Today is a scheduled rest day in Nottingham.  We’ve got beautiful weather here and it’s a great little town to enjoy.  Since we don’t have any ride stories from today, I thought I’d share a short article that I came across in Outside Magazine.  Here is a link to the web version of the article.  The original can be found in this year’s “Summer 2008 Buyer’s Guide.”  It’s written by Levi Leipheimer, America’s top cyclist.

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An Ounce of Prevention: 5 Tips to ensure your bike never slows you down

1. Never Let Your Tread Wear Out: Replace your tires frequently. With fresher rubber, you’ll have fewer flats and also a better-handling bike.

2. Regularly Inspect Your Tires: Sometimes you’ll come back from a ride with small bits of glass or debris embedded in the outer casing. If you habitually clean this stuff off, it won’t have a chance to work through the tire.

3. Same Goes for Your Chain: Keep it clean and lubed and your bike will shift, and look, better. And if you replace your chain before it gets too worn out, you’ll save the expense of having to fix or replace pricier items like cassettes and chainrings, which suffer increased wear and tear from old chains.

4. Buy a Torque Wrench: Modern bike components are made of expensive materials like carbon and titanium and highly engineered to save weight. But that also means they can be damaged by overtightening. Manufacturers test their products and provide torque recommendations. Make sure you follow them.

5. Find a Good Local Bike Shop and Mechanic, and Be Loyal: The more familiar they become with your bike and your riding style, the more able they’ll be to keep everything working to your liking.

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The final tip is one that I can’t emphasize enough.  It’s one of those things that until you experience it, you don’t know how disadvantaged you are.  We’ve mentioned Cadence Cycling on this blog several times. One of my most valuable relationships that has come from 10 Degrees Latitude has been through Cadence.  I have learned more about cycling/multisport from the coaches and staff here than I ever could have imagined.  Cadence has been a great supporter of ours but they’ve given us no money.  Our promotion of them comes out of respect.  I wish every serious athlete could have a top tier bike shop in their area.  Any bike retailer can sell you a bike.  Most of them can even put together a 30 minute bike fit for you.  But in order to make the step from recreational athlete to competitor you absolutely must plug yourself in to a first rate knowledge base. Cadence Cycling squared me away, and put me on a course to ensure a successful event this summer. Here were just a few of my problem areas that I never knew I had:

1. Bad bike fit
2. Poor nutrition regimen (racing and training)
3. Bought products based on price/brand.  Paid little attention to catering to my race needs.

Last but not least — pictures from our rest day in Nottingham. We visited the Nottingham Castle, and the local bike shop Freewheel where the head mechanic rebuilt Neal’s bottom bracket and tightened Adam’s rear cassette. Thanks guys!

It’s coming down to D-day. Less than two weeks! This past weekend, in final preps for our journey, I left the loving comfort of my family and my new Denver home and headed west to the land of fruit and nuts. The San Francisco Bay is a phenomenal training ground for the Channel. The water temps are just a bit colder than the Channel (55 degrees F), so they are a great acclimatization tool. The water conditions in the Aquatic Park did a good job of simulating the prevalent conditions in the Channel as far as chop and currents. Outside of the breakwaters proved quite rough, depending on the time of day. Another benefit of these training grounds is the Dolphin Club. Neal found this open-water-swimming jewel last year, but this was my first time experiencing it. They boast over 1000 members, and the camaraderie and enthusiasm amongst this eclectic group of swimmers is fantastic. They are also a wealth of information for those of us aspiring to swim the English Channel. They have several members who have made the crossing, and a few more that are currently training for it. Special thanks to Amber Rhett and Reuben Hechanova for all of their advice.

I was there for less than 48 hours, and Neal and I spent a good deal of that time training. We got in two decent swims on Saturday, and then we both participated in an open-water “race” put on by the Dolphin Club. We had to check in for the race by 6:00, which meant that the alarm clock went off at about 4:30! We took a boat from the club to the San Francisco Bay bridge, and once dropped off, it was an all-out sprint back to the club. The front group was ultra-competitive, with the winning swimmer completing the 2 ½ mile course in under 40 minutes (current assisted). Neal wasn’t too far behind at around 45 minutes, and I straggled in about 3-4 minutes after that. Many thanks to all of the volunteers who rowed beside us making this event as safe and as fun as possible.

We took a few minutes to bring our core temperatures back up to human levels, and then bee-lined for the airport. It was a fast and furious weekend, but all-in-all a great time!

Sorry for the radio/blog silence. I was driving cross-country in my Jeep & Trailer. What a gorgeous drive!

I moved from Philadelphia to San Francisco. I’m new here, and one of the big parts of moving for me is finding a new place to workout. I know about the Dolphin Swim Club in San Francisco, so I went there to check on their latest activities. While I was at the Dolphin Club I heard about two upcoming open water swims.

Both swims are open water swims. Both are relatively short (1-2 miles). And I’ll be doing both with my friend Paul who works at Facebook. I’m super stoked about both! It will be a fun way for us to mix-up workouts, and a good way for me to get in the race mindset prior to the English Channel, which is coming up SOON!

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Sunday, June 1 2008
Tri Valley Masters
Lake Del Valle
Livermore, CA
.75 mile (8:00AM)
1.5 mile (9:00AM)

Saturday, June 7 2008
Davis Aquatic Masters
Lake Berryessa
Napa, CA
2 mile (9:30AM)
1 mile (11:25AM)

I’m back in Philly for finals this week, and it has been a perfect opportunity to get back in my favorite river for a few good workouts. I took a sunset swim for about an hour on Tuesday sans Neal. He was busy trying to figure out why his Jeep can’t go over 35 mph without violently shaking as if it were about to come from together…an important detail to take care of before he attempts to haul a trailer and all he owns from Philadelphia to San Francisco. The swim was beautiful, although it was by far the most awkward workout of the season. Apparently this section of the river is quite busy on Tuesday evenings. Everyone from collegiate rowers in high-end shells to corporate outings on 8-person flat-bottomed canoes stopped to gawk at me like I was nuts. My only hope was to just keep swimming and pretend that they weren’t staring at me and talking. One husband and wife stopped within five feet of me and just watched for several minutes. I was listening to music, so I couldn’t hear their conversation, but I couldn’t help but crack a smile. They just laughed and paddled on. I was happy to be finished with the workout until, as I was climbing up the river bank, I was greeted by a friendly bicycle cop who hassled me about the safety of swimming in the river because of the unpredictable currents. Apparently when it is about to rain, the current shifts and runs in the opposite direction. I just said ok. Though I would have loved to hear his explanation as to how this shift affects the water falls that lie about 1 mile down stream, I was tired and wanted to go home.

Yesterday Neal and I jumped in for a 2 hour swim. We were a little disconcerted to look down at the Suunto and see that the water temperature had risen to a balmy 63 degrees over the last week! Aakk! We’re getting coddled here in the states! Mark Robson and the rest of the gang over in the UK will have some ammo to lob at us now that they’ve been organizing Dover swims that are still in the 50’s. In our favor, though, is the fact that we were swimming up stream against a mighty current. The stone bridge supports pictured are about 10-15 yards in width. Without exaggeration, it took 2 1/2 minutes to pass the supports. I think I was moving backwards at times. I literally felt as if I was working out in one of those endless pools. Every breath I took, I was looking at the same stone as the breath before. Take that, Brits! (Disclaimer: There are no head currents during the Channel swim so this workout actually gives us no describable advantage).

Incidentally there have been several conversations across both swimming and multi-sport message boards regarding watches. My 2 cents: I love the Suunto. I have the T6. If you are looking for a simple, no-nonsense watch this is probably not the watch for you. The T6 is good because I can use it with everything. Temperature is great for the water. It syncs with an HR belt to keep track of my heart rate and can be set to keep me in zone. It syncs with my bike and measures speed/distance etc. It syncs with my GPS and can track speed/distance/altitude etc. This feature is more useful for mapping out hikes or mountain bike trips. It also syncs with a “Foot Pod” and tracks speed and distance of the run workouts. All workouts are saved to the watch and can be uploaded to a computer in seconds with a maneuverable and graphical output for easy analysis. I’ll try to put a full review together in the near future.

I’m here in Denver for my sister’s wedding (yay!). Before the festivities began I got an early morning workout. I found a lake nearby called Union Reservoir. There were inland pelicans, 3-foot swells and snow. Perfect!!! I swam for 90 minutes in the 48-degree water (34-degree air). Three things happened that I learned from:

1. Swimming in the same direction as the waves makes you feel like you’re drowning. Waves force the legs down into the water. That provides a downward pulling sensation that caught me off-guard at first (i.e. I thought I was going to die).
2. The altitude here means I breath more - obvious and true.
3. My right hand cramped open, preventing me from scooping the water. This made me swim crooked and more slowly than usual. I kept up a 2 mph pace by kicking more. I hope the hand cramping was a one-time thing.

As always, here are some pictures to lend credibility to my crazy yarns.

My coach Mike Kuhn from Cadence Cycling told me to bike 100 miles today. So I did. I rode to and around Valley Forge (see previous post for pictures of park). During the ride I consumed 5 bottles of GU water, 5 GU packets, 1 bar and 2 pieces of pizza (kind of random right?). Even with all that I was famished so I ate a bunch of sushi after I got home. It’s been a good day!  Two pictures below are my Vetta bike computer and my head after 100 miles. I took the picture right when I got home so my heart rate (93 bpm) was still elevated.

Adam is driving cross-country to Denver on his way to his new home in Denver. He rode today too, in Ohio.