[amitoj]

Awesome! Thanks for sharing your goals. Maybe we can keep this thread going with updates on the progress towards those goals as well. You decide when you want to update. Whether it is weekly, monthly or after an event. If you have a more detailed post or thread, then link to that as well.

Here's my first update. Yesterday I took part in the first E-Fondo race on Zwift. The "E" here is not for electric, by the way. In these races, you get points not just for where you finish overall in your age group, but also for where you finish in the timed segments like sprints and KOMs. It was my first ever such race so I am not completely familiar with the format yet. Zwiftpower seems to have automatically put me in D category where I finished 7th out of 22. I will read that as a top 10 finisher

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[amol4184]

Good result and healthy power output there. Those races are grueling.

My 2024 is off to a dull start. I'm yet to get my first ride in. I took a day off on 1st and from 2nd I fell sick possibly with Covid. Still reeling in with tiredness and cough as of the today even though the rapid antigen test kit at home showed negative for Covid. Whatever it is, pretty drained out. Really hoping to get back on saddle tomorrow (Zwift) and start the counter.

By the way my year end tally for 2023 was around 9400kms, 600 or so short of 10k as I predicted earlier. Not bad but 10k would have looked fancier on Whatsapp status.

[amitoj]

Originally Posted by amol4184

By the way my year end tally for 2023 was around 9400kms, 600 or so short of 10k as I predicted earlier. Not bad but 10k would have looked fancier on Whatsapp status.

That is still quite an impressive mileage.

By the way, did anyone get an email from Strava about getting a water bottle from TheFeed with their year end stats printed on it? I thought that was pretty neat, so I ponied up the shipping cost and ordered it. Would be nice to build a collection of those over the years, like your own personal trophies.

[amol4184]

Originally Posted by amitoj

By the way, did anyone get an email from Strava about getting a water bottle from TheFeed with their year end stats printed on it? I thought that was pretty neat, so I ponied up the shipping cost and ordered it. Would be nice to build a collection of those over the years, like your own personal trophies.

I think you need to be part of "TheFeed" club on Strava to get it. I did that and today got a notification from Strava regarding this (not email). It took me to bottle design. $5 for shipping, not too bad. I got the most obnoxious bright green Thanks for the tip!

[ninjatalli]

Guys,
Take it a bit easy on setting these goals. If you have to set goals to keep yourself egged, suggest keeping those goals personal to you. So that it doesn't become a vicious cycle of social gratification feeding into your goal(s) setting.

If it helps gives you perspective, sharing the sad news of the demise of a serious Bangalorean cyclist, Anil Kadsur who was on a record breaking non-stop century riding train. May his soul rest in peace.

Originally Posted by silverado

I have stopped setting goals, my only goal is just to get out of the house and ride the bike on daily basis.

+100 to this.

[ebonho]

Originally Posted by ninjatalli

Guys,
Take it a bit easy on setting these goals. If you have to set goals to keep yourself egged, suggest keeping those goals personal to you. So that it doesn't become a vicious cycle of social gratification feeding into your goal(s) setting.

If it helps gives you perspective, sharing the sad news of the demise of a serious Bangalorean cyclist, Anil Kadsur who was on a record breaking non-stop century riding train. May his soul rest in peace.

https://velo.outsideonline.com/cycli...urance-sports/

Cheers, Doc

[silverado]

Originally Posted by ninjatalli

Guys,

If it helps gives you perspective, sharing the sad news of the demise of a serious Bangalorean cyclist,

Strava is a tool which cyclists take seriously too much at times.There was a time when i was very possesed with how many kms we are doing, avg speeds, etc etc.

It is important to listen to your body and not push it if its complaining. Its very very sad to hear such news, but Circadian rhythm has to be respected.

His was an almost punishing routine which should have been questioned by his friends and family. But the problem lies in the fact that people must have felt he was exercising and there was nothing wrong in doing it daily, but someone should have raised a flag if he was doing it 7 days a week.

[ebonho]

Originally Posted by silverado

Strava is a tool which cyclists take seriously too much at times.There was a time when i was very possesed with how many kms we are doing, avg speeds, etc etc.

It is important to listen to your body and not push it if its complaining. Its very very sad to hear such news, but Circadian rhythm has to be respected.

His was an almost punishing routine which should have been questioned by his friends and family. But the problem lies in the fact that people must have felt he was exercising and there was nothing wrong in doing it daily, but someone should have raised a flag if he was doing it 7 days a week.

Bro, competition cyclists in the Master's category for age group racing, elite racers, have a workload of 16-18 hours a week.

Guys like me, heading into season or top races (States or Nationals) will average 12-14 hours.

At normal times I will be at 8-10 hours a week, sometimes 12.

This gent was averaging 45+ hours a week! Non stop. No light week after 3-4 weeks, as competition guys do in blocks (cyclical training, sequential overload).

The first thing that struck me as a doctor when i went to his Strava were the photos of his hands.

RIP. Truly tragic.

Doc

[amitoj]

It is a valid point to not become so obsessive with your goals that it starts to affect your mental health. Goals are good in order to have a strategy but they become a problem when you start beating yourself up and become critical of your own self when you start to fall short.
Endurance athletes, whether they are cyclists or marathon runners or tri-athletes, are prone to atrial fibrillation primarily because their heart has been subjected to stress numerous times and has re-shaped itself for that kind of repeated stress. Phil Cavell's book The Midlife Cyclist covers this subject in great detail. I'll quote from that a little later. But bottom line is to have a balanced life with proper nutrition and a balance of cardio and strength training routines.

[aneezan]

I also feel the lack of sleep is a contributory factor. Waking up about 2.30 AM and setting off for rides at 3.00 AM every single day for almost 4 years, I wonder how many hours of proper sleep someone can possibly get.

Sometimes, we get addicted to and obsessed with one particular activity so much so, that our brain hardwires itself into believing that we are not perfect if we miss a day.
Can personally vouch for this. I got into running in March last year and have been doing it almost daily since then. Having made it a part of my daily schedule, i don't feel good if I don't run a day, even if my calves and feet ache. I consciously have to make an effort to take a day or two off.

But also, we can't put a finger on the exact cause of a cardiac arrest for any single person.


PS: I have met Anil a couple of times. A gem of a person, and a big loss to the cycling community.

[amol4184]

R.I.P, I first heard about him while he was halfway in his grueling streak. He was a well known figure among BRM folks. I always look at these guys in total awe.

Some guys are just built different than the rest I guess. Guys like Keith Roy who are doing something even more extreme, clocking an imperial century almost every day.

From his profile:

- Rode seven consecutive 36,500+km years 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, & 2023! (over 100 km per day!)
- Rode over 40,000 miles and averaged over 100 miles per day for the entire calendar years of 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, & 2023!
- Calendar year ascending world record holder: 1 million meters and counting (2023)
- First ZWIFTer to surpass 1 year of total ride time!

..with a fulltime job

No words, can't even imagine the mental strength to pull something like this off.

[narayanang76]

I don’t really know what really went bad with Anil Kadsur. And I don’t want to speculate. But we all should take care of:
Sleep: Proper sleep is essential and I would anytime prioritise sleep over my workouts
Rest and Recovery: After workouts our body needs rest and recovery. At least 1 day rest in a week and low intensity/active recovery workouts after an intense workout when possible
Vary intensity: Anil was taking 6-7 hours for his daily 100 km ride so I believe they were less intense workouts for him. But we also need to vary the intensity with some hard workouts thrown out in between. It is amazing to see our body get adapted to the things we do regularly and then it becomes a normal things to our body.
Pollution: I didn’t hear anyone talking about the effects of pollution on our health. We should be aware of continuous exposure with daily 7 hours cycling activity how it impacts our health. And I believe this has one role to play in this case.

Coming to cycling activity focus goals for the year 2024, I simply want to increase my cycling activities and get more focus. There is no number or targets I wish to achieve, simply do more rides and enjoy cycling. I want to continue my running activities alongside cycling and focus on my stretching and yoga to mix it up.

[amitoj]

Update: I completed all 7 E-Fondo races on Zwift even though I needed to complete only 4 to qualify for the Nationals. The Gran Fondo National Series Championship will be held in Maryland in September, which will be a road race and not virtual. I may go for the one in New Jersey in June as well.

The Fondo format is unique as there are timed sections where you score points depending on where you finish relative to your age group. The Zwift version had points for overall time also but this format meant that you could ride smart by saving your energy for the timed sections. I learnt this after a couple of races when I realized that I could finish behind a rider and yet score more points than them if I went hard on the timed sections. And it worked! I finished 3rd in 3 races and 2nd overall in my age category





With the temps finally starting to creep up, I am looking forward to riding outdoors again.

[Porschefire]

Originally Posted by Porschefire

My primary goal for 2024 is better health and fitness. I expect cycling to be the major contributor, hence, I'd like to pursue my 2023 goal along with a challenging milestone of 5000kms. 5000kms may not seem much to most people but it is quite an uphill task for me and, I'd rather overestimate and achieve 70-80% of the goal rather than play it safe.

Originally Posted by amol4184

Good luck for you! 5000km/year is still more than what 90% people would achieve anyway. That is a plenty of exercise to keep fit, just keep at it the first few days are tough after a break/sluggish past season but once you get in the zone your legs will beg you for a ride.

Keeping up with the promise to myself, did my first 75kms today. The timing won't set any charts on fire but I'm glad I accomplished it. I take it as my first small win.
Long way to go!

[amol4184]

Originally Posted by Porschefire

Keeping up with the promise to myself, did my first 75kms today. The timing won't set any charts on fire but I'm glad I accomplished it. I take it as my first small win.
Long way to go!

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Good going! I see you did a lot of u-turns rather than a single continuous loop. The average speed will drop in those cases and yet, its pretty good.

When I am trying to score a good time (3.5hr century or 1hr at 20mph/32kmph) I pick up a known route and grind it. Sometimes I even select a small section from a large course and do 2-3 laps back to back. Do that and see the speeds shoot up!