I did 400k today. Okay, ~200k was sitting on a train to/from Manningtree but over 200k was human powered. 🙂

My ride in to Liverpool Street was a bit nippy (-1degC forecast) and I’m blaming the cold on the Powertap not working for most of it. Very annoying! Give me power data!

I met Ed at Manningtree station (which I keep calling Manningham for some reason), after spending an hour and a half with the Raindance ravers.. a bunch of chicks clad in fluoro shorts, fishnets, high-viz jackets. I can’t really comment on people’s dress sense when I’m clad head to toe in lycra though can I? 😛

Ed has already detailed much of the ride in Suffolk in Hell so I’m going to let Ed do most of the typing and instead present a tonne of pointless graphs and stuff.. I’m a walking talking data logger!

Route: [Ealing-Liverpool Street] – Manningtree – Bentley – East End – Tattingstone – Holbrook – Freston – Wherstead – Ipswich – Trimley – Martlesham – Woodbridge – Chillesford – Sudbourne – Snape – Thorpeness – Aldeburgh – Tunstall – Campsey Ashe – Otley – Helmingham – Westerfield – Ipswich – Wherstead – A137 – Manningtree – [Liverpool Street-Ealing]

Download the Google Earth KMZ for the route here: Ed’s Suffolk in Hell Google Earth KMZ file

Basically, I got my legs ripped off. I knew Ed was faster than me based on the 10mi TTs we’d done last year, but it has now become clearer why he’s the club TT champion. I was quite enjoying my spotless big chainring but Ed saw fit to end that. We started out easily enough, mindful of ice and animal, visiting a nice little thatched house which backed onto a bridge over a river/creek (which poet’s house was it Ed?). (Update: Flatford Bridge Cottage, Painter “John Constable” not poet). We’d probably traveled just far enough for me to become lost, ie. around one corner. After that Ed upped the pace and it was a case of me gritting my teeth and hanging on. I did some feeble turns at the front but that was mostly out of feeling sorry for Ed who was doing all the driving. It’s a bit embarrassing when someone’s pulling 15 minute turns and you hit the front and fade within 2 minutes. Nevermind, this is what training is for!

We had a cake stop somewhere (hehe my sense of direction and local awareness is great ain’t it?!) where I think I should have eaten another 14 cakes and coffees to match. I threw in a quick hamstring stretch as my back was giving me grief. There was no more risk of ice now and I really wished I didn’t have my jacket on as the sun was out and I could get some more tan action. 😉 Off again and we rode past the sea! Lots of bird spotters were out.

I mentioned that Suffolk reminded me of Belgium – or perhaps Northern France, given the title of this post – rolling quiet roads, open flat fields, drivers friendly towards cyclists. It was meant as a compliment Ed, as I happen to really like Belgium! 🙂

With 150k on the clock, a million kilometres still left to ride on Ed’s map and me getting delirious I was hardly going to argue when he suggested taking the quick way back to Manningtree. More hamstring stretching to try and sort out my aching back. After a bottle of Lucozade though I was feeling quite good and when we passed under the huge bridge again I knew we were close to home.

The train trip home was a bit quicker, dozing off probably helped. The Tarmac came out of the guard carriage intact and I rode to a nearby service station to get some new AAA batts for some lightage, then made it home alive through the Sunday night carnage.

About 206k on the clock for the day. I even managed to set a new peak power of 1205W sprinting for home. 🙂

In the morning, one thing I noticed, aside from the pain behind my knees, was my saddle. I’d swapped the Toupe for a new SLR and noticed it had moved almost all the way back on the rails! No bloody wonder the stretching wasn’t helping my back. So, I’ve got to sort out this single-bolt Specialized seatpost so this doesn’t happen again. What the hell are these two arrows for anyway? Can’t believe I need to look at a manual for a seatpost with one bolt.

As promised Ed, here’s some funky new graphs from CyclingPeaks WKO+. Please big clicking to show bigguns!

Cadence Distribution:

Heart Rate Distribution:

Mean Maximal Power Distribution:

Power Distribution:

Speed Distribution:

Now I’ll see if I can get an elevation profile out of the Garmin.. here we go..