North, East, South, West. Not necessarily in that order. In my long ride base training after cross for Paris Roubaix I've ridden out to Essex (bad times), North London (muddy good times) and on Sunday I rode South to Kent (hilly sunny times).
So next is the chocolate cake ride to Windsor (hmmm) and then I'll be done. All points covered.
Cobbled Theory
From memory the cobbles are 2-5 minute sections where by high effort is needed and greater power. When you hit the cobbles it feels like your fighting against someone dragging you back.
The cadence you're spinning instantly drops. It feels like 85rpm down to 60rpm.
So.... with that in mind I decided to do intervals. There are two weeks to go until PR, doing intervals on my next 5 rides would be the final tune up.
Start the interval in a bigger gear than normal. Only by 1 or 2 cogs. This would mean that the spin up to greater speed and heart rate would be against a resistance.
In theory like entering the cobbles and trying to maintain speed before one gets a feel for effort needed and shifts to accomodate without too much loss of momentum.
In Practice
Every 20-30 minutes I rode for 5 minutes in Zone 5 . Heart rate was roughly 185 - 191.
The 20-30 minutes was is a wide band of time because the Kent route was fairly hilly so one had to just judge the land so not to begin an internal on the approach to a descent.
I perhaps shouldn't have chosen a hilly route as mid way through I ran out of puff and so just rode at tempo. To get through so of the little troughs and I wasn't sure how hard the big final climb would be.
I've highlighted the intervals in green.
I followed the Hell of the Ashdown route down to Cowden and then turning right onto a lane that bisects the loop. Rejoining the route just south of a place called Chiddingstone Hoath. Then I followed the route back to the a place called Knockholt Pound inside the M25.
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