Thursday, February 27, 2014
Sunday, February 2, 2014
The Bicycle Obsession
is one of the two big ones I have at the moment (Himalayas being the other one, in case you're wondering). A lot of even my closest friends don't know just how passionate I'm about cycling (road cycling actually, the Tour de France kind, if it helps understanding). It's part of everything I do - eating, sleeping, reading, browsing the Internet, making up a day's (even a week's or month's) schedule, grocery shopping...you get the idea. Like with anything else, it's a great feeling when you meet people who are as mad as you, who speak the same unintelligible (to the average person) language and who take joy in crazy ass weird little things that the average Joe wouldn't look a second look or think a second thought about. It's a connection; a kind of acceptance. I knew some people through a cycling forum but had never met them before the recent Tour of Nilgiris (TfN) that I rode. It was really great to meet them finally and to ride with them. It was the people I rode with that made TfN a great experience. Riding with people is often very different from riding alone. When you're riding in a group, you work together (by taking turns at the front of a paceline) to keep the speed up. There are a lot of unsaid (and hence beautiful) things going on - mutual trust (riding so close to each other needs a lot of it. It's amazing how a bunch of strangers can trust each other that much), deciding the pace depending on road conditions (terrain, winds, etc.), knowing when a rider is struggling and keeping the pace down for him/her to recover, everyone pushing that little bit extra because you're working as a team etc.; the cameraderie is addictive!
So what do I get out of cycling, I get asked often. It's hard to describe but besides the obvious fitness gains, I feel that it improves my quality of life. The time I'm out riding is time I spend with myself. Although I don't really think about anything specific (actually, all my mental energy is spent on trying to do what's supposed to be done for that ride - pedal stroke, form, making sure I'm neither slacking off nor overdoing it etc. with an eye on traffic), in the end it feels like time well spent. It's also an added benefit that you meet some very cool and like-minded people, like I talked about. One of my favourite tasks is to look at my ride data (yes, ride data; it can get quite technical. Some sample data if you're curious) as soon as I get home. It gives me a high (especially if I think I rode well) :-) It takes a lot of knowledge, time and experience (which I don't have at this point) to use this data. So I enrolled myself with the Peaks Coaching Group. I have a (virtual) coach who gives me specific workouts, analyses the data from these rides and gives me feedback, all in order for me to reach my goals. So what are my goals?
My goals for this year are simple, simply stated at least:
1. Get as close as possible to a sub-hour 40k (this is HARD)
2. Become a decent climber. Climbing is something that I'm really bad at (owing mainly to my excess weight). Climbing fast is something I can't even begin to imagine - it would be intense PAIN. Before the TfN, I used to dread climbs, be afraid of them. The good news is I no longer do and try my best - one of the best takeaways from TfN.
3. Ride 12000+ km this year. I've done around 1200 this month and I'm so far on track.
4. Start racing. While I'm not too keen on this, a race for me would at least be a good hard training ride.
To accomplish or even get close to them require one thing: lose weight! To do it, I have to be watchful about what and how much I eat. While controlling myself with food is a challenge even normally, after a hard day's ride it's almost impossible - it's guilt-free eating after all! And this is why I've NEVER lost ANY weight due to cycling :-P But I know if I have to get closer to my goals faster, I'll have to take food more seriously.
For me, any cycling talk isn't complete without talking about equipment! First and foremost - I love my bike! It was a self-gift for my 27th birthday :-P I'm an equipment geek and lazy. So if some component upgrade holds promise of making me faster without extra effort, I'm sold. My current road bike happened in a similar way. Even though I spent (and still spend) a bomb on it, it puts a smile on my face at the end of the day. What's money in comparison? :-) The next major thing I'm spending on is a power meter, one that's part of the rear wheel's hub and measures the exact amount of power you're putting out. Just the hub costs half of what my whole bike costs! (and mind you, it's one of the cheaper power meters on the market). I should have my hands on it in the next week or so and then I'll be building the rear wheel myself (a first for me).
I've planned on doing some riding in the hills in the south this month and in the foothills of the Himalayas in the summer. I'm also planning to go to Europe and cycle there. I've never been more excited about my cycling!
So what do I get out of cycling, I get asked often. It's hard to describe but besides the obvious fitness gains, I feel that it improves my quality of life. The time I'm out riding is time I spend with myself. Although I don't really think about anything specific (actually, all my mental energy is spent on trying to do what's supposed to be done for that ride - pedal stroke, form, making sure I'm neither slacking off nor overdoing it etc. with an eye on traffic), in the end it feels like time well spent. It's also an added benefit that you meet some very cool and like-minded people, like I talked about. One of my favourite tasks is to look at my ride data (yes, ride data; it can get quite technical. Some sample data if you're curious) as soon as I get home. It gives me a high (especially if I think I rode well) :-) It takes a lot of knowledge, time and experience (which I don't have at this point) to use this data. So I enrolled myself with the Peaks Coaching Group. I have a (virtual) coach who gives me specific workouts, analyses the data from these rides and gives me feedback, all in order for me to reach my goals. So what are my goals?
My goals for this year are simple, simply stated at least:
1. Get as close as possible to a sub-hour 40k (this is HARD)
2. Become a decent climber. Climbing is something that I'm really bad at (owing mainly to my excess weight). Climbing fast is something I can't even begin to imagine - it would be intense PAIN. Before the TfN, I used to dread climbs, be afraid of them. The good news is I no longer do and try my best - one of the best takeaways from TfN.
3. Ride 12000+ km this year. I've done around 1200 this month and I'm so far on track.
4. Start racing. While I'm not too keen on this, a race for me would at least be a good hard training ride.
To accomplish or even get close to them require one thing: lose weight! To do it, I have to be watchful about what and how much I eat. While controlling myself with food is a challenge even normally, after a hard day's ride it's almost impossible - it's guilt-free eating after all! And this is why I've NEVER lost ANY weight due to cycling :-P But I know if I have to get closer to my goals faster, I'll have to take food more seriously.
For me, any cycling talk isn't complete without talking about equipment! First and foremost - I love my bike! It was a self-gift for my 27th birthday :-P I'm an equipment geek and lazy. So if some component upgrade holds promise of making me faster without extra effort, I'm sold. My current road bike happened in a similar way. Even though I spent (and still spend) a bomb on it, it puts a smile on my face at the end of the day. What's money in comparison? :-) The next major thing I'm spending on is a power meter, one that's part of the rear wheel's hub and measures the exact amount of power you're putting out. Just the hub costs half of what my whole bike costs! (and mind you, it's one of the cheaper power meters on the market). I should have my hands on it in the next week or so and then I'll be building the rear wheel myself (a first for me).
I've planned on doing some riding in the hills in the south this month and in the foothills of the Himalayas in the summer. I'm also planning to go to Europe and cycle there. I've never been more excited about my cycling!
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