Dirk's Junkie group - CLOSED (Page 61)

I agree that the fatigue in my legs goes away very seldom.  The only time I actually get all of the fatigue out of my legs is when I take a full day off.  I have become used to feeling the fatigue and I seem to allow enough time for recovery by taking a day away from either cycling or running, whichever applies at the time, when the fatigue becomes more prevalent.  I too have been dealing with or allowing this to happen for a little more than a year.  I learned to deal with this during marathon training.  I think the biggest key is learning the difference between a distressing type of fatigue that requires recovery and a more marginal or lower intensity feeling of fatigue during the first mile or two of running or riding.

I agree with the assessment too.  I have been trying to work on the particular pedaling technique you are mentioning Jeff.  My achilles issues seem to be be going away slowly as I have been attempting to address the issue.  I have not reduced running frequency, only the distances I had been doing.  I am now getting back to my planned "normal mileage" and even trying to increase this distance starting tomorrow morning (at 5:00 AM nonetheless).  (I am planning to do 5k runs on Thursday mornings to increase mileage base.) 

I have not been out of the saddle much all winter long other than to allow some blood back into my backside so I can't really say anything from experience but the logic is certainly there.  The relaxed calves during the time out of the saddle may be harder to work on, at least for me, because it seems like there is a natural tendency to try use your calves for additional power.  I just wish I had some hills around here to try to apply this principal.

I can also assure you the "toe-ing down" will cause more stress on your calves and achilles because I have been trying to toe down almost since beginning riding a couple of years ago.  A simple seat adjustment may be enough to help.  I lowered my seat more than I thought I should have to try a new position out and that seems to have made a difference for me.  Maybe consider lowering just a tad and see what happens.

I posted this a couple of pages ago and I am looking for some insight.

" I bought the chain yesterday and the mechanic at the LBS may have been selling me a bill of goods from what I have heard before.  He told me to replace the chain every 2000 miles and the cassette every other chain replacement (4000 miles).  If I recall correctly the cassette should last for MUCH longer than that distance and the chain for about 6000 miles.  Who is correct?  I am fairly certain I remember seeing Jonathon post the 6k miles and the cassette lasting 10k+ miles."

The "mechanic" also told me that I didn't need a chain tool to remove links because "the chain is already the correct length."  I tried to replace the chain tonight and found the chain to be considerably longer than the old, stretched out one.  Went ahead an put it on to see how it fit.........................Horribly!!!  It was way too long!  (Which I did already know by simply holding it along side the old one.)

Anyway, my bigger questions are:

1. How many miles should I get out of a cassette?
2. How many miles out of a chain?

I am taking today away from training but not an officially needed or certainly not sanctioned recovery day.  The pool hours are JACKED!!!! I just ran yesterday and my bike needs a chain badly enough that I can't really ride it and get any actual training.  So I am going to go give it a bath at the car wash.  That will be just what the doctor ordered for it.

This is all great advice.  I actually have been employing ALL of it, so that makes me glad to know that I'm doing some things correctly.  I honestly have been practicing a lot more on a rounded pedal stroke and I think that the pulling up has been what has irritated it.  Got my 30 mins + video taping done at the track tonight.  Stand by in the next few days for some very eye-opening video of my stride with fatigued legs.  It is NOT pretty.  haha!

In reference to the chain, if you have cleaned, degreased and oiled your chain, loop it around a chain ring in good condition.  If each of the rollers sits tight inside each valley between the teeth, the chain is most likely still good to go.

In reference to the cassette, you can pretty much tell when the teeth start to be pointed.  You'll see it more-so on the gears that you use most often.  I will see if I can find a new and an old cassette that I have to show you the difference, but I'm sure you can see it in your head.

Hope this helps!  And BTW...my pool hours suck too.  I can only go at 5:30 AM (I have to be at work at 6:30, so this doesn't work) or 8 PM (hard to go to bed by 9:20 when you're still at the pool after 9.

OK - this is good to know. I get a little obsessive about it which is one reason I don't clean it as often as I should.

Sharing a little good training news - I'm finally starting to feel more confident on my tri bike this season. Had a great ride with my training friend tonight at a local state park. It is a 5.5 mile loop that I like to ride for some speed work intervals. Finally got comfortable enough to get my speed up over 20 mph. It has been a mental battle much more than physical so this is progress!

Matt, you are so right about bringing the kids along.  Emily rides her bike, Mariah rides her scooter, and Leah and I each have a dog attached to our waists.  Its so much fun, and the girls always talk afterwards about how great they feel.

I find I run better just having a dog with me.  I think it distracts me from the tedium of running.

Allison, it didn't take me much time at all to learn to flip turn.  Mariah taught me by having me do a flip in place to get a feel for the motion.  Then once I had done that several times, I'd swim from the flags to the wall and do it in motion.  At the end of the bottom stripe, take one more breath, then flip.  

I'm sure that mine aren't graceful, but they're functional.  And it really does make the swim harder without pausing to breathe at the wall.  I feel like that will help me in the open water swim.  I expected it to be much harder than it really is.

My dog ties himself around my legs... It's not the best of situations...

One a note for increasing the mileage base - my HM has come to the end, and I'd like to keep my weekly long run the same, but I'd like to increase the frequency of runs. Is the best way to do this to add short recovery/easy runs on days when I haven't been running? The schedule for my current week looks like this:

S - Long
M - Off
T - Easy
W - Off
T - Tempo/Medium
F - Easy
S - Off

Is adding an easy Friday or Wednesday run the best way to add some frequency without losing the distance of the long run (which I need for the HM in a month and a few days)?

Jonathan - Your Achilles issue beat mine by a week!! I found that I irritated it when I was pushing hard to keep up with the guy I was riding with on Sunday, and it makes sense that I was probably pedaling with my toes up. I'm going to ride again tonight and concentrate on keeping my heel down (just like riding a horse!). Thanks for asking the questions I would have had no idea how to ask. It feels pretty good after today's run, so I'm confident it was only a fleeting issue!

Allison - I USED to know how to flip turn and can still pull off a clumsy one. It's actually not that hard at all, just make sure you swim in with confidence and momentum!

Dina - great to hear you're getting more comfortable on the Tri bike! It sounds like you're going to be pretty quick on that.

Okay - back to work for me!

John

Looks like you already have an easy run on Friday...or am I missing something?

I'd definitely start by adding runs on two of those off days, so you're targeting 6 days a week of running.  Make them short and EASY.  Build the miles on those up until your HM.  I love the 3:2:1 plan, where 3 days you run easy at 1 "unit", 2 days at 2 "units", 1 day (long run) at 3 "units".  So for instance, make three short runs of 3, two medium at 6, one long at 9.

A question back to you first.  What are your training plans for triathlon and available time? 

I agree with this.  The only thing I might change would be the frequency of running.  I think you would be alright with only 5 days running if you are shorter on time and/or trying to get some other solid work on the bike or in the pool.  If you desire to be run focused and have the races that support this idea, 6 days a week are an awesome idea.  With the runs and distances that Warren is calling for that would be a really great running base leading into longer races over the summer/fall.

If you want to get more bike focus too, then try to run only 5 runs a week with similar distances that Warren is suggesting and add another bike with intensity.  For your triathlon you'll get the most bang with these 2 disciplines at a harder or more frequent level of work.

That's a great point Dirk, and worth really thinking about.  As a runner only, or even with a huge run focus, this plan makes sense.  I think it would be hard/not proper during a true triathlon training regimen.

I have been putting off thinking about my training after the HM, but I need to transition to a bike focus as my biggest race is the bike leg of a HIM relay, then a HIM the following week.  But for now running is front and center.  On that front - did 2.77 miles (as part of an 8.6 mile run) at tempo last night, which felt pretty hard.  It is record warm for us here in New England - 74 even at 7:30 last night when I ran.

Yes!

Dirk....miles from a cassette?  I have no simple answer.  The length of life for a cassette will vary a lot based on your riding style (do you ride mostly in the same gear? or mix it up a lot?), how well you maintain the chain, and the alloy the cogs are made of.

I have only thrown away a grand total of 1 cassette in my life.  I have 30 year old freewheels still in service...but in the old days they made them from indestructible steel.  Nowadays you have Dura Ace cassettes with some gears being aluminum.

I threw away a dura ace cassette last fall when I finally realized my mtn bike jumping out of gear was due to the cassette being worn.  In a mtn bike application the cassette is subjected to far more wear.  Visually there was nothing wrong with it.  I and a few other experts eyeballed it and there was no visible signs of wear on the teeth.  But when I looped a new length of chain around it I could slide the chain forward and backward.

Jonathan's suggestion of testing it this way is really the right thing to do.  In fact, the old addage of looking for 'pointy' teeth doesn't even hold.  Nowadays the teeth of the cassettes are engineered with a variety of different shaped teeth for optimum shifting.  If I look at a brand new cassette, to the untrained eye it will look like some of the teeth are mis-formed.

On the chain front: all chains are sold with a surplus of length so that they are guaranteed to fit your bike.  You will always need to remove some links to make it the right size for your bike.  Whomever told you otherwise needs to be fired because they don't know enough about bikes to qualify for the job.

The easiest thing to do is line up the new chain with the old one, account for the stretch in the old one and break the new chain where it lines up with the old one (minus the stretch).  Basically, adjust the new chain so it has the same number of links as the old one did.

For the emboldened remarks:

1. I had noticed this before when I got the bike and thought something might have been wrong with my cassette, posted a question and found out the correct answer is as you said.
2. I had exactly the same sentiments about the "mechanic" that told me I needed to replace my cassette so soon.  I think it was you that stated at the end of the last session that a cassette could last a very long time.  And the other thing he said that had me really NOT liking him was that I needed to replace the chain every 2000 miles.  I believe it was you or Jonathon that said every 6000-ish miles.  Obviously I see that he has something to gain from selling a chain every 2000 and you and most everyone else on here have nothing to gain financially from giving me advice............I'll listen to you all for sure.

I ride in similar gears most of the time because of the terrain I am in.  I have little reason to change gears for that reason, but I do change things up frequently to make my legs adapt to different loads, i.e. power, spinning.  Even still I am in a very similar gear pattern.

My bike now has a Tiagra groupo with one exception, a Sora front derailleur.  Pretty much bottom end stuff but it makes a very functional bike for me and one I don't plan to upgrade until part must be changed.  With that in mind were, I to need to replace my cassette, what would be a good replacement for a 9 speed?

One other Question (and I suppose it would be similar to the cassette):  Should I expect to get a similar amount of mileage from mt chain rings?

Thank you guys, I'll start adding in a couple of miles on days when I would normally be off. There's rarely a day I can't add a couple of miles, even if it ends up being straight off the bike. Frankly, straight off the bike helps as I can practice controlling my HR after a blast on the bike!

Speaking of biking, I have an elevation graph to make you flatlanders jealous:

It's up our local "mountain" which has an awesome view from the top. I think the view is even better when you had to "earn" it by climbing the damn thing.

Since we're speaking of biking - While I was on this ride yesterday, my pedals starting making a "bump" sound whenever the right pedal was between 4 and 6 o'clock... do you guys have any inkling of what this might be? It sounds a little like a bad bearing, but the bike has less than 1000 miles on it, so it would be early for something like that to go...

Now back to your regularly scheduled programming.

John

The interesting fact of bicycle parts is that the lesser (cheaper) parts will usually last longer.  With bikes you are paying for lightness.  The Shimano cassette that came with that group will be cheaper, yet more durable alloy than on the high end cassettes I typically use. 

9 speeds cassettes are becoming more expensive now than 10 speed cassettes because they are becoming more rare.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Shimano-Tiagra-9-Speed-Cassette-CS-HG50-9-NEW-12-25-tooth-Road-Bike-Bicycle-/120878328146?pt=Cycling_Parts_Accessories&hash=item1c24e8e952

Or if you want an upgrade look for SRAM PG-970 cassettes.

Chain rings get far more mileage than cassettes.  Because the chainrings are so much larger, as you ride they are getting 'touched' by the chain about 4 times less than the teeth on the rear cassette.  Also, the 'wear' or strain is spread over 20 or 25 teeth at a time rather than 5-12 or so on the rear cogs.

You could go forever with the front rings up until you notice that the ramps and pins are worn such that it's hard to shift or you notice that chain links don't mesh well anymore creating a lot of noise and friction that will equal lost power.

unlike the cassette, you probably CAN see a worn out chainring.  The teeth will get undercut on one side and appear to be hooked, or shaped like a breaking wave rather than having the same profile up and down both sides of the teeth.  You can also see the tendency for the chain to 'stick' to the teeth at the bottom of the ring when it's leaving the teeth.  The chain will ride upward with the tooth past the point that it should have pulled off.

I've never worn out a chainring myself.

John, the most common cause of this is....wait for it....

If the right pedal is around 5 o'clock (viewed from the right) then the left pedal is at 1o'clock (viewed from the other side).  That's right around where the end of the front derailleur cable resides.  If that cable end with the little aluminum cap on it, is sticking outward then it will often hit the crank arm on the way around.

Check that.

Yup, 11 o'clock or 5 o'clock....Mine hits my leg and it's annoying as hell.  I have to keep bending it in.

I had an awesome ride/run yesterday.  The ride was brutal.  Tried to hold on to a buddy of mine that was attacking every little hill we came to.  Ended up having a 20 min segment in the middle of the ride over 275 watts.  My run after that was tough, so I only got through a couple miles...and it was really dark out.

Hoping to swim again tonight.  What's everyone's plans for the weekend?  I have to work tomorrow morning and then hoping to get in a long run after that.

Jonathan, you look like a hoodlum!  Chris Hanson, a local Wattie Ink team member, just updated his facebook profile pic to one very similar.  Is Wattie having a team competition to see who looks most 'gangsta'?!

I've got 9 days until I meet Wattie Ink Chris on the field of battle!

Hey, suddenly I notice that everyone in their twenties is rocking a beard.  Must be the cool thing.  But I'm not cool.

For this weekend my plans include a 15k trail race tomorrow morning.  It's been rainy for the last few days so it will be an exciting man vs nature experience.

HAHAHA!  I am gangsta...just ask my fiance.  I was walking around the house yesterday in bib shorts a big puffy jacket and that big black baseball cap.  I'm sure if she could stop laughing long enough she would have taken a picture.  As far as the beard goes...it's laziness that originated in San Diego last fall.  Kate got used to it, so I am gonna milk it all the way to engagement photos.

Yeah, I'm interested to see how that race turns out between you two.  He's been putting in a ton of hours as I'm sure you have seen.  He's been running for a while and his swim is good....not sure about the bike.  I do know I just mailed him some new tubulars, so he's got new wheels too.

Good luck on the trail race.  I'm sure it will be muddy and fun as heck.  Although....9 miles in the mud...that's gonna kick your butt.

Chris beat me last year each time we met (I believe twice).  And he's been training well.  If I can beat him this year it will be quite an impressive feat given my advanced years.  Not going to hold my breath on that.

But I do feel confident I'm notably improved over last year.

I'm looking forward to the run tomorrow.  I love and trust my shoes, and the trail lends itself well to 'technique' running.  There are a lot of places on the course where the structure and roll lends itself to off-road specific running skills.  And I've been giving a lot of thought and practice toward these skills lately.  It should be fun.

You all will appreciate this - tornado sirens are going off here. We are safely hiding out in the basement. I'm running around collecting my prized possessions - wedding rings, tax refund check and my bikes!!

Have a great weekend everyone and good luck to all who are racing!

At least you're not debating wether to go for a ride in the wind!!

Stay safe!