Content about: Races
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🚴♂️ TFC Mad Monday on Climber's Gambit
I decided to race with ART on Zwift today rather than with WLVR on indieVelo. If indieVelo has a weakness, much like RGT, it is the weakness of the back of the field - and I wasn’t really in a good place to be racing by myself today.
Was also pleased that the autocat let me into D+, even though strictly I sit in Cat C. That meant that in theory, I could be competitive, more so if I hadn’t hung on to the ZSun category C ride for 90 minutes the evening prior.
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🚴♂️ WLVR Monday Malarkey 1.3 Race
Third race, two laps of the Flat 8 course on indieVelo.
Improved again, moving ahead of those I rode with last week, not quite able to hold onto Clive Byham’s wheel, having caught. Increased CP/FTP again.
18.30km > | 102m ⌃ | 32:00 | 166bpm | 225w | 430kcal | 34/45
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🚴♂️ WLVR RACE 7.9 ITT Black Park
Individual Time Trial around Pinewood Studios course in RGT with West London VR.
Released at 5s intervals, without draft. Went out hard, held on, riding a little ahead of L.Baerts for most of my effort.
15.23km > | 72m ⌃ | 26:53 | 174bpm | 232w | 418kcal | 40/88
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🚴♂️ WLVR Monday Malarkey 1.2 Race
Second race, a lap of the Coastal Loop course on indieVelo.
Much better race, holding onto a group including Neil Pugh, Andy Walker, Andy Evans - who pipped me on the line - nudged up CP/FTP again.
17.22km > | 26m ⌃ | 27:32 | 171bpm | 223w | 367kcal | 26/34
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🚴♂️ WLVR Monday Malarkey 1.1 Race
First race of the Monday Malarkey series, 5 laps of the South Lake course on indieVelo.
One off the back of the field, but much closer to group 14-18 - raised CP/FTP slightly. Class field from 11 up.
12.50km > | 62m ⌃ | 21:52 | 165bpm | 223w | 292kcal | 19/23
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🚴♂️ ROUVY - Race: Challenge Shepparton | Australia 20 km
Enjoyed my first attempt at Rouvy races, but spent most of the race between groups. Misses a rider grading system like ELO.
indieVelo workout helping to recalibrate my cadence and power.
19.99km > | 44m ⌃ | 34:29 | 165bpm | 219w | 433kcal
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🚴♂️ VCNTT 1.7 Key West | 24.76km > | 32m ⌃ | 44:22 | 162bpm | 210w | 623kcal
Dropped into RGT for a ranked race, nobody else turned up for the US slot! I came first in a race of one, but my ranking stayed still.
Happy to average 210w TT effort on tired legs, but still ~15% down on my best.
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My first look at indieVelo, in West London Cycling’s test ride for the new Monday Malarkey series running from next week.
Excellent start, some features I did not expect yet - note the Atom gear indicator.
🚴♂️ 12.64km > | 258m ⌃ | 26:44 | 154bpm | 195w | 312 Kcal | 16/18
#virtualcycling #indievelo
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Run Aintree Half Marathon - Feb 2023
We headed down to Liverpool for the RunThrough Run Aintree event.
RunThrough run the Run Aintree event five times per year, with entry into the half-marathon costing £40 (2023) including event t-shirt.
The event itself is well run, and based within the stadium, it was incredibly nice to use permanent facilities, and not to have to use portaloos! There was also an excellent though expensive coffee van, and spectators could just sit in the stands and watch their horses run around the course.
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Burnley Parkrun #337
Looking to start off 2019 in the manner that I hope to continue, I headed off for my first visit to my new local Parkrun in Towneley Park. We seem to be quite well blessed with Parkruns in Lancashire. The Pendle Parkrun in Colne is also particularly close, and Blackburn is probably 20 - 25 minutes away. I did contemplate doing the Blackburn / Burnley Parkrun double this morning, the event times had been amended with an 8:30 start in Blackburn, and 10:00 in Burnley to facilitate this - and many did both.
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Dublin Marathon
My initial race plans for 2017 had centred around the Grand Tour of Skiddaw race at the start of September. A big chest infection in the winter followed by ongoing problems with asthma meant that I barely run until May, and work commitments made it pretty difficult to get into any sort of rhythm until a change of job at the start of July. By which point I'd long discarded any hope of running at the Skiddaw race and had instead picked the Dublin Marathon as my A Race, and my only race, for the year.
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Poolbeg Parkrun
As a prelude to the Dublin marathon the following day, the main objective of racing at Poolbeg was to stretch the legs out, and not to push too hard, pick up any tightness or injuries. After an awful year it is pretty safe to say that I went out hoping for a worst ever competitive 5km time.
Having said all of that a qucik glance at my watch half-way through the first km showed an average page of 4:30/km, and so I had to reign myself back at that point.
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Summer 2014
This summer turned into a bit of a disaster from a race perspective, despite training going quite well in the main.
The fall at the Highland Fling race in April led to an enforced 3 weeks without training, and a good 8 weeks before I could train properly again in the pool. This led to me missing the Aberfeldy Sprint Tri.
I had a decent race at the Hawick Sprint Tri in June:
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Highland Fling
After collecting Vickie from Edinburgh Airport on Friday we made our way across to Milngavie for the start of the Highland Fling Race. Avoiding the Edinburgh traffic, and upsetting a taxi driver in the process by purchasing croissants as well as diesel, we probably arrived at the Premier Inn at Bearsden where we were staying, and where by coincidence the race registration was taking place and the incrowd gathering. I registered, and we ate ok food rather later than I would have liked.
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Galashiels Novice Triathlon
Swim: 400m
Ride: 11Km
Run: 2.5km
I had been planning to drop into triathlon at some point for a wee while, and originally had been looking towards Iron distance events which seemed to slot in nicely with my ultra endurance focus. This changed a little in the aftermath of the Barcelona Marathon when I decided that I also wanted to improve my speedwork, and to get faster, and more competitive at what I have been doing.
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Barcelona Marathon
Running in the sun has never really been my strength, and so it was with some trepidation that I flew into Barcelona on the Wednesday prior to the Marathon, hoping that I would hold it together in the warmer weather.
Fortunately I had taken the opportunity to spend 3 weeks warm weather training in Valenciana over the festive break, and a weekend in tropical Paris the weekend before the race had also helped me to acclimatise somewhat.
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Glen Ogle 33 2013
The Glen Ogle race had become my priority for the remainder of the year after cancelling my Ring o Fire entry. Given that the race had sold out in 53 minutes flat I also wanted to set a good time so that I didn’t have to worry about whether I actually entered in time or not in future, although this will not be an issue next year in any case given my alternative plans.
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Pentland Skyline Race
I had chosen earlier in the summer to run in the Pentland Skyline race in the run up to the Glen Ogle 33 race. I came to regret this as I struggled with a recurring virus after the Speyside Way race which refused to clear. The weather forecast was pretty ominous, and I did seriously consider giving the race a miss. Ultimately I decided that I’d spent best part of 6 weeks training specifically for the race, and that I just needed to man up.
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Speyside Way Race
I had spent much of July and August moving from Aboyne down to Fife, losing around 3 weeks in training due to both the move and a case of infected bursitis in the elbow developed from manhandling bookcases. The Ring O’ Fire race had always looked ambitious, but I felt that the loss of key training was fatal to my chances of finishing it. I decided to enter the Speyside Way Race a week earlier which I was pretty confident I would be able to run.
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Clyde Stride
The weather forecast for raceday for the week prior indicated that Glasgow and Lanark should both be overcast and cooler, but this changed on the Friday to indicate a sunny morning and cloudy afternoon. In truth neither was correct, the sun was relentless all day.
I stayed in Milngavie before the race, hopping a train into Partick where I picked up some tea and toast for breakfast.
I went into this race aiming for around 6 hours, but expecting to tail off towards 7.
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Cateran Trail Race
Today was the Cateran Trail Race, a hilly 55 mile ultra in the heart of Scotland, and you’ll probably guess from the title that it isn’t one that I finished, but it is one that I will thoroughly recommend.
I’ll try to keep this note fairly brief.
The first 10 miles or so went pretty well, but I was starting to overheat from about mile 5 onwards, and the windshield came off before the checkpoint at 6, and despite a rally heading up the tarmac out of this checkpoint I worsened through the next stage into the second checkpoint at mile 15 where I had a drop bag waiting.
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Cambus Canter
A 3 min PB at the Deeside Runners May Cambus Canter, and a good minute quicker than my training best, without the cheeky rest break!
I flew past somebody on the first climb, and pulled away, but the gap to Geoff in front stayed pretty static. I didn’t go past anybody else, and nobody else caught me.
I still think there is a few minutes to come out of this time, as I was runny on pretty heavy legs, and with a bit of a calf strain, but good hillwork all the same.
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London Marathon
I had known that I would be running the London Marathon since September, but an injury riddled 2012 combined with a low mileage asthma riddled winter, 3 weeks in Vietnam and a post travel bug meant that after the Glen Ogle 33 in November the sum total of my training for London was 3 weeks on treadmill in Vietnam, 2 weeks on trails back in Scotland, and then a week trying to remember what it felt like to run on tarmac, and in road shoes.
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Glen Ogle 33 2012
The Glen Ogle race went pretty much as expected, finishing in around 6:27. I was disappointed on the one hand with my time, and with a better month leading into the race would probably have been around an hour quicker. I had also underestimated the amount of extra hill at the back of the course which I had missed the year before. Och well, will have to run it again next year….
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Aberdeen Parkrun 30
I went into the Parkrun today feeling a lot fitter, lighter and quicker following a good long hillrun with Deeside Runners on Tuesday in which the quick crowd pummelled me into the hillside in an interval session at Glen Tanar.
I started off the race holding onto 6:30 min/mile pace, holding onto that until well after the first turn. The pace slipped into the low 7:00 min/miles by the end of the fist mile with the average pace slowly creeping up towards 7:25 min/mile.