nice job. century looks very cool (http://www.mapmyride.com/us/taos-nm/...-route-3569518 here's a profile, if anyone else is interested). do you regularly ride at such high altitude?

@power estimate: you can simply strip the power data from the fit file : https://www.fitfiletools.com/#/stripper#view , then upload this to strava. then open the ride in a new window, delete the ride from strava and upload the original file and then compare the two. just fyi

ps: not sure if i already mentioned the stravistix browser extension for strava. it offers a ****load of additional stats / analysis tools.

Thanks for the links, trontron. I don't ride at altitude. I ride at 500 feet above sea level. I did a ride west of Dallas that climbed all the way to 1100 feet above sea level.

One of the reasons I want to try this century in New Mexico is to experience what the altitude is like before trying to go to Colorado and riding the Triple Bypass. I've been toying with the idea of seeing if I can get a lower gear available on my bike without spending a ton of money. My lowest available gear is a 34/28, which is fine around here but on a long climb I'm not so sure. It would be nice to have a real granny gear like a 34/32 available. It doesn't look like these are overly steep climbs, except for the last one called Bobcat Pass.

All right, I didn't have access to the original FIT file, but I found that when I exported the gpx file from Garmin it strips the power data. I changed the date to today and then reimported it into my premium account. I tried creating a new shadow account but it looks like Strava has made a bunch of stuff only available to premium accounts, and custom heart rate ranges and power estimates were among them.

Long story short, the estimates are not very good, though the overall energy output estimate was quite close.
The actual is the first number, the estimate is second.
Avg Pwr 125w 100w
Tot. Wrk 1110kj 1080kj


There are a ton of segments on this ride, and some of the estimates are quite close and some are off by 100% or more. It appears they have a tough time factoring in momentum coming into a segment, like a short uphill preceded by a downhill. They over estimate the power needed in this case.
Not surprisingly, the estimates on the head wind segments were well under the actual.

If you want power numbers, I now agree with Rusty that the estimates are not useful. Get a power meter.

That doesn't really make sense. Work is power * time so if the average power is 25% larger then the work should be 25% larger too.

The .FIT devices are on your device, btw. If you plug it into a computer it'll mount like a thumb drive, and they're in the Activities directory.

That surprised me as well. On the ride with actual power data they term it as weighted average power, on the one without it is called average power.
Even more interesting, looking at Garmin's info about this same ride, the one with actual power data, is the Avg power is 104w, NP is 142. They don't show a weighted average.
The work on Garmin is 1097 kj and they estimate calories at 1654? I thought it was pretty common to use kj = calories?

Yeah, I'm just at work and the device is at home.

Ah, weighted average power is *probably* something else, what most of the rest of the world calls "normalized power"

The idea is, consider 2 rides that are both an average of 100 watts
1. you ride at a constant 100 watts for an hour
2. you do many brief 500 watt intervals and relax at 50 watts in between
#2 is going to feel harder, and require more recovery. So they use an impulse response model to generate normalized power. 2 rides with the same normalized power should feel similar in difficulty.

It is common to use kj = calories, yeah, but it's just an estimate. Even strava tends to give you about 10% more in calories than kJ, not sure why. In my experience in the industry, they're just using some models they pulled out of some random journal articles.

bobcat pass seems to be 6% / 7% (depending on side). i don't know if the climb is very irregular (the profile looks very ragged), of if it's just bad altimeter data. for 6/7% a 34/28 should be definitely enough. if there are 15% parts (that are more than a dozen meters or so), sure, a lower gear would help. if you have a cheap possibility to change the back to 11-32, do it imho. i was thinking about doing the same (but i also probably ride more 10%+ climbs over several kilometers, those suck)

you can download the original fit file from garmin connect, just in case you didn't know. (go to an activity, press the "more" icon on the top right, click "export original")

Thanks for the tip, that works.

Weigh in day today, 190. Up 1 this week and down 25 overall, 26 weeks.

When I started the log I did a CTS field test to determine training ranges. It was on a different bike but I got 145 watts for the best 8 minute effort. 8 weeks ago I started the Time Crunched Cyclist experienced century program. I did not retest for this program, but I looked at recent rides and used my best 20 minute effort for the training ranges, that was 160 watts. This week I did another field test and my best of two 8 minute efforts was 194 watts. Pretty happy with the progression, even if the numbers are not directly comparable.

Nice, very solid improvement. My weight has been creeping up, I need to lock that down. This time last year I was 10lb lighter.

Thanks. I had been holding back without thinking about it and trying to protect myself from blowing up on the group ride so I hadn't really "tested" myself. After I did the CTS test on Friday, I went all out a couple of times on Saturday to keep up with the group and surprised myself on how deep I could go compared to even earlier this year. Definitely in the best shape ever. Still a long ways to go. Really like the power meter, thanks for talking me into it.

Weigh in day today, 190. Even this week and down 25 overall, 27 weeks.

I think I'm going through one of those consolidation periods where the body tries to adjust metabolism to fit caloric intake. Plus I'm tired of logging calories so there may be some creep into my intake. Losing weight is hard. Not giving up or anything, just keeping it real, lol.

As far as actual bike riding, I've put in 30 hours and 419 miles this month already, which is only two hours less than my all time high(32 and 455, July 2013), so I will beat that pretty easily.

Nice! I've been having some WIM problems lately where I don't have much enthusiasm for riding and been trying to plow through it.

same, most recent post by OP made me look at my monthly stats and may, june, july I kept increasing miles but for some reason I am not even at 2/3 of July distance this month.

Weather starting to turn = time for me to start shopping for an indoor bike to exercise on this winter. It should also help for next spring/summer so I can get a ride in on the wet and extremely hot days.

Is WIM woe is me? Or something something motivation? I did a google search, but that is one I'm not familiar with.
As you know, I've been doing the TCC program. He mentions in the book that 11 or 12 weeks is about the max time to do the program. A few weeks ago I was thinking I could do it a lot longer, but thinking about doing over/under intervals tonight I'm dreading it a little.
I'm like 90% to go to Red River and do the Enchanted Circle Century in mid September. After that I'm going to ride less and go back to some of the body shaping classes and maybe some general strength training. Try to stay fresh.
The other thing I would like is to ride some "meaningful" miles, like a commute to work. That is a pain in my area because of traffic.

I joined LA Fitness early this year for those reasons. I've always gotten in pretty good riding shape (for me) by the end of the summer, then veg out from October to February and lose all the gains. This year I intend to hold on to as much as I can over the winter, and improve if possible.

Yes, I came close to getting a membership at smaller chain and considered LA Fitness also but for various personal reasons I won't go into I didn't go through with it. I also work from home and don't like driving around in the winter unless absolutely necessary (FU Michigan) so a bike in the basement seems like a wise investment and would be great for rainy days and super hot days in the summer when I can only ride early in the morning or late at night.

Where are you in Michigan? I grew up in Lamont, a very small village 20 miles west of GR. Moved to Texas when I was 20, still have family there. We visit about every other year, my sister has a house in Muskegon a stones throw from the big lake.

Edit: Just noticed your location. Guess that is Detroit?

Yes, I grew up in Shiawassee county and now live in Roseville which is on the east side a few miles north of the D city limit.

WIM is wanting it more, just a general term for motivation

Got it.

Cool. Nice to have another cyclist around the forum.

I stumbled across an online cycling book, Cycling Performance Simplified:
http://www.americanroadcycling.com/T...px?frm=MenVert

Some of it is very funny. The thread running through it is he is working with his wife, Mary(AKA Black Widow), to do their group ride at a 23+ average speed. They are around my age, mid 50's.

I think it's worth reading, and the page on diet called Naturally Thin should be required reading for everyone that starts a diet log on this forum.

A couple of gems from that page:
"You are fat because you eat too much of the wrong stuff, plus your gargantuan overweight body has been a long term project, and it is going to take time to remedy.

You are not going to get into that bathing suit in the next three weeks no matter what diet you go on."

"Being fat does not mean you are a bad person.
It merely means you are an ignorant sedentary sloth.
Of course, that is not your fault.

You are only a sloth because you have been sedentary so long you can't move anymore even if you try.
You have only been sedentary because you are ignorant of the rabidly horrid effect inaction has on your health.

And you are only ignorant of that fact because nobody has ever told you the simple truth (how bad your lifestyle is for you) in a way that might convince you.

In fact virtually every product advertisement you are using to get your information has a strong interest in keeping you stupid and sedentary.
Let me fix that right now.

A sedentary lifestyle is the absolute worst thing for you."

So I read a bit of one of the chapters in the book. It might have a lot of good advice in it but he is making some very large categorical mistakes. Here's a quote:

He goes on with some nonsense about

No. 1 Nm != 1 watt

1 watt = 1 Nm/s

Torque is a measure of (rotational) force. Power is a measure is force * distance / time

I think the point he's getting at with efficiency is probably something like the fact that with a smaller torque with a sufficiently larger RPM leads to higher power output (because power = torque * rpm or torque*speed).

Maybe this is just nit-picking. I don't think his approach is wrong, I just think he doesn't really understand the math/physics that gets him to his conclusions.

Man, just a few sentences later we have

Man... this is, I'm pretty sure, a big part of Training with a Power Meter and similar books. The first thing I did when I had a power meter was work out my power profile, which is basically figuring out the max power you can sustain for
5s
1 min
5 min
20 min
and comparing that to people of known strengths (untrained, cat 5, cat 4, cat 3 etc)

Yeah, I probably should have written a little more about my perception of the book. I think he was working a lot of this out on his own and then he found the Allen / Coggan book. He reviews it here, tongue in cheek:
http://www.americanroadcycling.org/a...BookReview.htm

I'm sure he is not breaking a lot of new ground, he is basically advocating high cadence / low torque peddling technique. He spends a lot to time on peddling technique, which I'm not sure matters as much as he thinks it does. As I said, I think he was sort of working it out on his own.

I like the style of the book, he's a sarcastic older guy which fits my sense of humor. He doesn't race, but he seems to be part of a pretty competitive group ride that he takes seriously, but in a funny way. There are nuggets here, but it's not all gold. Here is one page that means a lot more to me now then it did pre power meter:
http://www.americanroadcycling.org/t...px?frm=MenVert

On another page he has a power to weight calculator:
http://www.americanroadcycling.org/T...frm=Widder_nav

and the table from the Allen/Coggan book. I entered 190 pounds and 190 watts, and get this little nugget:
BTW: 2,856 calories per day are required to maintain your very impressive 190 pound body weight.
Make sure you never fall below that amount of food intake or you risk losing your significant downhill advantage.

Cracks me up.