Club Dinner Dance

From Brian,

We are actively seeking an alternative venue for the Dinner Dance previously set for 22^nd February 2014.

The Burford Bridge Hotel is closed for repairs after the recent flooding and will remain so until May.

The Dinner Dance and prize presentation will be at a different venue and the date may change as well, but we will try to keep it to early March.

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Early Season Sportives 2014

Those of you planning some sportive rides this season might be interested in looking here for a list of upcoming events.

Happy New Year everyone.

Burford Bridge Hotel is flooded

Let's hope the dehumidifiers work. Looks likely that we may need to find a different date for our annual dinner.

Bike fit App

I cannot afford to buy you all a present so I thought that I would instead point you in the direction of something that you might want to purchase yourself. It's pretty cheap and it might well help you with your cycling next year.

DCRainmaker is a triathlete and cyclist who has an excellent blog where he reviews the electronic gadgets and products that we commonly use. He does a very thorough job and even details how the products have been packaged, instructions given as well as how useful they are in the field. He recently reviewed a bike fit app and he gave it a very good write-up here.

I have not yet tried it but I will be giving it a go as there is now an android version too, available here.

As we know having a good fit is essential for riding comfortably and fast and this app allows you to analyse your position for a road or TT fit. What makes it different to other apps is that it is more dynamic using the video capture of your phone or ipad to then analyse the angles of your body on the bike while you are pedalling. At a couple of quid it could well be worth a go and would at least be a start to getting a comfortable set-up.

Have a great Christmas.

Alex

VTTA Membership

Just a quick reminder for those who are members of the Veterans' Time Trial Association (VTTA) or those who wish to join that the membership subs will be due on the 1st of January. This is the National Association for racing cyclists over 40 and they have their own awards.

It's £12 for single members and £13 for couples. If you wish to register for a performance award for the fee is £10 for all rides at all distances.

See www.vtta.org.uk for more information on the performance standards. If you need more information about joining then please leave a reply here and I will forward the contact details to you. Please note that the membership details on the Surrey/Sussex page of the website look out of date at the moment.

The VTTA Surrey / Sussex Prize Giving Luncheon is on 2nd February at Rowfant House. Again, let me know if you are interested in attending and I will forward the relevant contact details for you to book a place.

Thanks to Ray for highlighting this.

Alex

MTB ride Sat. 21 Dec 13

Thanks to Andy for a great if wet ride! We all enjoyed an amazingly good value Xmas Lunch at Wetherspoons!

Some people don't like being apart!

Not only the shortest day of the year but the longest table in the pub!

And of course some people never change always acting the clown. Hiel!

American Supper

The Stelvio

Thanks to all those club members who turned up to the American Supper last night and brought food along. It was a lovely evening and a nice opportunity to catch up and to meet some new people. Unfortunately, I am still none-the-wiser as to why it was an American supper? Maybe someone could enlighten me! :-)  Particular thanks to whoever brought the mini Cornish pasties which took a bit of a battering at my hands!

I had a great chat with our own Doreen Powney and it gave me a chance to talk to her about her exploits as a cyclist and keen walker. This article was on our facebook page recently and if you have a few minutes it's well worth a read. One of the cycling targets on my personal bucket list is to ride the Stelvio, well Doreen's already done it, and I bet she didn't do it on a carbon fibre bike either. ;-)

Scottish Highlands Video

Hannah Barnes: NorthWest - A mountain bike adventure through the Scottish Highlands
 

Hannah Barnes embarks on an epic mountain bike adventure up the west coast of Scotland. Taking in the incredible trails, scenery and beaches on the way. 

As recommended by JohnB. Enjoy.

Road Bike Party 2 - Martyn Ashton

Cycling downhill, backwards on his front wheel!?

Boris vs Ventoux

As recommended by John on the forum. A bit of winter cycling inspiration for you.

24 hour TT blogs and sites

A different way for a support crew to grab their rider's attention.

It transpired at the recent AGM that there could well be a healthy contingent of Kingston Phoenix members taking the start in the National 24 hour Time Trial this summer, scheduled for the 21st & 22nd June. I thought that I would do a little search and see what information is out there about how to tackle this event.

The longest that I have sat on a bike is 6 hours so the thought of only being one quarter of the way through a tt after that time seems, well, ever so slightly bonkers.

 I would think that the best thing about it would be the rolling buffet that could be consumed to keep those legs turning.


Here are some links that you may find interesting.

http://www.cyclingweekly.co.uk/news/latest/540172/how-to-get-through-the-24-hour-time-trial-championships.html

http://www.rapha.cc/the-audax-diaries-the-24-hour-tt?locale=UK

http://roadcyclinguk.com/news/rides-news/national-24-hr-tt-the-ride.html

http://www.24hourfellowship.org.uk/

http://www.edinburghbicycle.com/blog/2012/09/24-hour-time-trial/



I am sure that there are members in the club who have ridden 12 and 24 hour events in the past and who could pass on the benefit of their experience to those taking it on for the first time. My immediate thoughts are;

Ensuring that the rider is extremely comfortable on their bike. I see that quite a few riders opt for a road bike as opposed to a tt set up.  How do you avoid the inevitable aches and pains that will creep up on the rider.?

 Do some riders take a spare bike in case of mechanicals / wanting to change their riding position later in the event?

Getting the nutrition right, planning this out and practising it in training.

Keeping moving and avoiding unnecessarily long stops. I guess that comes down largely to fatigue later in the event and therefore how well the nutrition has gone down and whether one is still comfortable on the bike.

Winning the mental battle later on. Having something to look forward to like a particularly large pastie / hot soup / planned stop.

What would be the typical or longest training rides? I suppose a 12 hour would be perfect preparation but what about the long Sunday rides? How long and frequent should they be?

Any ideas would be useful to share.

Ride safe,

Alex

Mid-week chain gang ride; Any takers?

I was thinking about if there would be any interest in setting up a mid-week chain gang ride in the new year, pre-tt season?

I was going to see if I could plan out a 6-8 mile loop around the Chessington-Epsom area and use it for a one hour ish fast ride. The roads around Horton are fairly fast and open without too many junctions, plenty of roundabouts for relatively safe turns. I'd need to plan it out accurately but would there be anyone else who might see this as a useful session to set up?

What night would be best? For me Thursday.

Maybe we could have it on different nights? Just put a rider list on the forum during the week?

Routes. Any suggestions? My thinking is keeping it local so that we have not got too far to go. We can get a good session in without having to go too far from our front doors. As I said, Horton, Leatherhead Road, towards Cobham if needs be. Any other suggestions? Have a couple of different routes?

I have put a thread on the club's forum so please post any ideas there.

Cheers,

Alex

How many punctures?

Hi chaps. So we managed to double the numbers for our early ride from 2 to 4.

Thanks to Shaun and Lee for tagging along with Simon and I. 44 miles in 2:40, taking in Newlands and a few other lumps. We were going to finish with Boxhill but as by then I was on my third, yes, third puncture and ready to throw my bike into a hedge we called it quits there and came back home.

Thanks to Lee for finding the 2 offending pieces of very small glass that was causing all the aggro, Simon for letting me have one of his tubes and Shaun for making sure I got home without getting a  fourth one.


Hopefully this can become a regular ride for the early birds amongst us.

Early Sunday Ride

Simon T and I have been regularly meeting up on Sunday mornings for a hilly 35-50m ride. If anyone would like to join us then that would be great and we intend to be out again this Sunday.

I will be at the BP garage at Malden Rushett at approximately 7:20am. I know it's early but you can be back home with a cup of coffee and a smug grin by 10:30am while everyone is still heading out. I appreciate that this will not be everyone's cup of tea but if you would like to join us then it would be great to have some other Phoenix members along.

Alex

CTT handbook (Take 2)

Ok, the 2014 Handbook is now available online here at the usual price of £9 ready to be dispatched in January.



Alex

Re CTT Handbook

Hi Alex

the reason it's half price is because it's this past seasons handbook.

regards

Joe

CTT Handbook

Hello everyone. It's your new TT secretary here. :-)

I thought I would start up by letting you know that the CTT Handbook is currently available here on the CTT website and it is half price at £4.50. It will be published in mid-January. Frank has kindly sent me the dates for the TTs for next season and once they have been finally confirmed I will get them published for you.

Looking forward to seeing as many of you as possible taking on some time trials next season and for those who missed the AGM this week, attempting to take on the President's challenge to the racing members of the club. Further details of this will be revealed soon.

Ride safe.

Alex

Cycling magazines/books going begging

Ann Bath has about 5 recent years of Cycling Weekly and would like to give away to a good home otherwise they will be thrown which would be a shame, lots of interesting articles nutrition, training etc.

Also about 6 books on cycle racing, they will go to Charity shop otherwise.

Contact Ann directly - details on your recently received address list!

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