The Road to Action Asia Challenge Week 1

When it was announced that 46% of Action Asia Challange will be on bikes, we needed some extra training dearly. So stead of doing KOTH - Sai Kung (trailrunning). We did a great MTB route called Project X, created by Julien, the instructor in our previous MTB course. The route cris crosses a gentle hill on the island, we some great downhill runs but perfectly safe with brush and grass on either sides of the route.

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INATT Off Road Triathlon

Another great day out with my new mountain bike and Martina with her camera. It was the INATT Off Road Triathlon, a Xterra style race consist of 800m swim, 15km mountain bike and 5.5km trail running on the beautiful Wan Chai peninsula in Sai Kung. Who are my gang of brothers this time? There is my arch rival in adventure race Larry and Kin, also Micah from Sonic and Andrew, podium finisher in Singapore Ironmah 70.3.

Keith the organiser can't help adding some adventure race elements into it, like after the swim we have to run across a beach, cimbing up some boulders, jumped fences and dash across the camp site to get to the transition.

The mountain bike was tough for me, I am still very cautious and slow on the bike, not quite getting use to balancing and picking lines off the downhill. But it was a glorious route, at one part, we had the ocean all to ourselves.

To finish off the run, we have to repeat the beach + boulder run again but in much shattered condition, thanks to the marshall who yelled at me and said the guy behind you was trying to catch up, that really sparked off my final charge to the finishing line.

I finished in 2hr35min, 15-20 mins behind Larry and Kin, but they are so much faster than me on the bikes, it is kind of expected. Slowly, I am building up my fitness again for Action Asia. All photos taken by Martina, my fiancee.

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Back On A Mountain Bike

The end of this month will be the one year anniversary of the mountain bike accident that fractured a bone in my arm. I have been staying away from MTB all these time, partly cause of focusing on triathlon but deep down I must admit I was scared. But the enjoyment of Adventure Race is so great, I couldn't hesitate from planning ahead for the Action Asia Challenge Hong Kong in December. First, I check on my race partner, Andy, he is still not training as ever, so any loss of trail running and moutain bike sharpness from my side probably wouldn't matter. Then finally I slashed out on a new machine - the Specialized Epic, finally gone was my oversize hardtail bike and instead of a full suspension cross country bike.

Then along with some Sonic guys, I joined a one day MTB skill course in Lamma Island, the instructor has built an obstacle course on a little hill, so we can practise bumps, stairs, tight corner etc in a safe environment. It was a real cool day to regain my confidence back. After lunch he took us to tackle some stairs, it was my my ultimate demon, coz I fractured my arm after falling "over the handle" bar on top of 3 steps of stairs. When it comes to my turn, I stare down the stairs, everything else in the background just fade into a blur. It was that dramatic, like soloing up a rock climb and nothing else in the world but the route itself matters. I headed down, there is hardly any difficulty with the wide stairs but my heart rate just pump right off the scale. I did only half the staircase and the flash back of the crash replayed again and again. Thankfully I had the gust to do the eventual challenge of the day, a drop off from a big stone, probably a bit over half a meter tall. It was easy when we know the right technique.

The next sunday, I head out to do a easy ride with Brian and gang in Tai Tong Country Park, the very park where the accident happens but we stayed on easy trail all day. It was part of the scheme to exercise the demon within. So much practise for now, I am gonna do a Xterra style off road triathlon coming Saturday. Should be fun. And let's hope for a safe off road racing season!

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Ramping Up The Miles

I've been ramping up my cycling mileage this week. On last Monday, I cycled 68km in Tung Chung, followed with a 6km run in the midday heat! The cycling was mostly flat, with a long time looping around the under-utilised road of the Disney Hotel. Then on Saturday, another long distance training in Shek O, I cycled 45km, looping Shek O Road 5 times. Then ran the hilling road between Shek O and Big Water Bay 3 times (12km). Hence I felt Sunday was well earned rest day. My bike muscle endurance is still pretty poor, take the Shek O session for instance, I managed a speed of 27.3 km/h on the first loop, but by the 5th loop and cadence of 89rpm. But by the firth loop I am doing more like 25km/h and 80rpm, yet my HR has reduced at the same time, meaning I simply coundn't work those muscle hard for too long.

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Cycling Pedal Efficiency

Let's approach Singapore Half Ironman strategically, my weakest link is obviously cycling. I found it quite taxing to cycle a road bike despite having some experience on a mountain bike; and during the Sundays' Brick trainings, I found it impossible to run even at a normal pace after being on the bike for an hour. I begin looking up resource on how to cycle more efficiently and was delighted to found that just like swimming, there is an art to cycle efficiency, I am probably applying the wrong force and ended up straining my hamstring too much. The most insightful article I read can be found in Coachseiji.com. Read on for my summary.

I used to think of cycling as an up & down motion like a piston, but if I am applying force vertically up and down, then only at 3 o'clock and 9 o'clock would my force be at a tangent to the circle that the pedal is traveling at. Compare to a efficient cycling technique, I am also loading up my hamstring in both the up and down cycle leaving no room for it to relax. Since the hamstring is involved in both hip extension (down) and knee flexion (up). Instead you should be thinking of moving your foot around a circle in 3 phase.

#1 The downstroke beings at 11 o'clock of the cycle, you should used your quadricep to kick your feet forward and down to 4 o'clock without relying on the hamstring to extend the hip too much.

#2 The backstroke begins at 3 o'clock, overlaping the previous phase, use your hamstring to flex your knee like kicking backward on sands, this takes you pass 6 o'clock to 7 o'clock, providing your other foot power to move forward while it is at 12 o'clock.

#3 The upstroke begins at 7 o'clock, the aim is to take the weight of your foot off the pedal by lifting it up. The hip flexor will be used to bringing your knee up in running. The writer of the articule emphasis to "lift" the foot but not to "pull" the pedal up at this phase as that will involve the hamstring muscle which should be relaxing at this stage. It would be an in efficient use of energy to pull up the pedal anyway.

Doing it right, your cycle stroke is more horizontally than vertically, the power output will be more evenly distributed from 11 o'clock to 7 o'clock of the cycle.

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