Hello, I am a lurker on the forums soaking up all the knowledge I can. I have been road cycling for almost a year, and have trouble with consistency in training, and keeping up with my cycling group, but I continue to try. Anyways, I started this thread because I am excited obout my ride to and from work today, and I dont really have any cycling friends to share with.

So I my highest avg speed to date was 13.7 mph, and today I rocked out a 16mph avg for 15.4 miles.

That's all, just proud of my self!

https://connect.garmin.com/activity/180861601

Jimmy

You picked a great place to share. Congratulations on your improvements, keep it up!

Good job. Keep it up.

always push yourself that hard, and you'll keep breaking your personnal records!

I am gonna ride in 2 more days this week, then rest on Friday. My group and I are going to ride to another island on sat. It's about a 54 mile round trip. I sure would love to keep up, or at least stay close. They are a good group of guys, and they may drop me on some spots, but they never leave me behind.

Riding with others is a great way to improve your cycling. My Achilles heel has always been hills, so once or twice a week I'll just do hill work. Ride up and down a nearby hill 5 or 6 times. It's helped a lot.

get some friends that ride...you'll notice you'll get faster quicker.

Congrats on the huge improvements!

It may only seem like a little gain but the power required for that change is much larger than you think. Great job and keep working and eating right. Good nutrition leads to good rides!

That is a significant improvement. Well done.

a) Congratulations! That looks like a nice route to periodically evaluate your progress.

b) Did you forget to turn your Garmin off?

[TABLE="class: summaryTable timing"]
[TR]
[TD="class: summaryTableLabel"]Time:[/TD]
[TD]57:32[/TD]
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[TR]
[TD]Moving Time:[/TD]
[TD]57:16[/TD]
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[TR]
[TD="class: summaryTableLabel"]Elapsed Time:[/TD]
[TD]10:11:08[/TD]
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[/TABLE]

Bring plenty of water & snacks to nibble on as you go, not all at once.

good job! look into interval training for speed - also, try to befriend more of your cycling group people...offer the guys who wait up for you for a beer at the end of the ride - they know you better than anyone here and can provide you with better tips on how to improve!

Congrats! Nice improvement.

Congrats on a nice jump in performance. It is always a rewarding experience to see your average speed go up like that.

If you don't mind me asking, what is your age? I am only asking because I wonder if you have the aerobic capacity to go even faster. Is 177 near your max output? I think a 150bpm average is pretty good exertion level if 177 is in fact pretty close to your max heart rate.

Excellent! Remember, more time in the saddle will result in faster rides.

Good work. IMO, an out-and-back is the way to do it.

I've got a buddy that brags about his 20.4 mph moving average on one of his 30 mile rides, but he only rides it in one direction...the one with the tailwind.

Bob

That's awesome... battery life.

OP: congrats on your improvement, and your honesty... next time follow the 41 tradition and add 10mph to each number (23mph average up to 26mph) (just kidding, we will laugh instead of praise)

Thanks for all the responses, I did turn off the garmin, I am assuming that that is the total time from start to finish. I rode my bike to work, when I got there, hit stop timer, and turned it off. when to work, then I turned it on and did not reset the timer before I left to go home. so the total elapsed time includes work too.

Jimmy

Hi, thanks for your response, I am 36. I am not sure how to figure out my Max Heart rate. But i sure can tell you that there where times I was giving it everything I had. I would imagine being 36, 5"10", and 160lbs, that my max heart rate would be higher than 177, but who knows.

Jimmy

I agree - that's a pretty high exertion rate. HR seems high, but it could be just you.

Hows the cycling scene in Okinawa? Is it popular? Are there a lot of clubs/group rides?

It is great, if you have never been here, there are alot of military bases here, and alot of military riders. I am not sure how many clubs there are, but I am a member of one, and its a pretty large group. we average about 12 to 15 riders on Sat. mornings. on any givin day, I will see many people out riding, and the Japanese locals love cycling too. There is even a tour Of Okinawa race here every year. Its a 2 day race and covers about 120 miles each day.

Once a month there is a LBS that sponsors a touring ride. it cost 2500 yen ($27), its normaly about 75 kl, and they feed you lunch and have a vehicle following you incase of problems. That ride, I bet has about 150 to 200 people. Its a blast. Mostly locals, and only about 5-10 Americans!

Jimmy

That's awesome to hear man. I've been improving as well so I have a pretty good idea how pumped you are. I recently purchased a new seat (Selle SMP Dynamic) and find that I'm now able to stay down in the drops for a much longer period than before. I think this is helping me with my speed. My time on a 10 mile loop (I don't get a lot of time to ride) improved today by just over a minute from last Thursday's ride. I work with a guy that's faster than me and trying to catch him has been my motivation and the improvements I've made have been very fulfilling.

Congrats on your improvement and keep up the good work.

Keep in mind that my only basis of comparison is myself and my wife who is 3 years younger than me. Her numbers seem to be inline with mine for max heart rate. I also know that max heart rates vary from person to person, but I am far from an expert. Using myself as an example, I road 20 miles recently both ways and exerted myself pretty hard the entire time. My max heart rate was 185 and my average was 164. The other day I ran 5k (I rarely run), and I wanted to beat my best time, and my max was 193 with an average of 169 which is probably pretty close to peak output for me. BTW, I am 38, with a similar build.

I hope my comments aren't taken in a negative way. I am not trying to directly compare or anything like that, or diminish how happy you should be. I have been riding all my life, but only started riding regularly again this year. In some ways there seemed to be some similarities between us, and I thought I would share my experience. In fact I started out the year around the same 13.7 average speed, and it seems that our current average speed is pretty close. The 20 mile ride I mentioned earlier was with an average speed of 17.1mph. I guess part of me wonders if you would have been closer to 17mph also if you got your heart rate up a little higher which I suppose is the primary reason why I posted in the first place.

Oh yeah, in regard to finding your max heart rate, there are some calculations you can do to figure out your max, but those generalize a lot and are said to be inaccurate. The best way is to be tested by a professional. I figure that 193 is probably pretty close to mine. I have never gone higher than that intentionally or unintentionally, and I would probably puke or black out if I went much higher.

Anyhow, congrats again on a very nice personal best, and good luck on your quest to get faster.

nice. I'm working on obeying this rule myself..

Rule #10 // It never gets easier, you just go faster.

Climbing is hard. It stays hard. To put it another way, per Greg Henderson: “Training is like fighting with a gorilla. You don’t stop when you’re tired. You stop when the gorilla is tired.