Monday, April 30, 2007

weekend training

or lack thereof...

did absolutle no training over the weekend. saturday took the kids to a birthday party at megakids in midvalley megamall. fortunately, it was in the morning so i didn't have to contend with the traffic. evening, planned a short ride with senn, to check out her new saddle position. that was a comedy of erros. as we were leaving my place, we realised we hadn't brought any water bottles. so short ride was going to be even shorter. then, as we got to her car to take the bikes (both bikes were in her car), we realised i didn't have my front wheel! so, she just rode up and down the hill in front of my house for a bit. adjusted her saddle a bit and we were done.

sunday. had a choice of riding to janda baik with pcc of doing a tri sim with swimbikerun. decided on the former. woke up sunday morning, got my cycling kit on, went to the car only to see it was raining. made a quick call to ride leader pk, who was still sleeping. "ride cancelled," he says. oh well, back to bed then. then i had a brainwave, since we were already up, let's go to kampung baru for nasi lemak. so that's where we went.

on the way back, got stuck in a jam as we drove past the big walk group. after a quick nap, we went for a short swim with my brother and sister.

in the evening, spent some time chasing the kids around the playground.

ok, so there was some sporting activity, but i would hadly call it training.

anyway, tomorrow ride to fraser's hill. let's hope the weather holds out...

Thursday, April 26, 2007

my steed




trying to post a pic for the first time. hope it works

Wednesday, April 25, 2007

this week's training so far

last night, usual tuesday night ride. today, did a short run.

last night's ride was kinda slow. sure, the pace picked up now and again, but it was more of a chat and ride rather than the usual hammerfest. pushed hard up the hills, took it easy and slowed for chitchats after that. it was actually quite enjoyable.

today's run was also more of a social event. decided to go to lake gardens with my sister. she was planning to walk. i wanted to run. so she took the short loop around the lake while i took the long one. eventually caught up with her at the far side of the lake, and guess what... she was running! so i slowed my pace a bit and ran with her. going up one of the hills, started walking, so i ran up to the top, turned around and ran back to where she was.

then it was off to the poolside for a couple of california rolls and seafood fried rice.

so far it's been a fairly easy week. think i'd like to keep it that way. tomorrow: swim. planning sets of 500, 400, 300, 200, 100. with 30 second rests in between. that's the plan, at least, we'll see how far we stick to it.

Monday, April 23, 2007

another brick in the wall

did a brick yesterday: 39km bike, 6km run.

midway through the run, i came across the gates of bonk city. fortunately, i didn't bring my passport so they wouldn't let me in.

no, i didn't bonk, but i sure was close to it. legs felt heavy the whole time. even though i was on the cervelo with the zipps, it was just slow going all the way. it was almost as if the brake pads were rubbing against the rim or something.

the run started ok. but as i got 2km in, the legs just said, "stop!" the stomach was saying, "feed me." and the body was saying, "hot!" ignoring their pleas, i just kept on going. kept telling myself that this is the time that we'll be running anyway in races, so better get used to it. the difference is, in races there are aid stations where you can get water to splash on yourself and drink. i had no such luxury yesterday. so, at 3km, i started walking. when i got to the last km, my legs were recovered enough to run the rest of the way.

got home and all i could think about was food. so had a shower and drove all the way to kampung baru for nasi lemak. man, that felt good.

i think working on the garden the day before contributed to the bad performance. all that squatting, digging and lifting heavy slabs and rocks probably didn't do me any favours. on the plus side, though, i do have a nice garden now.

or it could be i'm just plain slow to begin with!

anyway, for the next brick, i plan to cut the bike down to 30km and start earlier so that it won't be so hot when i run. also need to eat a bit more before and maybe bring a bottle of water during the run. we'll see how it goes the next time.

Friday, April 20, 2007

diva's test ride

last night, senn and i took the diva out for her first test ride.

route: home to damansara loop and back via penchala link, a 24km ride. senn wanted to test the diva's prowess up hills so we included the short, steep climb on jalan setiabistari into the ride.

overall, senn was one happy puppy. the bike looked good and performed as good as it looked. she says it's a lot easier to go up hills now, accelerations were faster, and that she can go the same speeds as the cow (her old bike) but with less effort.

with senn going off to china, it looks like the diva's public debut will have to be postponed till she gets back. that means the diva will finally be introduced to the world during the labour day holiday. the route? kkb to fraser's hill. what a place to make a debut...

Thursday, April 19, 2007

Announcing the Arrival of the Diva

senn's diva arrived yesterday. sacrificed running to witness the unveiling. man, it is one sweet frame (i'll post a pic as soon as i figure out how).

senn didn't know the diva had arrived. bike shop owner edwin wanted to surprise her so asked me to drag her over to the shop. when she got there, she had no clue, until the bike box was revealed to her. immediately, her face lit up.

she opened the box and took the frame out. whoa! it was a thing of beauty. we just put it on the workstand and stared at it. for about an hour, just staring. finally, after picking our jaws up off the ground, we took out different colored saddles and bartapes to see which matched best. like with any of senn's bikes everything must be color coordinated. in the end, we all agreed that a black saddle and black bartapes would look best on the diva.

today, edwin's going to be busy building the bike up so that hopefully, senn will get to test ride it tonight. it'll be her one and only opportunity to ride before flying off to shanghai sunday morning.

can't wait to see the completed build. i think i'm more excited about this bike than she is...

Wednesday, April 18, 2007

Tuesday night on the bike

Finally got Senn off her butt to join us on the weekly Tuesday night ride. She's been coming up with all sorts of excuses to skip it since Ironman Langkawi.

We started the ride from home and met up with the rest of the group at KSH Taman Tun. We were late but the group was held up by Ronald who needed a tyre change.

It was a small group tonight with some of the regular speed demons missing. Thank God. After the long Sunday ride and the run the day before, I don't think i could have handled a hammerfest.

We started off nice and slow and gradually picked up speed at the Penchala Link tunnel. By the time we got to Jalan Bukit Kiara, however, Senn just blasted off. Being the puppy dog that I am, I gave chase. Couldn't catch up with her. Jalan Bukit Kiara was, after all, her domain.

Finally caught up with her on the downhill and after that it was me and Gunter setting the pace. It was a barely managable pace for me but I reckon Gunter wasn't even trying. He had a calm, relaxed look on his face, even going up that long hill at SetiaBistari. I, on the other hand, was huffing and puffing just trying to keep up.

Regrouped at Secret Recipe to find Bernard already there. Sneaky little bastard had taken a shortcut. Apparently, he was knackered after Sunday's extra long ride.

Continued the ride without incident. Got back to Taman Tun for some much deserved Orange Juice + 100Plus drink and a roti telur. Riding home after that was a bit of a chore on full stomachs, so Senn and I took a nice slow ride back. It's been a while since we rode just the two of us. Pity there was no moon to make it a bit more romantic...

At the end, we had done around 38 kilometres with an average speed of about 23kmh. A bit slower than the usual Tuesday Night Ride but hey, I'm not complaining.

I'm a blogger now!!!

Looky looky! I have a blog!











Now what?