Obree’s philosophy was that to make progress, you have to train at a higher level than ever before. To transcend previous achievements you need to be fully recovered. If you train when already tired, you can’t make the same progress.

So with two very successful professional cyclists – you have two very different approaches to the amount of rest needed. For amateur cyclists aiming for maximum fitness with limited time, rest days take on more importance.

On the one hand, coaches often stress the importance of rest days to allow full recovery – but then the best cyclist are those who race 100 days a year and ride three-week tours.

The responsibilities of a cyclist

December 15, 2017 by tejvan

The thing about being a cyclist is that sometimes ‘non-cyclists’ take you as a representative of the cycling world. I remember when a close friend mentioned to me.

“I was walking on a path – and one of your lot nearly knocked me off.”

It took me a while to work out that ‘one of your lot’ meant a fellow human being on a bicycle. I couldn’t say I felt much responsibility for the act of random stranger, but there you have it. Sometimes you have to take it on the chin. (By the way, it doesn’t work the other way around saying to others. “One of your fellow motorists nearly knocked me unconscious.:)

Representing the cycling world also extends to the world of professional cycling. I haven’t been asked if I’m going to ride the Tour de France for quite a long time. But I do know at an upcoming Christmas Party, I will have several inquiries about the Chris Froome drug saga. If I was going to answer properly I would try to mention the relevant points from this excellent blog by Inner Ring.

Young kid on a mountain bike – Joe Baker

October 31, 2018October 31, 2017 by tejvan

Inspired by the National hill climb, I went out for a 30 mile training ride yesterday to Brill. It was a beautiful autumn day, but unfortunately, I was in discomfort by the end of the ride. I was plodding along St Clement’s at a fairly sedate speed when I got overtaken by a young lad on a mountain bike, backpack and big mudguards.

There was me – on a state of the art – Trek Emonda, Dura Ace Di2, several thousand pound Carbon fibre bike, and here I was getting overtaken by a young lad, taking home the weekly shopping. Welcome to the future.

Not only that, but as he nonchalantly breezed past, he obviously recognised me and said:

“Hi Tejvan”

So I made a big effort to catch up this MTBer and find out who was sailing past. Of all people, it was Joe Baker (Zappi CC) who had been riding the national hill climb championship this weekend up at Hedley on the Hill. Not only that but he was the champion under-16 rider, finishing 11th junior men in a very respectable time of 4:40.5 (results)

On the positive side, he mentioned he is getting closer to my Brill KOM, but still a good 20 seconds off. So at least for a short-while, I can live on my past glories of Brill hill.

It’s a small world. You cycle around Oxford and you don’t know who you are going to bump into next.

Update 2018

In 2018, Joe Baker finished 1st junior in National Hill Climb Championship at Pea Royd Lane. Even more impressively, he finished 5th overall in a top quality field. Men’s results 2018 National Hill climb

Related

National hill climb 2017 – results

October 31, 2017October 30, 2017 by tejvan

It looks to have been a great national hill climb championship up in the North East. Both Dan Evans ASSOS Equipe UK and Joscelin Lowden (Lewes Wanderers CC) making worthy champions.

It’s not quite the same watching results drip through on Twitter – compared to actually racing and being there. Sitting this year out reminded me of what the championship means.

Champions

Men: Dan Evans ASSOS Equipe UK 03:54.3
Women: Joscelin Lowden (Lewes Wanderers CC) 4:53.4
Junior Junior Male: George Kimber (CS Dynamo) 4:13.9
Female: Corinne Side (Racing Chance Foundation) 5:19.0
Male Team: B38-Underpin Racing (K. Savage, P. Clark, Andy Nichols) 12:31.7
Female Team: Racing Chance Foundation (Corinne Side, Tamsin Vicary, Heather Bamforth) 18:08.5

Dan has been a very consistent hill climb performer of the past few years. On hills above two minutes, he has rarely been beaten. It’s an impressive open campaign and becomes the first man to take a second championship since Dan Fleeman in 2010. They say hill climbs is a young man’s sport, but a little like myself, Dan came to the sport relatively late. All I can say 36 is a very good age to become national hill climb championship (I was 36 in 2013). Can Dan win again? Well, it doesn’t get any easier as you approach the big 40.

2nd place Adam Kenway (Raleigh GC) put up a spirited title defensive; perhaps next year will be more to his liking. Proving that hill climbs is still a young man’s game, Kieran Savage (Team B38) must be pleased to get third spot, whilst still an espoir. I always feel a certain empathy for people who just finish outside the podium. Jo Clark has consistently finished in the top 5, but is collecting a few near misses. This year just one or two seconds was the difference. Interestingly Clark was the only rider to beat Evans in an open event (on the Rake) – another rider who will be looking forward to the short climb up Shelsey Walsh. With strong competition, there were many very good hill climbers within 10-15 seconds of a podium place. Honourable mention to first Vet man Niall Paterson Velo Club Cumbria. Next year, I might be able to provide some competition in the old man category.

JoscelinLowden_velo-uk — Joscelin Lowden Velo UK

In the women’s event, no former champion meant the event was open, but the quality of the field was as strong as ever. I don’t think the women’s podium has been so close – with just 2 seconds separating the top three. It was good to see Hayley Simmonds enter the event and get so close. She is a world class rider and time triallist, but, at the end of a long road season, the rigours of four minute British hill climb make it a real challenge compared to what she is used to riding. Mary Wilkinson (Yorkshire Road Club) produced a superb ride to finish 2nd. After a good open season, Joscelin Lowden (Lewes Wanderers CC) won her first title. In this CTT report, Lowden sums up the attraction of the hill climb championship.

“Some people question why I would come all the way up here to ride for five minutes and I start to think ‘Am I mad?’ but it’s so much more than just riding on a hill.

“It is everybody else here that makes it special for us riders: the supporters cheering us on, the course commentators, everything just makes it such a fun event and to win makes it extra special,”

The photos of the ev

National hill climb 2017

October 31, 2017October 29, 2017 by tejvan

Results:

Men:

Dan Evans (ASSOS Equipe UK) 3:54.3 (course record)
Adam Kenway (Raleigh GAC) 3:59.5
Kieran Savage (B38-Underpin Racing) 4:03.1
Joseph Clark (Cycling Giant Sheffield) 4:04.9
Leon Wright (Race Hub) 4:05.3
Mike Morris (NFTO Race Club) 4:05.6
Andy Cunningham (All Terrain Cycles) 4:08.1
Zeb Kyffin (GS Metro) 4:09.9
Kieran Wynne-Cattanach (Maxxis 4 RT) 4:10.6
Patrick Clark (B38-Underpin Racing) 4:11.2

Team: B38-Underpin Racing (K. Savage, P. Clark, Andy Nichols) 12:31.7

Women:

Joscelin Lowden (Lewes Wanderers CC) 4:53.4
Mary Wilkinson (Yorkshire Road Club) 4:54.5
Hayley Simmonds (Team WNT Pro Cycling) 4:55.6
Fiona Burnie (GS Metro) 5:03.9
Jessica Evans (Assos Equipe UK) 5:11.6
Rebecca Goodson (Velo Schils Interbike) 5:13.2
Elizabeth Banks (Storey Racing) 5:16.1
Jacintha Hamilton-Love (Dulwich Paragon) 5:20.6
Alice Lethbridge (Drag2Zero) 5:21.4
Hannah Slade (Chippenham & District Whs) 5:23.7

Team: Racing Chance Foundation (Corinne Side, Tamsin Vicary, Heather Bamforth) 18:08.5

Junior Boys:

George Kimber (CS Dynamo) 4:13.9
Thomas Prentice (GS Metro) 4:23.5
Alex Raynard (Matlock CC) 4:26.8

Junior Girls:

Corinne Side (Racing Chance Foundation) 5:19.0
Lily Greenhalgh (Team 22) 5:28.7
Jasmine Gray (VCUK Velochampion) 6:29.0