Nice training

I went to Nice, the location for my Ironman France event coming up soon, to try a bit of proper hill climbing. While the memories are farly fresh - here's a little bit about the trip.

Packing
After much deliberation, bought a bike bag from Cycle Surgery in Spitalfields. Boxes look a bit big for train journeys and lugging around when I also have another suitcase. I took my wheels off, deflated the tyres, and put them in the padded wheel bags supplied. I took off the derailleur and encased it in bubblewrap and taped it up between the back forks. Took off my handlebars and did my best to put them flat against the bike, then taped and bubble wrapped them too. Pedals are very hard to take off with a common-or-garden bike tool - I gave up and stuck some bubblewrap round them too. For good measure, I bubblewrapped everything else that I thought was sticking out or liable damage from pressure. I kept the saddle on and put the bike inside a large sheet of cardboard upside down inside the bike bag. This left the spokes from the front chainring sticking up, and so more bubblewrap and the cardboard from a cornflakes packet was used to protect this. Padded wheel bags then went inside too and the whole lot zipped up nicely.

Cycling
My accommodation in Nice was actually approximatrely 20km along the bike course. My brother-in-law Jon and I decided to backtrack a bit and then head back as a warmup. We did about 15km and then hit the 500M steepest part of the whole course. It goes straight up, but is quite manageable if taken slowly.

I haven't studied the map much, and the town's names still don't mean anything to me, that's what happens when you are with someone who already knows where they are going. But we turned left at the top of thee hill, and did a bit of gently climbing for a while. Before long we were hurtling down hill on quite a wide road which was very pleasant iand into and through a town. Around then, the proper climbing started, and continued for the next 90 minutes or so. This was the bit I'd dreaded - I've never climbed for more than five or ten minutes before. Strangely enough, I managed to keep going - slow at times, but never stopping. The views were spectacular, and it was quite hot, but even though I occasionally had climb out of the saddle and step on the pedals, and my speed dipped to 12km/h, I never felt as if I couldn't make it.

At the top, after seeing the landscape get more brown and arid for some time, I was very suprised to find a valley of farmland up in the hills. A bit of undulating road led to a pleasant descent through trees and cooler temperatures. I'm a bit hazy on the next bit, I think we had a windy descent - no chance to get much speed up if you want to be careful on corners, I think I maxed at around 45km/h. We found a small shop and refilled our water bottles. Reached the bottom of this section and then started a long and pretty boringly straight 8-9k ascent through trees. I found this very dull, nothing to look at, just pumping the pedals.

I watch my average speed a lot, and by now it was way down at 22km/h or so. I do not want to spend 8 hours on the bike leg, and know that a nice fast stretch can pick up an average a lot. Some decents, and the fairly flat out-and-back followed, and then it was downhill to Carros where we finished the day. Total time was a fraction less then 6 hours for 150km and an average speed of just over 25km/h. The 30km we missed is flat, and I believe I can easily average 25km/h for that. So from being totally in the dark about what kind of time I might achieve, I'm now looking at 25km/h average to give me just over 7 hours. I never pushed really hard on this training ride, using my breathing as a guide, and think this time is a realistic target. Race days are different, but I believe the smart thing for me to do is stick to this kind of pace no matter how I feel in the heat of competition; there is a lot of running to do afterwards after all.

Running

Feeling guilty about missing 30km, a mini brick session was in order, and though quite tired at the end, we did a quick change and set off for a run. It was about 5pm, and hot, and after 12.5 minutes headed back - still, 5km in 25 minutes isn't bad (ipod nano measurements 4.95km, 24:07mins, 4.52mins/km)

All in all a very good day. The weather was fantastic, the roads superb, looking forward to trying it 'for real'.