Busy Week

After the BESS ball on Sunday night, Monday and Tuesday were a bit of a write off training wise. With that in mind, I hit the gym hard on Wednesday. Did a really tough spinning class (possibly the toughest I've ever done) Loads of sprinting followed by long climbs. After that, I did some weights with James and Gibs. Concentrated on chest, shoulders, bis and tris. Was wrecked after that...

On Thursday I took an early day from college to give the new race bike its christening. Brought her up the Leadmines for a few laps of the club course before heading off the top of the scalp. Got about 3 hours of solid cycling in which was really good. Got a great feel for the bike too. Was a little disappointed with its performance coming home but put some time into changing the compression and air settings on the fork. DUCC had our first beginner day on Saturday to Glen of the Downs and Kindelstown. The few alterations I made to the bike made a HUGE difference. Absolutely love it now! Flys up the climbs and is even quicker on high speed descents.

Took a trip out to session the Sugarloaf DH track today. After a brief walk up most of it, it became clear that Flow still had quite a lot of work to do. We found a nice double and a couple of rock gardens but it was just singletrack after that. We then re-routed and went to Cloon. Rode the Commencal DH bike and the Stab Supreme. Both awesome bikes. Really inspire confidence over the rough stuff and you can't even feel jumps! Bit frustrating for the first few runs as the brakes were set up the wrong way around for me but finally got used to them to get some out of control stuff down 'Colin Bs' track. Can't wait to get up again now that I have the brakes the right way around and the suspension tuned for my weight.

Going to be a good bit of college work this week I think. Got another Sociology essay looming and the usual complicated Economics and Stats to keep me busy! Hope to get some more miles in on the roadbike and XC bike though!

Essay and Training

After finally giving myself the kick I needed to start my business essay on Monday, entitled, 'The Battle Between Capital and Talent', that wrote of Monday and Tuesday for training. Went to the Wednesday spinning class with Tom. It was a weird experience from the start. Tom had mentioned that the instructor was Spanish and this was the theme of the class. Latino music started blaring out of his speakers and we did a quick warm up before getting into weird interval/dance 'things'. They were hard to explain but one second we were cycling normally and the next we were being told to sway forwards and back or push harder with one leg than the other. It did the job I suppose but more into the military type ramped session. Finished it off with a short bicep and tricep session.

Did a good turbo training session tonight. Did the normal warmup followed by the one minute on one minute off thing and then into some longer (6minute) intervals. Took a few minutes easy before going into 20 minutes of 2mins on, 1 off. And then some more long intervals at a higher tempo. Fairly sore now but no rest for the wicked! Will do more gym and essay work tomorrow before heading out for some partying. Hope to get out on Saturday for a good XC spin if the trails are decent, and then down to Bree, Co. Wexford on Sunday for some Dh action! The BESS ball is on later that evening in the Burlington. So all in all, a really busy next couple of days!

Phat Weekend

Well not exactly phat, more FAT... did a very tough turbo training session on Saturday. Think the harder you go, the quicker it seems to go. Started with a 5min warm up then went into ten minutes of 1 min hard, 1 min easy. Then did 5 mins spinning and into 2 mins on, 1 off for 20 mins. Then moved onto 3mins on and 1.5 off. Took another 5 mins easy before going into 2 long intervals at a lesser resistance to the previous ones. Finished with a 5min warm down to round out the hour. That's where the training ended for the weekend unfortunately! This snow is really wrecking my 'get savage or die trying' buzz. It's supposed to be getting warmer this week so hopefully I can take out my new Race bike

Ate lots and drank a few beers over the weekend. I blame the snow for it though. Turbo trainer doesn't motivate me to eat well like the mtb. Fingers crossed for mtbing this week but I bet it'll be the turbo trainer and 3000 words on the 'battle between capital versus talent raging on' Can't wait to get the final bit of the new bike put together bling grips Tom also gave me a call last night to tell me he picked up TCD's new Commencal Supreme DH!! All these deadly bikes and no trails to ride them!!

More snow = more gym

New race bike with different wheels and bar!


Got up reasonably early 11:30 (good for reading week!) yesterday and into college to meet Mark and Craig for a spinning class. As it happened, they decided not to go so went with Tom and Cock (a friend from ski trip at Christmas). Definitely one of the toughest spinning classes I've done. Started with a short warm up and then up to 20% which was the lowest effort of the class. We did some 10 second fast intervals followed by 50% high cadence longer intervals. After about 20 minutes, we started into very hard 80% intervals followed by 60% fast cadence. The last interval to round out the 50mins was 100% (could barely turn the cranks) for about 3 minutes. Really struggled to finish it but felt OK once I had stretched out a bit. After a quick jersey change, I went down to the lads to do some weights, mostly concentrated on biceps and triceps. Working towards a new program of only back, chest and double triceps than biceps in future. The Squats are just no good for biking!!

DUCC (Trinity Cycling Club) got the go ahead for the rest of the bikes to finish our fleet today! In total we have 3 Giant XTCs (One small, two medium), a Kona Stab Supreme and a Commencal Supreme DH which I will be riding for the third DH Winter League in Cloon on Sunday. Can't wait to ride such a high spec DH bike!! Will post a review once I've given it a good going over.

Picked up my new Rocky Mountain Race bike last night. After making a balls of bleeding the brakes twice, I got frustrated and brought it over to the Cycle Superstore for them to sort them. They feel nice and crispy now. The spec is:

Frame: Rocky Mountain Vertex 70
Fork: Fox F100RLC
Groupset: Including brakes- Shimano XTR
Wheels: Stans Olympic on blue Hope ProII
Finishing kit: Raceface Next carbon bar and post

It is weighing a tad under 22lb at the moment which I am pretty pleased with. Would be a dream to drop a couple of lbs but don't have the funds at the moment to do it.

Pictures of TCD new bikes:

Stock Kona Stab Supreme



Commencal Supreme DH, Fox 40s, Saint crankset, E13 chainguide, Rocco ti shock


Will do something steady and hard on the turbotrainer later as the snow has started coming down again. Mountains are still covered apparently... :(

My first post!

After a couple of boring snow days, I've decided to create a blog. I don't know why really. Just something more to do and I can stop stalking Ryan's, Richie's, Mel's and Fergal's for a while!

Submitted my Tragedy of the Commons and collective action essay today. Not amazing, could have done with more actual sources and not just the ones I said I used in the bibliography! Should get a decent enough mark. Handily I could submit it using turnitin.com so I had the day free to do, nothing! Finally got off my ass at about 4 and did an interval session on the turbo trainer. Not as bad as usual with the snow breeze coming in the door. However boring the TT is, I always feel like I've sweated out all booze and pizzas especially after a rough Super Bowl the other night!

So, I think this will be the general format of my blog. Ramblings of what I do and what I think. Watching the afternoon show today (yeah I know, that lame!!) strenghtened by hatred for Bláthnaid Ní Chofaigh. She's just such a know it all and a crap interviewer. It's cringe worthy how little she listens to her guests and constantly talks over them with her arrogant 'my thoughts are more important than yours'. Coupled with her annoying Gaeilge pushing and you have a frustrated Scrivo!

Plans for this evening include doing something with the lads. Maybe go to the cinema. Not up for going sledding again just yet! Will let the swelling go down (had to bail out before hitting a fence on the local hill last night) in my hand first. Tom was talking about some DH action in Cloon tomorrow but I can't see that happening with this continuing heavy snow!