owl_girl's Group --- FULL! (Page 36)

I had a good swim today, much better than on Monday. My swim on Monday was partly a mess because I felt like I couldn't exhale properly through my nose. So, today I worked on exhaling through my mouth instead. It seems like it will work out, but I need to get used to exhaling at the right rate.

Still working on better body position via keeping my head down more and pressing my "T" down more. I can feel the difference when I'm doing it right.

I've got a 40 mile ride planned for the weekend. Hopefully I can get it in between the lacrosse game, skating sessions, Mother's Day, and the rain. Given the choice between 3 hours on the trainer or rollers in the basement and riding in the rain, I'm gonna take the rain.

What you did on your run is called a "negative split."  The first half of your run was slower than the last half of your run.  This is a good thing to be able to do.  You should practice this whenever possible.  One time I did it during a race and I managed to get a sub 8min/mile pace for the 4 miles!  I was so excited!  Great job on the run!!!

Don't kid yourself, Shaun!  You are gonna LOVE having the girls in front of you!!!   Maybe that hottie will spot you on the Zipps and try to keep up!

Safe travels to San Diego!

Yep, just don't holler out "nice legs baby".  I did that last night to a total stranger who was in front of me in a paceline.  It just popped out of my mouth.  Couldn't help it.  Good thing he couldn't see how red my face was after that.

Oh boy, gearing questions!

The formula for figuring gearing is: crank tooth number divided by cog gear number multiplied by wheel diameter in inches. Since wheel size is factored in, it obviously makes a difference. If your tri bike (650) and road bike (700) had identical gearing, your tri bike would have basically 8% easier gearing. There are gearing calculators on the web where you feed in your crank sizes and cog sizes and it will spit out your gearing for each combination.

What do your two bikes have right now? 

Tri bike--Cranks=170, Front=42/55, Rear=11/23 (10 speed), Wheels=650

Road bike--Cranks=165, Front=30/42/52, Rear=12/26 (9 speed), Wheels=700

I can ride the same 2 mile hill about 4 minutes faster with a lower heartrate on the tri bike than I can on the road bike.

On your tri bike, your lowest gear is 46.7 gear inches ((42/23)*25.6) and your top gear is 128 gear inches ((55/11)*25.6)

On your road bike, your lowest gear is 31.8 ((30/26)*27.6) and your top gear is 119.6 ((52/12)*27.6).

I'm not sure how the crank length factors in.

In theory, hill climbing should be much easier on your road bike because you have much lower gearing available. If this isn't the case in real life, then the difference in geometry between the bikes may be a big factor. Do you use the full gear spread on both bikes?

The number of gears/cogs affects the size of the jump between gears but not much else. These days you're really only going to find 10 cog cassettes on new bikes.

When I built up my race bike I went out of my way to make it a 9 speed so that everything would be compatible with my other bikes. All of my bikes have triples, but I rarely use the big chain ring. I make great use of the granny gears!

Thanks for the tips!  I think the shorter cranks on the road bike are a major problem.  I just can't get enough torque.  I'm definitely going to get longer cranks on my new bike.  I'm also going to go with a compact chainring.  It is awesome to look up the gearing stuff!  Thanks!!!

Where did you find the athlete tracking? 

I have a metric century coming up in 3 weeks. Since my triathlon in April I've been ramping up my riding, trying to get ready for this event. 2 weeks ago I rode 30 miles and it felt great and easy. Last week I rode 40 miles in some strong winds and I felt grateful to even finish. Yesterday's 42 mile ride was similar. I can't imagine riding an additional 20 miles under similar conditions. I'm starting to have real concerns about being able to finish this ride. I've got 2 more weekends to train for this. I am planning to keep next weekend's ride around 30-40 miles because I'm racing on the 26th, but then do about 50 miles on the last day of May.

Any training suggestions or ways to gain more confidence for my metric century ride? 

Hmmm...I went the other direction.  The P2C came with 170 cranks, but they felt too long.  When I'm in aero it was difficult for me to pull up very efficiently.  Actually, even sitting upright it was more difficult than it should have been.  The LBS recommended the 165 cranks, so I did, and was HAPPY HAPPY HAPPY after they arrived and got to ride with the shorter length.  I was actually faster.  But then again, I'm pretty dang short myself...  I'm sure you've done it, but get fitted and see what the bike shop recommends.

I've been trying to get the ironman site to work for the last hour.  Grrrr....  Seriously, they need to upgrade their server (or whatever computer people do to make the sites work better).  IMAZ back in April was a nightmare trying to get online as well.

Anyway, HOLY SHITENESS Shaun.  You are FAST in the water.  You've been holding out on us.  I think you need to give us all lessons!

If anyone is getting the site to work, mind posting updates?  Although, given the time difference, he's probably well into the run right now.  Most likely hanging out behind some hot babe checking out her gams thinking "Sarah told me not to say anything.  Don't say anything about her fine a$$ legs.  Don't, Shaun, don't say anything."  :-)

Okay, I got through on the website.  He's off the bike and probably half way through the run.

Swim: 39:51 (huh, that's different than what Roni saw)
T1: 3:29
Bike: 2:40:29 (wow dude, that's almost a 21mph average.  Nice job!!!!)
T2: 1:57 (smokin!)

Almost done Shaun!!!!!

Just got back from a run, swim and movie (Ironman). The tracking site is ironman.com, I'm not sure what happened with the swim times because they changed it when I checked this time. Here are the results posted:

Swim 39:51

T1 3:29

Bike 2:40:29

T2 1:57

Run 2:03:01

Total finish time 5:28:47.

Awesome! Nice job Shaun! Can't wait to hear about it!