Slipstream Sean

...You see these are the type of stories that make me worried...hence my question!

Thanks for the advice. Seems like i need to invest in a hard case then.

So I'm gonna enter for the 70.3IM in East London on 22nd of January. I stay in Cape Town. I want to fly up to EL but from the stories I've heard, I just don't trust these feakin airlines with transporting my bike. What does everyone else do? Is car pooling, and driving up the way to go. Or do you take the chance that you may arrive to see your bike in a carbon ball on the other side. Suggestions will be most welcomed!

Shot man, you too.

I also got 03:00:18 from group E...man we were so close

Apologies for the hijack btw

I cant ride on saturday, have to go to a work related workshop. Any keen to do a sunday thing for about 2/3hrs at an ave of 30km/h???

awesome route

E for me

And me

I ride 11sp 11-23...I have every gear except a 22 tooth sprocket. I guess a 25 might be handy, and I"d prob get a 11-25 on my next cassette, but I'm so used to it...and btw I still refer to my 23 as granny gear.

I think you have been given some decent advise. Between Velouria and Rude, you have something to start with. I use Rhodes memorial as my hill repeats. I go all out and it works out to just a touch over 3mins. I never do more than 9(which is 3x(1 sitting, 1 standing, 1 sitting/standing)). In my view you should go all out, and slowly work your way up to 9/10 sets. I think 5/6 is a realistic number to start with though. If you do 9/10 you are gonna hold back too much. You need to kick the @$%&ing $h1t outta your body. Rather 5/6 hard than 9/10 med-hard, if you catch my drift. Obviously this should not be attempted without a good base, which it sounds like you have. Oh and alternate between sitting and standing intervals. Some hills are too steep to sit, you will fatigue the hell outta your muscles, whereas standing fries your muscles at a faster rate than sitting, so both need to be worked on, so you can alternate for maximum benefit.

I doubt he is even on the hub!

If I can just make 1 suggestion, at the risk of trying to look like a smart-ass. Your sprint training on Thursday, requires your body to be 100% fresh and fully recovered. So for me doing sprints the day after hill repeats is maybe not such a fantastic idea. If your goal is to improve top speed, your session will be compromised quiet a bit, depending on how hard you went on the hills, but I assume you're going balls to the wall. If your goal is speed endurance, and wish to practise sprinting when the body is slightly fatigued, then the placement of the sessions would be alright, but don't expect your top end speed to be dramatically improved. It might be a better idea to do hill repeats on Tuesday, easy 40km recovery ride on Wednesday, and repeated sprints on Thursday OR sprints on Tuesday(after rest day) and hill repeats on Thursday. It's nice to see some cyclists with a plan tho...many cyclists just play their training sessions by ear.

For me, I dont like descending the glen, too much sitting on the brakes, but then I'm a very average descender...not a daredevil. I like to Climb the glen, then take a right at the top and descend down camps bay drive. Camps bay drive is one of my favourite descents in the cape, fast, thrilling, exciting, and challenging as the road narrows and some cornering comes into play. You can then take a right at the bottom of camps bay drive and u got urself a nice triangular loop.

I'm talking road...from the sign at the bottom to the top. However I do do the mtb route aswell sometimes...same route except u keep going up the gravel road.

Rhodes Memorial is an awesome climb for intervals...it's my practise pad. 700m of killer gradient, perfect for repeats.

Yeah, and btw this is not a hill for descending...even if the baracade was removed it's suicidal, far too steep with hairpin switchbacks.

You see guys...i.e Airbender, fakes and LeTurbo...Bones and I were right. According to this route map you dont do Slangkop, you cut through ocean view, this map could be wrong, because his map is 5km short. Actually while im typing this I'm beginning to think this map is wrong, i cant remember whether we did slangkop or ocean view, my gut feel is actually saying slangkop contrary to my arguement...somebody help pls.

Eish sorry man, as much as I'd love to ride over every hill in the cape peninsula again, I'm leaving to go away on holiday(for a week) that morning. Taking my bike with me tho, have to do a few hill repeat sessions while im there. Going to Grahamstown then Port Alfred. Anyone know of a sharp hill of around 500m-1km in those areas...something like Rhodes memorial? Enjoy the ride guys!

No they will definitely remove barrier for race, but if you wanna practise hitting the climb hard, it's just a bit irritating for training.

A bit on the steep side, hehe. It's not really maitime climb, but the fact that you still have black hill and OKSW after maritime... It takes toll on the legs. Wish they would remove that retarded baracade on the reaction climb, sucks having to unclip and walk around at the start.

Yeah I remember, I did the 99er at the beginning of this year. But that's just a case of following either directions from marshalls or the wheel in front of you. Anyway, had a c@ck 99er this year...next year will be better. I dont think i need to do visserhok. To simulate the two final climbs I'll just practise hitting myself on the head with a baseball bat and then submersing it underwater...that should prepare my body for it

Perhaps I have myself to blame for not knowing the route then, but I thought we wud all be together so didn't really take much interest in memorizing the route. I definitely just took the same road home to durbs, if you guys turned off, then i definitely missed you guys. I'm keen for the cobra ride...and yes, I know that route all too well :-)

Hmm, that's weird...when i got back on my bike, I saw you guys cresting a hill in the distance, and I raced to the top of that hill but then couldn't see anybody...so i just kept riding, wanted to stay in my base zone, didnt feel like ripping myself to shredds trying to catch something i cant even see. I didnt see you guys waiting anywhere??? I actually missed the whole vissershok effort. I just followed road signs back to durbanville, I couldnt remember where to turn off to v-hok, and didnt wanna get lost ;D Anyway no hard feelings, I think i learned enuf about u guys today to know that you wouldnt have shelled me on purpose, was actually still a very enjoyable ride. I see you guys are doing a training session in my back yard on thurs, Airbender. Think i'll join u guys again. And then u can make it up to me , gifts will be graciously accepted