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Another vote for the Specialized Phenom, love it 
Gladly paid R1,035.00 to buy a Wahoo one for a friend who couldn't afford it. Combined with speed sensor and they had a giant dumb trainer. They are on zwift with us now, loving it, mental sanity. Making a plan for another one with Bluetooth and a stages PM I've take. From my spare bike. Transactions conducted via postbox, alcohol wipe downs.
Figured out why my power was so low, seems Rouvy doesn't support dual sided power meters 
. Will investigate more tomorrow, works 100% on Zwift 
Ok gents , I have created a race for 4 30 pm today .
It’s called Bikehub North Applegate . It’s about a 45 min workout.
Awesome keen to give it a bash, FYI the event link is: https://my.rouvy.com/onlinerace/live/18107
Hoping my rouvy power readings work properly, for some reason it was showing 100w less than the PM the last time.
I'm practicing social isolation, cancelled travel plans, cancelled social events with bigger groups - but I am riding as per normal. We generally ride in smaller groups of less than 10 - as a bonus the roads are traffic free and the weather is great atm 
. We've cancelled our post ride coffees in restaurants though.
Riding keeps me sane, the groups are optional - everyone can make their own call on if they want to join or not. If I was in contact with someone who was on the higher risk profile I would not do group rides, but my family is far away - so I think I'm probably more at risk going to the shops.
Who knows how long this will go on for - your approach needs to be sustainable IMHO, that means physical health and mental health too
I have a Ryder 900 Lumen front light that I've been using on early morning 5-7am rides and commutes for the last 18 months. I find it perfect for the job - its able to provide descent light for around 2 hours on full bright mode, alternately on medium brightness or flash mode I can comfortably do a 4 hour ride.
Pros: Great support, easy to get replacement batteries. I like not having to fuss with cables and battery packs, easy to just take-off recharge and snap back into place.
Cons: It can run down if you use the full bright mode. It only has one flash mode which works ok during daylight, but seems to piss of drivers and runners when its dark. Its a rather intense flash pattern - I normally leave the constant beam on when dark or point it slightly downwards.
I have an extreme light for the MTB, great product - but I find it too bright for commutes and the recharging process is a bit clumsy.
Condolences to friends and family, very sad news. RIP Chris 
That would be the ideal solution, but I could in no way justify a purchase of R899 per tyre (ex. tubeless wheels/rims) unfortunately.
I have a friends old marathon plus tyre on the front at the moment to test out ... that this feels like I could ride over nails and still be ok....but still not the best solution.
Will keep searching for a solution.
Went out to Conters this morning with car and bike .... the amount of riders I saw on the side of the roads fixing flats was rather depressing ... later in the day I had to head out to Melkbos and saw the same carnage along the sides of the roads again. It is unfortunately just the season of devil thorns.
Cool man, I looked into those - didn't ever get to try them. Good luck!
Good luck to everyone doing TOGH tomorrow! . The route and conditions look stunning. I look forward to stalking my friends on Strava - serious FOMO.
2
I started out about 6 years ago with a basic commuter that had cheap tires and tubes - I got a lot of punctures and was cursing daily, landed up with double tyre liners and that worked ok, but it was heavy as hell along with the basic rims on the bike ... and I'd still get an occasional puncture. I then moved to hard-shell gatorskins and that worked well, plus it was so much lighter.
I'm currently riding my 'racing road bike' with carbon rims and tubeless road tyres to work (899 per tyre at CWC and I fitted them myself at home) - its the only road bike I now own. Its a short ride but I do it come rain or shine. I haven't had a puncture in over 18 months on the commute and I love the ride into the office so much more. The ride home is a sprint ... life is short, enjoy the ride
Sad to miss it, hopefully it happens again with better scheduling. My daughter loved Junior CTCT at least . Now to suffer through a long week of tapering .... 
How many of you MEN *in the most offensive way possible* are doing the juniour tour. I got signed up for the 7km.
Any last minute training tips ?
Took my 5 year old for a training ride on Sunday afternoon, training starts like her Uncle when I start with my tapering - she's all set, serious business
Same day as the Junior CTCT event unfortunately. I was so keen but unlikely to be able to make both on the same day and my youngest daughter is so keen on the junior ride .
Very sad to have to miss it!
I generally use mine quite a lot, depends on the terrain - I'm also on a twin-lockout Scott DS. Like Chris said its just so easy to change between the settings and the change between the settings is massive.
The Scott bars looks like a birds nest, but my roady is the pretty bike - my MTB is the ugly step sister in the family, covered in battle scars
Its pretty useless IMHO unless you do all your riding in a lab. There are just too many variables e.g the weather/wind/rain, bike type, drafting, terrain, bike position, clothing etc,etc.
In general if you ride more - you will get stronger. However IMHO a tailwind will probably make you smash more PRs from 1 week to the next vs the week of training itself . If you want numbers, get a power meter - you can pick up a single sided stages for under 5k now. Do you need it no, does it help to gauge your training if you mostly ride outdoors - hell yes.
Seedings has been updated
Wow, that was fast - I can see the revised seeding on the PPA site, but not on Racetec. I wonder if they will consider these for CTCT 
Race report
I should be disqualified from today's Tour de PPA and my 16th place in E batch ceded to the rider in 17th spot. Like most people who profit by illegitimate means, I long for the punishment that will free me from my guilt.
More about that later.
The Tour de PPA was extremely well organised. By this I mean that the toilets had enough paper and I didn't have a long wait in the queue. This sets the tone for a race and the PPA didn't drop the ball.
I lined up in E in the improved seeding lanes and bumped into BillyGoat on his aero flying machine and we chatted while the two main worries of the morning gnawed at my mind. First - I've recently acquired my first pair of road shoes and I didn't want to make the Mamil name gat by failing to clip in and causing a pile up. As it happened I clipped in first time and immediately set about holding my place.
About those shoes, I jumped in some Lakes, made with Kangaroo leather in Austria, yes that's right, who knew there were Austrian kangaroos? I've been making Christopher Robin jokes long past the point where everybody starts rolling their eyes at me.
The second worry was of course, would I hold on to the top of tiekiedraai unlike last year where I failed about 100 meters short of the top?
Well, either group E took it easy up that hill or I've got fitter but whatever happened, I was within spitting distance of the front of E at the top and it was a simple matter to use my substantial weight advantage to catch up to BillyGoat who came past me at 77kmph.
I'd kept an eye out for the injured Skubarra and as the start beep went I thought he'd probably elected to stay in bed. He hadn't and he kept me company on the rollers on Conterman's. I was in a good mood - I was feeling strong, I'd held on to Vissershok and I I knew that even if I got dropped here I'd catch on to F as they caught me in Durbanville somewhere and all I was going to do now was my level best to stay with E up the steep climb.
And I was doing well.
When I say well, I could still see the leaders of the group about 40 meters ahead of me, I'd seen BillyGoat put in a big effort on the relatively flat bit just before the last super-steep gradient, my heart rate was at 90% or thereabouts and I was just calling on my reserves to stand up and try put in a similar effort to at least be in touching distance.
I was hopeful.
And then suddenly I was weightless - almost.
Skubarra had his hand on my back and proceeded to show me the difference between an E batch hopeful and an A batch rider. He pushed me with what felt like superhero strength for about 40 meters (I had to drop 2 gears just to keep my own pedaling going) until I was right on the wheel of the last rider in the lead group.
"No point getting dropped now" said Skubs as he took his place in the group.
I've never been pushed before and I have to say -- I liked it.
I could feel BillyGoat's eyes boring a hole in the back of my head and as the relief of the downhill washed over my legs, so the guilt began to weigh me down. Here I was in the best case of all scenarios I'd sketched for myself in my daydreams about the race .... but I hadn't earned it.
I would have held on for those 40 meters I told myself defensively. Maybe. But I'm not sure.
Should I forfeit my medal? I'll let the hub be judge and jury.
The ride from there until the R302 was uneventful. Fast, fun, took a few turns on the front and told Skubarra that he could at least look as if he was breaking a sweat because the rest of E was on the rivet. He just laughed. We caught the tail of D and some of them joined us.
I kept waiting for BillyGoat to join us - I felt sure he'd be able to chase back on but misadventure had waylaid him.
The second defining moment came predictably when we turned onto the 302 and caught the full force of the cross/head wind. This time there was no friendly hand, in fact I suspect it was Skubarra who orchestrated the attack. I ended up fighting a losing battle for the last wheel before I would need to be over the white line. The next guy a dead wheel. and I had to go around him in the wind. I needed 600 watts for about 30, maybe even 20 seconds to get on and my legs felt numb.
This and the top of Vissers reveal the biggest current weakness in my riding - the big short duration effort that's needed if I'm to respond to to situations like this. I have endurance in spades and a decent (by mamilian standards) 20, 40 and 1 hour power, I've lost a couple of kilos, so if I'm in the group I am more than OK. But these critical moments need work.
And I know the answer is more intervals.
The rest is familiar and predictable. I teamed up with a good little group of 4 and we rotated nicely in a functioning unit along the R302 and I left them on Philadelphia road, along with the dead wheel rider who annoyingly kept breaking the paceline. One of the group, a friendly mountain biker out for a road ride caught me again on Adderly and we chatted for a bit.
Oh one other thing - another milestone in my progression. A fellow mamil a C batcher with a Camelbak told me I can't just ride people over the white line on Vryguns road. He had left a gap and I took it. That's racing bud.
32kmph average - not too bad - notwithstanding that I got by with a little help from my friends
Well done David! Going from strength to strength Tough conditions out there today!
Love your race reports!
Continental GP5000TL 28mm Tubeless
Weight 81kgs
Front 75 psi (5 bar)
Rear 80 psi (5.5 bar)
Hope you have better luck with your Vector 3's than I did. I bought a set with a new road bike in September 2019. The Garmin support is good, so that's a plus - but the power readings were sporadic at best. I had one session where they showed an FTP of 400, which although flattering was a 100W jump from the previous week and meant 5.16 watts/kg .
Garmin replaced the first set in November, and it was better, but after 1 month the left pedal started giving random readings again. I tried the cleaning mineral oil tricks (see Garmin forums for more), however at close to 15k I was longing for my single sided stages. In addition the battery covers screw into plastic threads that are never going to last imho. I told Garmin I'd had enough and they kindly gave me a refund (can't complain there). Another guy in our group had similar issues 4 sets in 1 year and then a refund. We both bought dual sided 4iiii, been happy ever since - nice to just ride and forget and get numbers that are reasonable.
Could have just been our bad luck, IMHO if your on a budget I'd get two stages single sided power meters - one for each bike. The new gen worked flawless on my old bike and they've just halved their prices from January 2020. I have 47/53 balance, so honestly single sided if your doing IDT to check is more than good enough.
https://store.stagescycling.com/STAGES-POWER-L-ULTEGRA-R8000 plus XT etc.
4 years ago I was exactly where you are now. Yesterday I rode the 99er in less than 3 hours with only a 750ml bottle. After struggling after 2 hours, I started to to train more consistent with longer rides over weekends. I do a lot of fasted rides and Intervals in between. 3 weeks hard 1 week off. On a 100km training ride I can go easily with only 2 bottles with no food and that after I used to consume a powerbar, banana, 2 gels and whatever else on a 3 hour ride. Don't train your body to eat in order to perform, train it to be efficient with only the necessary fuel.
Matches my experience too, the cramping disappeared when I got fitter and stronger. There are no shortcuts imho. Tried some stuff, but they didn't really work as well as more training.
I'd like one, put me on the customer list ????
Ultegra Di2 weight and reliability?
in Technical Q&A
Posted
I've been riding Ultegra Di2 for 2 years now, absolutely love it - definitely worth it IMHO. Reliability is better than mechanical if you consider in addition to just working, its much less maintenance, flawless shifting every day. In my opinion its more tangible than a wheel-set upgrade. I bought a new Scott Addict in September, Ultegra Di2 with descent wheelset ... the love of my life
. I like the shifting so much I even prefer to use it on my IDT!