The racing season has started

Tour de Taiwan blog – Felix English

This is my first blog for a while and I think it comes at an appropriate time of my season. My last blog took us up to the end of our second team training camp. This point marked the end of my winter training and the beginning of my 2012 racing season. I had already spent 3-4 weeks away with my new team mates and as the start of the season drew closer, the exciting talks of racing were growing evermore common. Personally I couldn’t wait to take off the legwarmers and get stuck in.

My season started relatively quietly with a local 25 mile TT. A very cold Sunday morning in Sussex marked my first race, where I was entitled to proudly pull on my Rapha Condor Sharp skinsuit for the first time. Although the TT itself was hugely uncomfortable and not particularly quick, it felt good to lay down a definitive marker and I can now monitor my improvement as the year progresses. More importantly it meant the season had now officially started.

My first big race for the team was the UCI 2.1 classified Tour de Taiwan. But before I jetted off to the other side of the globe, I was looking to fit in a few more races to help ease the always painful transition from training to racing. I was lucky enough to be given the offer to stay up North with my team mate Rich Handley - I got to know Rich quite well after sharing a room with for the duration of our first training camp in Lanzarote. It appears I didn’t annoy him too much first time round, so he was willing to accommodate me at his home for a weekend of training and racing. Along with a few of our other team mates, we raced in the Eddie Soens Memorial and CDNW Pimbo circuit races. I was pleasantly surprised with how I felt in the season openers and picked up 6^th on the Saturday and 9^th on the Sunday.

Tuesday afternoon I was dropped off at Manchester airport to meet the members of the team I was travelling to Asia with; Luke, Andy and Pete. You can always sense the disappointment of the person behind the check-in desk at the airport who has to deal with us and this time was no exception as we had quite a large entourage of baggage to stow away on the plane; 7 bike bags, 8 suitcases and 1 very lanky rider. Our flight plan would add a few more pins into the chart on my wall with the journey taking us from Manchester to Amsterdam to Bangkok and finally to Taipei.

With no apparent signs of jet lag on arrival, the few days we had before the start of the race flew by. A few short rides, lots of Starbucks coffee, birthday cake purchasing, press conferences and probably too much twitter were what filled my time. After receiving our race programme it quickly became apparent that we weren’t going to be waking up any later than 6am at any point during the race. I generally don’t have a problem with early starts and here was no different but I did find myself struggling to stay awake past 9:30 most evenings.

Stage 1 was a short, very wet 55km crit around the centre of Taipei city. The short distance, bad weather and tight corners suited my style of riding quite a lot. I was pretty nervous before the start  – as John picked up on when I couldn’t stop fidgeting - as I didn’t really have any idea how I was going to compare to the highest ranked field I’d ever raced against. I was fortunate enough to be given a nice initiation into this level of racing with a fast but comfortable first stage where I picked up 4^th in the bunch sprint, which was good enough for 10^th on the stage. However, the following few stages weren’t as kind.

The next 3 days involved me suffering, wheel sucking and trying my best not to get dropped from the main group too early. Even after a nice first stage, in my head I knew I was going to take a bit of a kicking. Last year whilst stage racing, although I experienced some good stages I also experienced a lot of bad days where I was struggling from the start to the very end of the stage. Naturally, taking a step up from the racing I did last year I expected it to be harder, so I think not underestimating how hard it was going to be was what helped me get through those first few days. I wasn’t panicking about my performances at night and wasn’t dreading getting up for the race in the morning – quite the contrary as although I wasn’t performing as well as the rest of the team, I was still loving the racing.

After a tough 5 days and my personal goal of reaching the finish of the race nearly complete, I was given the opportunity of trying to get in the days break away. Stage 6 was my best chance, when the break was let go within the first couple of km’s. This marked for me, personally my worst day of the tour. Sitting in the bunch steadily riding along knowing I could’ve been in the break wasn’t a nice feeling and to top off a very long drawn out day, I got burnt to a crisp by the sudden heat wave shortly after the start – 35 degree sun and pale Irish skin without any suncream is a terrible combination.  After the disappointment of not capitalizing on my role of getting in the early break-away on stage 6, I was determined to rectify that on stage 7 and must’ve followed over 10 attacks within the first hour but to no avail. The not too shabby average speed of 49 km/h probably had something to do with that. The end of the race was tarred with an unfortunate event. A fast technical finish looked to be the perfect end to our tour, with Deano and Ben both up well within the top 10 with 500m to go but some bad dangerous riding from another rider saw Ben being taken down and bouncing down the tarmac on his ass. Not a nice end to Ben’s tour, especially after his solid performances taking  a 5^th and a 6^th.

Looking back now I am pretty satisfied that I got through the race. I loved the experience and it felt great to finally get involved in some racing after months of excitedly anticipating lining up with my new team mates. International stage racing has definitely become one of my most favourite aspects of the sport in the last few years. I relish the way the team comes together throughout the race to help each other achieve the best results possible and to get each other through the lows as well as the highs is something that I haven’t yet experienced anywhere else. Although in the Tour de Taiwan I was at times disappointed that I wasn’t able to help my team mates more, I think the experience gained there will stand be in good stead for the rest of the season.

From this moment I have quite a busy 4 weeks ahead of me. This Saturday (24^th March) I’m racing for the first time since Taiwan in a short hilly circuit race in East London. I then move to my next race with the team the following Sunday – the Dengie Marsh classic premier calendar. After that I fly to Belfast for the 4 day stage race: the Tour of the North. Finally, I fly out to Holland to compete in the ZLM U23 Nations Cup event, where I will be riding my first race of 2012 for the Irish National team. A busy, but very exciting few weeks ahead and I can’t wait to get racing again.

Benidorm – training camp II

After the success of the previous camp, I had high expectations for our second camp of the year and it didn’t disappoint. It was my first time meeting the 3 new international additions to the team for 2012; Ben Grenda, Rich Lang and Chris Jennings. The 3 guys fitted into the team immediately – probably helped by the ‘Twitter banter’ which started before we’d even met the guys and has kept everyone entertained both at home and whilst together on camp. Our stay in Benidorm was scheduled by the boss to get us race fit, just before we kick start our racing season. The harder efforts were a bit of a shock to the system, in contrary to the laid back steady riding I had become accustomed to over the winter and whilst out in Lanzarote. This time around I wasn’t nervous about the camp, but I had a small amount of doubt at the back of my mind about how I was going to perform after training was interrupted when the UK skies decided to snow. I’m writing this now about 10,000 feet up in the air, sat in my Ryanair seat (thankfully I’m on the shorter side so I have some leg room, unlike a few of my longer team mates), flying towards London Stansted (or knowing Ryanair, somewhere within a 50 mile radius) in preparation for our team launch at Sharp HQ. Our mechanics and soigneurs are currently driving North through Spain heading towards the French border. With our bikes being driven back home, it means each of us only has to worry about getting our suitcases and a pair of sore and heavy legs back home to the UK, sometimes easier said than done.

With a total of 9 training days, the camp was split up into two four day blocks with one rest day. This alone was going to make the camp harder, and with the added bonus of specific TT, hill and leadout efforts it was destined to produce; aching legs, stiff backs and tired bodies. Along with the different style of training, we had our team nutritionist Mayur over for a few days, examining our meals and checking our skinfolds – which always brings competitiveness from everybody. We’ve decided that Luke has to be removed from the competition as he puts us all to shame! The presence of an all you can eat buffet meant that Mayur was definitely necessary to keep us in shape and to make sure we were getting the most of what we were putting into our bodies. The combination of Mayur’s advice at the dinner table and the support from Science In Sport, every rider has got through the tough camp without picking up any illnesses and we’ve all seen the ever welcome improvements in our skinfolds.

The setup in Benidorm was different to the self-catering apartments we had out in Lanzarote. We had smaller rooms with 2-3 people in each, which I think suited this type of camp a lot better. There was also the huge bonus of having free wifi in every room. Having access to wifi always make for a more relaxing stay -the ability to lie in bed, flicking about the interweb after a hard days riding is priceless. This time around I was rooming with Mr Deano Downing. I learnt a lot throughout the week just from chatting to Dean about the upcoming season, and the expectations this team has. All of the talk of racing throughout the week, has every rider on the team chomping at the bit and super excited about pinning our first set of race numbers on the back of our Rapha Condor Sharp jerseys.

Along with the other stuff going on, we had the Rapha film competition winner Andrew with us for the duration of the camp. He’s producing a short film of the team, which will show the ins and outs of a Rapha Condor Sharp training camp. After seeing some of the shots he’s picked up over the week, I can’t wait to the see the finished product. A few of the days involved Andrew filming out the back of the Skoda team car with the boot open, whilst we chased him down one of the particularly fast and windy descents. All good fun!

Training throughout the week was kept simple and we made sure we got some essential race prep work done. I won’t bore you with the specifics but as I said earlier we worked on a 4 days on, 1 day off schedule. The first 3 days were each between 90-100km, with the first day working on TT efforts, the second day working on threshold hill efforts, the third day – my favourite of the block – was leadout/sprint day and finally we ended with a steady endurance day. We each worked on our efforts individually as it was clear from the beginning of the camp that we are all different in our abilities in certain areas – as expected with our age gaps and variety of different types of riders. The steady (sometimes not so steady for me when the Aussies got to the front) endurance day took us on a nice loop around the surrounding mountains , allowing us to clock up 160km in 5:30 hours with 3000m of climbing. Each ride was always a good laugh and with a few coveted ‘Strava segment sprints’ being contested there was always a good flow of conversation between everyone – saying that I was communicating considerably less on some of the climbs… not out of choice.

All in all, another highly successful camp. All of us are buzzing for the start of the 2012 racing season and judging by the way a lot of the guys were riding it won’t be long until we have a few wins under our belts either.

 Felix

Sunny Spain and crosswinds + more pictures

I’ve sat down to write this blog 3 times now over the past week but failed on each occasion. Finally, sat down with a nice cup of tea and I’m ready to start rambling.

I posted a bunch of pictures from the first rest day on our team training camp last week, so I’ll kick things off by talking about what I got up to in Lanzarote with Rapha Condor Sharp.

There were a decent number of us involved the camp with 8 riders, John, Ken- one of our teams coaches, Andy- our soigneur, Pete- our mechanic and Camille- our team photographer from SHARP. Straight from the off everyone got on really well and conversation flowed easily from when we got up in the morning to when went to sleep at night. I think this transferred directly into how we rode as a team, even from our first ride together. It was made clear by John from the very start of the week that this camp was to be used to practice and hone our skills riding together properly as a team. There was no intent from anyone to try and prove themselves physically stronger or fitter than anyone else on the rides. If one of us was having a bad day, then the group would alter its pace to ensure that everyone was looked after. This mutual respect made performing and perfecting the technical aspect of our riding a lot easier. We did a series of sub-maximal efforts throughout the week including some through and off blocks and a few lead out sprints. Pretty much everything went to plan, which was surprising seeing as some of the things we were doing can be quite tricky whilst riding in the very strong winds Lanzarote is famous for. Saying that, I let the team down on one of the days… whilst sat on the back of the group I got blown off the road and then couldn’t hop back up again! Whilst it was happening I thought that it was crazy winds and I had a picture in my head of me leaning at 45 degrees, heroically managing to avoid crashing. However, to my disappointment Camille had everything on video. So after being shown it I was disappointed to see nothing crazy happens, it’s just clear that I’m just not very good at riding a bike. We had one other unfortunate moment at the beginning of the camp where Deano’s tyre blew out and sent him flying off the back of his bike! It was a fast stretch of road where we were riding at 50km/h but I think the unlucky Deano got off quite lucky in the circumstances, after only just recovering from an operation on his collar bone and somehow managing to avoid falling on his side and without landing in the endless amount of volcanic rock by the roadside- that stuff is lethal looking! Andy did a great job patching him up each day, but it still looked so painful. Climbing onto his bike each day with wounds the sides of dinner plates on both sides of his ass, made you think twice about complaining how your legs were a little bit tired!

Overall, it was a great camp. Had a good laugh with everyone, felt good on the bike, enjoyed the sun and clocked up some good km’s in the process. I’ve been home now for 5 days and haven’t really been up too much. Took a few days off the bike and then started riding again a couple of days ago.

As well as riding together well, we also looked the part (never sacrifice style for speed was mentioned a few times). We all had our matching custom Condor Leggero road bikes, our Rapha team kit and our brand new Giro gear- Aeon helmets and Prolight SLX road shoes - which are particularly nice, with Easton EC90 carbon soles and 3 Velcro straps, as I was really not a fan of the ratchets that continuously broke on the shoes I had last season!

I’m at home now for a couple of weeks before heading off to Benidorm for our second training camp in early February. I am expecting this camp to be entirely different to the one he had in Lanzarote. Although I’m sure we’ll still be working on the technical stuff, the main objective of the camp is get physically ready for the racing season, which starts a few days after arriving back. I think this one is going to be a bit of a shock to the system and I reckon us younger guys will be doing a bit\a lot of suffering! Looking forward to it though.

My racing programme kicks off with a TT and some road racing up in Manchester. I’m staying up with one of my team mates for the week, so it will us the opportunity to race together as a team for the first time. I then jet off to the Tour of Taiwan in mid-March. The race has upgraded to a UCI 2.1 – which is the highest category race I’ll have ever ridden. The race website mentions teams such as SaxoBank and Europcar could be riding.

I’ll stop myself from rattling on now. Going to go indulge and have a Yakult.

Thanks for reading,

Felix

@mike_cuming was pretty relaxed all week

Long smooth roads

Blue skies all week

Add caption

My gangsta room-mate for the week twitterless Hands -  aka 0.5

Team Giro Prolight SLX shoes @girosportdesign - motivation shoes!

Rapha Condor Sharp training camp - rest day photos

Been a good  few days here in Lanzarote with the Rapha Condor Sharp team. Today was a rest day so I took the opportunity to take a few photos on our 2 hour spin.

@Jimmy_mach10 ready for the coffee spin this morning

Coffee stop in the Spanish sun this morning after a recovery spin

It's been nice and warm everyday - bare arms and legs!

Smooth roads and interesting scenery make for enjoyable rides

@dean0downing came down pretty hard yesterday but was back out on the bike today

Our @raphacondor Sharp team bikes prepared to ride by our mechanic Pete

@camillemcmillan from Sharp is here in Lanzarote to take videos and pictures (don't worry they're much better than mine!)

Out on the road with @raphacondor Sharp

@mike_cuming has picked up a bad habit of making it look too easy

We've ridden well together from the very first ride

@timkennaugh has been on fine form the last few days

SiS keeping us hydrated during the hot weather

Felix @felixenglish11

                                                 

Update - Rapha Condor Sharp training camp

I have been a bit lax on the blogging front over the past few weeks. I’ve been busy sorting things out with my new team Rapha Condor Sharp, and also getting some important base training done. I’ve been mainly tackling the cold and usually wet Sussex road by myself. I had a spell of 2-3 weeks where I was doing 4-5 hour spins on a regular basis. I backed off just before Christmas when I was starting to feel tired. I then had an easy week between Christmas and New Year to properly recharge the batteries before tackling the second and final part of the Winter.

Since going up to the Claremont hospital in Sheffield with the team I have found out that I am deficient in both Iron and Vitamin D. So I am now on the correct supplements to set this right – this highlights how important having a partner like Claremont is to the team. Even more so when one of my team mates broke his collar bone and he was able to be checked and have surgery within a week of the accident.

Christmas and New Year for me was very relaxed. I stayed at home and enjoyed some good food, some bad telly and some very steady road rides. I’ve also had Camille and Tom Southam – our team photographer  and press officer– come down to the house for interviews and photographs. On a second visit I was chasing Camille on his motorbike (hooked up with cameras) around Beachy Head in horrific conditions. Again, the team have been so efficient getting all of this done already! Plus, the press/journalism side is something that also interests me quite a lot.

As I’m writing this I’m sat on a plane with my team mate Oliver Rossi flying over to Lanzarote for our first team training camp. The rest of the team would have already landed and probably won’t be far from the hotel at this point. I’ve been looking forward to this camp for a while and can’t wait to get out on the road with my new team mates. The Spanish sun and 22+ degrees temperature will also be a nice bonus. I’m not sure yet what the plan is training wise but I’ve heard mention of; race radios, lead out practice and coffee – so I’m a happy boy!

My first race with the team will be the Tour of Taiwan mid-March. The team’s position in the race was looking doubtful but we had a nice surprise a few weeks ago when we received an entry. After doing some research on the race and looking at picture from the past few years it looks like a pretty big event! It’ll be the biggest race I’ll have competed in anyway. There was a prologue TT last year – 2km = 1 lap of the crit course – but it appears to have been removed for this year’s edition, which is a bit of a disappointment, but then again I won’t be short of things to be thinking about with seven stages! There’s a good mix of hard hilly courses, a couple of sprint stages and a 60km crit on the final day. The team has had success in the past few years it has done it, so let’s hope we can replicate it this year.

In other English related news; I got to meet Edith Bowman from Radio 1 whilst we were both working at an event at the Olympic Velodrome! I even got my name mentioned on her next show – this had me very happy for a 24 hours! I also got to meet the ‘voice over guy’ from the X Factor, Pete Dickson. Family wise, my Sister finished her cross season on Saturday with take a top 10 in the national cross championships. She’s been training hard over the past months with the British Cycling Talent Team – there may be some conflicts this year in the household with myself riding for Ireland and my little Sister riding for GB. My Dad is in training for the Wicklow 200 this year. It’s a 200km sportif over some pretty savage terrain. All I know is my Dad was out on the bike this morning at 8am for a planned 100 mile spin!! At least there’s 1 athlete in the house…

I’ll leave it at that for now as my battery is starting to die, and I quite fancy shutting my eyes for 20 minutes before we land. I will do my best to do a couple of updates whilst I’m out in Lanzarote.

Thanks for reading, hope you had a good New Year,

Felix

Being short - does it have you on the backfoot?

I want to write about something slightly different to the kind of things I usually write about. So my topic today is – Advantages and disadvantages of being small in cycling.

I wouldn’t say I’m particularly small at 175cm but compared to the majority of the guys I race against I am definitely on the smaller end of the scale. Being a smaller rider is often used as an excuse for being weaker than some of our larger counterparts. However, I don’t really agree.

There are a few main points you will hear people come up with, why being small is an inconvenience in cycling. Firstly, and one which I can definitely relate to a certain extent is, trying to find a bike that fits you properly! This can definitely be a bit of inconvenience when you don’t fit between the standard 54-58cm frame size bracket. In my case, it’s not my height that causes a problem as I fit quite nicely on a 51-52cm bike, but it’s my body geometry. Inevitably passed down from both my parents, I have short legs and a long torso. This usually means a super small bike so I can get enough saddle height and then a nice long 14cm steam to allow for my overly long reach. However, once you have managed to hunt down a frame that’s small enough for you – I have seen a lot of people who have clearly given up on the search and ride bikes way too big for them – there are some definitely advantages to a small frame – it’s lighter and more compact which usually makes for a more responsive and stiffer machine.

Secondly, a lot of people believe it can be hard to compete against the larger rider in TT’s and those horrible flat windy races. It’s true that to do well in these disciplines you need to be able to produce a lot of power and having the larger levers does usually help in this field. However, the fact you’re bigger means than you’re having to push more of that wind. This was one of my excuses when I taking a beating in past races, but it more came down to the fact that I wasn’t strong enough, or fit enough to compete with the other guys who had simply trained harder than me! So now I am training correctly, I think I should be a lot closer to these guys. Another aspect I’ve been looking into, to make those all important ‘marginal gains’ is aerodynamics whilst road racing. I’m experimenting with a few ideas, but the main and seemingly most obvious one to do was to cover the vents in my road helmet. The idea was stolen from my team mate Martyn Irvine, but after doing some research and seeing numbers and phrases such as ‘12% more efficient ‘ it seemed stupid that I’d never done it before. Especially after knowing an aero helmet over a regular road helmet in a TT is one of the biggest equipment gains you can make.

After looking through my last 2 paragraphs of mindless ramblings, it appears I haven’t really made any proper points yet. So I’ll sum this post with a list of bullet points I have rattling round in my head about the advantages and disadvantages of being small-

Disadvantages

• ·         Can be hard to get a correctly fitting bike
• ·         Spectators/Photographers/Helpers find it almost impossible to spot you whilst in the middle of a bunch
• ·         Not being able to fit bottles over 500ml into your bottle cages
• ·         Cycling shorts being too long

Advantages

• ·         Lighter and stiffer bikes
• ·         More aerodynamic – you should be! but some people manage to somehow not be able to achieve this
• ·         Can fit through small gaps
• ·         Usually more aggressive – small man syndrome (I am no exception whilst racing/sprinting!)
• ·         Gives you an excuse when; it’s too windy/it’s too flat/you haven’t trained hard enough – or all 3

                                         

So to sum everything up, height doesn’t really make too much difference as long as you work on the aspects which will help you in those inevitable windy/TT/flat races. Basically, train hard and stay low and you’ll be fine. I hope.

Gracias,

Felix

p.s not to be taken to seriously

It does have its disadvantages 

Spain, training and track racing

Over the past few weeks I’ve been to Spain, trained hard and got way too nervous whilst watching some World Cup track racing in Colombia.
After choosing not to ride the track this winter, it’s been clear a long cold few months awaited me at home. So on being offered a week out in Majorca training I jumped at the chance! I was heading out to join my team mate Martyn Irvine – Ireland’s number 1 track rider and Olympic hopeful – who I spent the majority of 6 months last year training, travelling and competing with all over the world. I really enjoy the travelling involved with the sport and the chance to be in a foreign country is always something I look forward to. I wouldn’t have thought I’d look forward to it as much after visiting 3 continents last season, but every time I hear that I’m being flown off somewhere different I look forward to it a lot! After speaking with Martyn – who has been training with a small group of riders; Recep, Mutlu, Sofia and Sarah – I desperately missed the track scene. He had already been to Holland, Kazakhstan and Colorado Springs in the US! I don’t think it’s quite as exciting for him, as he has done it all before – and the fact he is not receiving the financial support he really needs! – but I still think it’s pretty cool. The week was spent doing the road training with the track guys and girls plus then doing a bit of extra training by myself. I would usually spend my evenings watching the guys fly round the track. I thoroughly enjoyed the week and would like to thanks Andy Sparks for allowing me to come out.
Once home, the cold weather wasn’t particularly nice but was a lot warmer than I was used to late November. I had now officially started my winter training and the new structure to my day was a great motivator. I was really enjoying going out for 4-5 hours on my own, listening to my iPod and just generally feel like I was working towards next season. With all the excitement of joining Rapha Condor Sharp and the prospect of a really good racing calendar, training was easy to do. It’s by far the most training I’ve done on the road, so looking forward to the benefits next season.
Another thought that has been in my head is that with the new racing calendar and the opportunity to race more; premier calendar, UCI 2.2 and 1.2 races is if the right results are achieved throughout the year then it is definitely possible for Rapha Condor Sharp to be the final bridge across to a top Protour team. So that will be my aim over the next 2-3 years riding with RCS. The opportunity to race these races, be able to race and learn from team mates who are some of the best riders in the UK and have the best support of any team I’ve ever been a part of, it really is down to me to work hard and improve so I and the rest of the team can achieve these results we need.
I think I’ve written enough to bore most people who are likely to read this so I’ll finish up with a quick section about the UCI Track World Cup in Cali, Colombia. It was my favourite World Cup and probably my favourite country I was lucky enough to visit last year. Luckily the guys I was supporting throughout the 4 day event did a lot better than I did when I competed in my first World Cup last year – I was 13th in the scratch race. On the first day Sarah Hammer picked up 3rd in the Women’s Team Pursuit, but from Sarah it’s always clear there’s more to come. This became true when she won the Women’s Omnium in dominant fashion – as always. Next up was Sofia Arreola in the scratch race, where she picked up another great result – after finishing 4th last year in Manchester – taking 5th in amongst a truly world class field. Last, but definitely not least was the turn of Martyn and Recep in the Men’s Omnium. Both comfortably made it through the qualifiers and then they showed the rest of the World how hard they’ve been working by taking 4th and 5th overall. Sofia was involved in a crash in the Women’s Omnium Elimination race which meant she wasn’t able to compete in the rest of the event but after taking 5th in the Scratch race the day before, it’s still a very successful World Cup for all of Andy Spark’s riders. The Olympic points Martyn picked up this round have moved him up to within 1 place of Olympic qualification. After missing 2 meets – 1 intentionally and 1 non intentionally after a crazy DSQ in the Astana round – it’s looking very very good for him!

I’ll leave it at that!

Thanks
Felix

Lots going on but nothing to write!

Again, I've neglected this over the past few weeks. I haven't much to say really - nothing that would sound interesting over a blog anyway. A lot of the things I've been up to are pretty exciting from my perspective though. With signing for Rapha Condor Sharp last month, I've had plenty to do and think about.
My first outing with the new team was a trip up to both the bike shop Condor Cycles and the Rapha clothing offices. I hadn't been to either of them before so it was a good getting to have a look around and chat to the guys and girls who will be helping us through out the 2012 season.
I travelled up by train and then a short tube journey across London to my first stop - Condor Cycles. It was a lot bigger than I was expecting and was definitely the cleanest bike shop/bike showroom I'd ever been in. I had a chance to wonder about looking at the different products before being fitted for our new custom Condor Leggero bikes. We were also fitted for our Giro helmets and shoes.
The Rapha offices were a short taxi journey down the road. We were given a tour around the very fashionable Rapha offices before being issued with some Rapha tops, caps and my first Rapha Condor Sharp team jersey! The quality of the kit is definitely better than anything I've seen/had before.

A few weeks later we were up in Sheffield visiting the Claremont Performance Hospital. It was a good weekend to meet a lot of my new team mates for next year, plus also getting some mandatory and very interesting tests done which gave an indication to where we were at fitness and health wise.

Since then I have been training away with long steady rides. I ventured over to Andy Spark's new training base in Alaro Majorca for a nice week in the sun (it rained most of the time). I got some good training done out there and it was good fun hanging out with a different group of people. Watching them train on the track definitely brought back memories after last year on the track. It was a hard decision to not ride the track this winter but its something I definitely want to come back to in the near future. I feel for this winter it will be a good opportunity for me to work on my road base and get a strong season with my new team. I think I will respond well to a winter purely concentrating on the road and in the long run will stand to my strength on the track and road.

In other news, my sister got onto the BC Talent Team - which has been significantly slimmed down over the past few years. So now we have myself riding for the Irish National Team and my sister riding for GB within the same household! I'm a bit worried that I think she's better than me... she's already won more national titles than I have.

I'll leave it at that!

Ciao
Felix

Times flying!

Just a quick post as I'm knackered!
Been putting in some steady rides whilst I've been here in Majorca. So far I've ridden everyday; 3.5 hours, 4.5 hours, 3 hours and today's ride was 4.15 hours.
Today was a good ride, heading out for a planned 4-5 spin, with Martyn, Recep, Sofia and David Muntaner - one of the Spanish team pursuiters - who was leading us on our route. I successfully managed to keep our quite quick ride steady by skipping all of my turns! However, the roads were wet and ended up covered in muck after a full day wheel sucking.
Tomorrow I plan to do another 4-5 hour spin with Martyn and David M. Which then leaves me two days before I leave for home... will try and hit one of the days with a 5-6 hour spin by myself before I fly home on Wednesday.
All in all a successful and very enjoyable week so far, and I'll definitely look at coming back here in December.

Adios!

Settled in

My flight from Gatwick was simple and easy. A quick 2 hour flight and I through passport control and bags collected within the space of 20 minutes. Although it had clearly been raining in the morning, when I stepped out of the airport I was greeted with 22 degrees and sunshine. I took a taxi to the track to meet up with Andy and the other guys.  We have a small training group here in Majorca - Sarah, Recep, Sofia and Martyn - and I got to watch a few of the guys suffer in one of Andy's stereotypical pain fests! It felt weird not being a part of the session and it did make me wish I was riding the track this Winter... but I need to concentrate on the road over the next few months and there was no way I could've bounced straight into a track season after a tough first year as an U23.
We are staying in a different place this year - last year we were staying in Arenal on the South coast of the island - in a place called Alaro. A much smaller town, right on the edge of the big climbs. I'm living in a house with Martyn, Recep and Mutlu. It's a really nice house, which is fully kitted out for us. Downstairs we have a gym and a watt bike room, whilst upstairs we each get our own big rooms. I've taken a few photos but the quality on my camera is terrible!
Most of the guys are on either rest days or short road spins today, so this morning I'm heading out with Martyn for a couple of hours and then I'll head off and do my own thing for a little while.

Majorca bound

This is just a post to test the new Blogget app on my phone.
I'm currently sat in Gatwick North Terminal enjoying a coffee. I have a grumpy man on a laptop sat opposite who is getting increasingly angry everytime I rock our off-balance table...
I'm in Majorca from the 15th-23rd where I'll be trying to do as many steady kms as possible, in order to build a good base for the latter part of the year. I'll be staying with Martyn Irvine and Recep Unulan. I spent the good part of 5 months racing and training with Martyn last Winter as we both tackled a full programme of UCI Track World Cups.
I've decided to concentrate on the road this Winter. I was knackered after competing all winter on the track to then go straight into the road season - it worked well at first and I had a string of solid performances for the first part of the season but I then noticabely struggled in the latter months.
I'll keep this up to date throughout the 8 days I'm away with Garmin and SRM files - for anyone who's intetested in that stuff!

Will stop rambling now,
Ciao

New start

Over the past few weeks I've started to get myself back into my training routine. My training will remain steady and relaxed over the coming 4 weeks, and will take a more specific and regulated route in the new year. At the moment I have been steadily clocking up the kilometres on short steady 2-3 hour rides. I have now reached the 1200km mark but I hope to be up around 3000km by Christmas.
I spent the weekend in Sheffield getting to know some of my new team mates at Rapha Condor Sharp. I drove up to North London on Friday evening to stay with my new team mate Oliver Rossi - Team Sinner. I know Oliver quite well, after spending 2 years racing and training with him as part of the British Cycling Talent Team.
We left early Saturday morning to arrive at our very nice hotel in Sheffield for 2 o'clock. We were about 90 minutes early, after allowing plenty of time for bad traffic, but we got to meet the Oxford United football team and have a nosey around the hotel before the others arrived. It was good to meet some more of my new team mates for next year - Mike Cuming, Jimmy Mach, Richard Handley, Tim Kennaugh and Luke Mellor. We spent the afternoon in some brief meetings, setting targets and going through our early season race calendar.
I was sharing a room with Mike and I think we both agreed the thing we were both most looking forward to was the meal at Nonnas. It didn't dissapoint! A large very nice steak was the highlight of the meal.
After sleeping off a very full stomach we were up and checked out of the hotel for 7.30am to head over to Claremont hospital for our day of testing. A nice healthy breakfast to kick start the day and we were away having meetings and tests. My day consisted of - EPG/blood tests, physio, medical, nutrition and finally performance testing. Everything went well and I learnt a lot over the course of the day.
I arrived home late last night, after making the decision to drive home straight from Oliver's. After numerous closed roads and diversions I managed to be in bed by 12.30. Today will consist of cleaning and boxing team bikes and packing to leave for Majorca tomorrow morning! A week in the sun and hills awaits.

Thanks again to Claremont hospital for a great weekend.

Felix

Our hotel

Oliver - Team Chef

Season 2011

Haven't blogged on here in a while.
Since my last post, I've been to the World Championships, enjoyed my break off the bike and have restarted my training again! Everything looking spot on for next season, with some exciting prospects.
I would like to take the time to thanks my sponsors from the 2011 season;

USE
Morvelo Cycling Apparel
Continental
Prendas Ciclismo
Red Venom
Science In Sport
Specialized
RTS Carbon

It was a really enjoyable season and I learnt a lot. The upcoming 2012 season is looking to be pretty exciting so watch this space!

Thanks
Felix

1st day back on the TT bike

It felt good to be back on the TT bike this afternoon.
I kick started my last training block of the season with 2 shorts TT efforts. I rode out to a short 8.5km circuit and rode 2 laps at race pace with a recovery lap in between.
It was a good session and it's going to help me work out what kind of watts I should be sitting at during my races this weekend.

Here are the garmin links to my two laps;
Lap 1 http://connect.garmin.com/activity/108657827
Lap 2 http://connect.garmin.com/activity/108657787

The rig for today's training

Back on the bike

It's the last night of a full week of minimal riding and a lot of rest! It was something I really needed after a tough season. The fatigue of my first year as an U23 crept up on me and caught me by surprise a little... I've been so busy with racing I forgot about taking a proper rest. Combine this with my 2010 road season running straight into my track season without any break I was run into the ground after my 3 week racing block in France.
I finished racing with my French team EC Mayenne on the 10th August. A lack of sleep, and the aggressive racing had me in constant state of fatigue, and the rest week was inevitable! However... I had the small obstacle of the Olympic Test RR to overcome before I was able to relax. Lining up against the likes of; Tom Boonen, Mark Cavendish, Haussler, Goss and O'Grady! It was never going to be easy, but my form didn't help matter. Although I hoped to get round ok and possibly pick up a good result I knew I could really only hope for possibly staying in with the front group until the first KOM and then trying to get to the finish! In the end I lasted 2hours 30minutes with the main bunch, and then luckily my team mate Martyn waited for me over the last climb (after he punctured twice... not so lucky!) and he helped me get to the finish in the center of London. I definitely would not have made it without him! So thanks again Martyn!

I've ridden 3 times in the last week, and only a maximum of an hour at a time. Forced myself down onto my TT bike today and I definitely need to spend this week readjusting to the position before racing this weekend.

The break has done a world of good and I can't wait to get back to some proper riding again! So now time for a month of hard training, hard racing, 100% commitment and hopefully some good results to finish the year!

Let see what I can do!
Ciao

First French experience

Right, I needed a break after my last essay so here is an update covering everything over the last few weeks.

Once I have arrived home from Italy - after a very rushed drive to the airport, leaving about an hour after the RR!! - I was wrecked for the majority of the week. I had a few easy spins thrown in mid week, but that was it. 

I needed as much rest as possible before jetting off to Nantes, France on the Thursday.

I was met at the airport by EC Mayenne manager Serge Pineau. We drove the 200km trip up to Mayenne the following morning where I met my team/house mates for the next month. We are a mixed bunch of different ages and nationalities, with riders from Estonia, Lithuania and Finland.

My first weekend was to contain two 2eme division races. I didn't know what to expect from the racing but once into the first 20km of the race on Saturday I knew what the French like to do... ATTACK! and attack and attack and attack...

At first I was finding the racing quite comfortable so started attacking and following moves and I soon ended up on my own out front. The races here seem to be lots of short laps. The short laps give the impression of a short race when you're in the zone racing... so it is easy to get carried away! This said, I was out on my own after 4 laps of a 7km circuit with 12 to go! I regretted this later on in the race and once the race was back together I had very tired legs! The winning move went with 1 to go, and I just about managed to haul myself over the climb with 3km to go to take 5th place about 20 seconds in front of the bunch.

Happy enough with my first result I headed to my second race. A very similar set up of short, hilly laps and once again I got carried away and ended up off the front very early... I still had tired legs from the day before so my chosen tactic was not ideal. I managed to scrape round, once again missing the move and just being pipped to 4th by the French Junior Champion from last year, I was once again 5th!

My first impressions tell me I should be capable of getting a win out here before I head home on the 10th and that the racing style will be sure to make you strong! I am also enjoying living with the team at the apartment in Mayenne. I like being left to my own devices so I can chose what I eat, when I train and just generally relax and look after myself properly!

Tomorrow's race is a night criterium, which will be my first 1eme division race. So it'll be sure to have a strong field and the hopefully the potential to pick up a good result!

I'll update when I can,

Merci!

Felix

Attack attack attack!

Back from Italy... but not for long!

I arrived home from Italy early this morning after a late flight from Prescara. I enjoyed my time in Offida but I'm definitely glad to be home!
We arrived a good 5 days before my first event which was definitely necessary, in order for us to try and acclimatize to the very humid heat. It was over 35 degrees for the whole week and I've been told that it was in the low 40's during some of the TT!
Whilst out in Italy I rode everyday going over and over the courses we had to race on later in the week. Myself, Sean and Conor must have ridden the descent at the beginning of the TT course over 5 times... which doesn't seem like much, but we had to ride to the top each time!!
Whilst out riding for the Irish National Team I was still riding my team bikes from Science In Sport. Both of which are top level machines; Scott Addict road bike and my favourite Trek Speed Concept TT bike. With the combination of HED Wheels and USE Tula bars I think I probably have one of the fastest bikes in the world!
The tough weather conditions meant that nutrition was really important throughout the week. This is where racing with the Science In Sport team once again is an advantage! I was using my GO Electroyte/Superhydro combination in my bottles which did the trick! For recovery after rides I was using a mixture of Rego rapid and Colostrum.

The races

My first race was Friday afternoon in the TT. A turbo warm up with lots of ice, water and wet towels to keep me cool. I was first rider off out of the 3 so there was no shortage of staff at hand to help! A small problem before the start when my water bottle was deemed UCI illegal, so I was stuck without anything to keep hydrated over the very warm 25km. In the following car I had team our team soigneur and the only girl on the team Ciara - who unfortunately crashed in her TT that morning on a tight corner early on in the trick descent. With the warning of a 'tight corner 1km into the course, just after you pass the orange sign' I proceeded to go full speed into said corner and I got slightly lost and went off said tarmac and ended up riding up a grass bank at just under 70km/h and produced a perfectly exectuted front flip! With my bike retrieved and me clambering back onto my bike (no mean feat with a combination of; cycling shoes, adrenaline and a very sore back!) I was away down the rest of the descent to record the slowest time of the day at the first intermediate check point. I managed to claw back some time and quite a few places on the decisive climb on the course but it wasn't enough for a result worth talking about. With only being approx 40 seconds from a place around the top 20 it was very frustrating and took me a while to forgive myself for taking the risks I took at the beginning of the race where as perfectly stated by team manager Neil "you can't gain much time on the descent, but you can sure lose a lot if you crash!".

I was left with no cuts at all from my crash but a sore back which seemed to be restricting my movement a fair bit and was causing me quite a lot of pain. The pain itself didn't really bother me too much, it was just the thought of possibly not being able to race to my full ability during the RR.
When it came down to it, my back wasn't what determined my result in the RR but my legs. The pace was very high from the gun and the tough climb on the short lap was enough to cause a lot of riders including myself some problems. I lasted 1 hour 40 minutes with the main group which I was pretty happy with! I then proceeded to ride with Conor Dunne - my fellow haircuit friend - to complete just over 100km of the demanding course. There were 40 finishers out of 180 starters, which I think shows how tough the course really was.

I'm now home and looking ahead to leaving for France on Thursday. I'll be racing for EC Mayenne, based just outside Brittany. This trip could possibly determine whether I decide to race in France for the 2012 season. Other than that there's not much going on! The rest of my season consists of; France, Olympic Test RR, Baltic Chain UCI Stage Race and possibly a big one to finish it off!

Hopefully everything comes together and I'll have some results to shout about rather than talk of crashes and injuries!!

Thanks to Science In Sport and Cycling Ireland for a great season so far!

Ciao.

TT training on my favourite bike!

Me going too quick into 'said corner' - notice the big orange sign!

The A team

Perks of the job!

Haircuit - Yr 7 PE shorts FRIEND

Italy

Half way through my 2nd day here in Italy. We've had 40 degree heat day and most of the night here. Finally got my air con to work and legs are feeling good!

Had a spin around the TT course this morning. To put it simply, we start on top of a mountain and descend for 4-5km. 10km of flat and then a really tough climb to the finish. All fun and games in 40 degrees!

Really up for it now, just need to rest rest rest!

Ciao

Felix

Update!

Well this is my first update for a long time! I've been at home for the last few weeks, so I've had no excuses! Just laziness.

Over the last months I've been pretty busy. I was away with the SiS lads in Estonia competing in the Saaremaa Velotuur. It consisted of a team trial and 5 road stages. Each road stage contained sections of gravel road which made for interesting racing! We performed well thoughout the week. We rode a good TTT, I won 4 bunch sprints, I was 2nd on the last stage and Alistair managed to get 4th on GC after being consistently strong at the front of the race.
After flying back from Estonia I didn't get a chance to go home, and I headed straight to over to Ireland for the National TT and Road Champs. The 40km TT course was tough, with hard rolling Irish roads and bad wet and windy conditions. I was very pleased with my finishing time of 52.00 just 1 min 30 seconds from well known time trialist Michael Hutchinson. However, it was only good enough for an U23 silver medal. I struggled through the tough 180km road race after not fully recovering from the TT. I finished up 6th U23, really just happy to have got round the full distance.
Over the last couple of weeks I've been at home. I spent a week relaxing trying to get over a hard couple of months. I've spent the last 5 days doing a lot of TT specific training. This is because I was picked to ride in the U23 Europeans TT Championships in Italy in 2 weeks time along with; Sean and Conor. I'll also be riding in the U23 European Road Championship with; Sean, Conor, Sam and Philip. I think we have a strong team but I think I'll be playing more of a supportive role this year!
This brings me up to date and I'll make sure I keep this up to date more regularly in the future, so please check back!

Thanks
Felix

New TT skinsuit!

Team ScienceInSport.com have kindly given me a SMART skinsuit for the National TT Champs on Friday.
I don't know how I fitted into it... but I did! Should definitely save me a few seconds...

Baby grow?

Fits perfectly when tucked down!