Benchmarking: Castle Hill

Following on from the last post, it make sense that I benchmark myself against the other individual stage of the Tour of the North (v2021). This one an ascent of Castle Hill.

 

Castle Hill sits on the fringe of the Townsville CBD and the Townsville beachfront. It's bloody close to being a mountain - just a few feet short. 

There's a road that goes to the top - it winds its way around the hill. 2.5 Km long. It's popular with the tourists and locals. You get great views of the city, Magnetic Island and surrounding area, and it's a solid 60 minute walk up and down, so it's a good exercise spot. The road surface is pretty good and the car traffic very light.

 

It's also popular with the local cyclists. The rest of Townsville is largely flat, so it's pretty much the only decent climb in town. 

It's not though what I'd call an easy climb.

Here's the segment for the climb on Strava. 2.55 Km, 7.5% average gradient. It's far though from a consistent 7.5%. The first half of the climb is a series of short ramps (of up to 11%) with a number of flatter sections to provide some relief. After the last flatter section (which is known as the saddle) the remaining 900 m of the hill is a constant 10% apart from the final 100 m which jumps to 14%. 

It's that last 900 m that makes Castle hard work. Double digit gradients are never easy. It also limits how hard to can afford to go on the bottom section of the hill. Push too hard in the bottom, and you'll pay for it bigtime up the top.

So how did the D-graders go in the Tour of the North? Well again focusing on Knight-Hanson-Mort: Knight crushed out a 10.15, Hanson 12.01, Mort 12.41 (as a reminder Knight won the tour, Mort 2nd, Hanson 3rd). 

And me? Well today I punched out 18.15. 

That's the sort of gap that make you suck your teeth a bit. 8 minutes? That's an eye watering amount of time to make up. Well there is some good news on this front:

• This was only my 5th Castle Hill since embarking on my cunning plan to win the Tour of the North next year. My first climb was 21.03. So I've already found nearly 3 minutes.
• The time when your weight hurts your cycling most is when you are climbing. And as of last weigh in I'm still over the century. Using the rather clever Bike Calculator website, if I can drop from 100 kilos to 90 by raceday, I'll be almost 90 seconds faster up the climb 
• Segment misalignment. The actual climb used in the Tour of the North isn't actually perfectly matched to the Strava segment (the start-finishes might be out by 30-50 m at either end). And that make a big difference when you're sitting on 10 km/h. Thru comparisons of race times (across a number of grades) and a few of Strava segments, I'm confident in saying that's about another 15 seconds in my favour.
  

So if I bank the weight loss and the segment misalignment I'm back to a 16.30. The rest though will have to come from hard graft on the bike.

 

Benchmarking: the Prologue

So as discussed below, the Tour of the North (v2021) ran an opening prologue. A prologue is the cycling equivalent of an appetiser. It's almost always done as a time trial - that's a solo race against the clock. Riders start at one minute intervals. It's less a tactical event, rather one of measuring raw horsepower.

That said, it was a 7 Km ride. Far from massive, but that's a 9 minute effort even for the hitters in A-grade. It would be very easy to go too hard, blow up, record a crap time, and stuff your legs for the rest of the weekend. My feeling is most would have gone at 90% not full gas.

Here's the start finish point. It's out on the fringes of suburbia in Townsville.

The course is pretty much flat. It gently drags ever so slightly uphill on the way out to the turnaround. Always pushing into a headwind on the way out as well. The road surface is good, though a fairly coarse chip.

Here's the Strava segment. 

D Grade was won by Mario Romeo in 11.30. Probably more relevant are the times of Mort (11.36), Knight (11.55) and Hansen (12.15). These guys ended up filling the podium at the end of the Tour, and were there or abouts in all the stages.

So my time this morning? 13.33. 

I was pretty happy with that. I think I've got a lot of improving to do in my fitness. I actually had to stop pedalling at a few points and just coast, to gather myself up, recover a bit and go again. That will have cost me time.

I also wasn't able to sit in the drops the whole way. That's the most aerodynamic position on the bike. But it's also the least comfortable place to sit. I did quite well on this front (I did around two thirds of the way out in the drops), but if I can go the whole way out come Tour of the North 2022, that'll save me another 15 seconds (you're about 2 kph faster in the drops). Admittedly that's less critical downwind but it still helps. So if I can do the full journey in the drops, I'd be about 40 seconds faster.

Take off 10 kilos and that finds me another 15 seconds

 (It's bloody interesting to play with variables around weight, where you sit on the handlebars, etc with Bike Calculator)

So just through weight loss and improvements in my flexibility, I'm already back to a 12.38. The rest would need to come thru improved fitness, strength & endurance, but I reckon that's achievable over 10 months.

My August on the Bike

 I think I'd describe my August as an encouraging start.

525 km

18 rides

3 ascents of Castle Hill 

54.2 km my longest ride

Nothing epic there, but considering I'd only racked up 1000km in the last 6 mths, I'd describe that as a very positive month.

I think that's enough rides, but I think I'll need to push up the average distances and attempts on Castle Hill (it's the only serious climb in these parts).  I'd also like to do a regular ride of 70+km - reckon those longer endurance efforts will really help with my cycling.

I do also do some exercise off the bike: the odd light gym visit, and walking the 4km round trip to the local coffee haunt. It's a rare day that I don't do some exercise.

I'm also trying to keep the calories down. I'm trying to run at a 7500 KJ (net) energy intake

The scales are also recognizing my efforts: down to 100.1kg. That's a drop of 2.9 kilos over the month. Still plenty to go, but again, promising.

Results from the Tiny Mountain Brewery Tour of the North

So the whole idea of the journey is to win D Grade of the Tiny Mountain Brewery Tour of the North in 2022.

Probably then make sense to have a look at the results from 2021.

So there were 4 stages: a prologue, a road race, a crit and a climb of Castle Hill. 

The prologue: an 8km time trial up near Ross River dam. 

Pretty flat, pretty straight out and back course. It was a slightly shortened version of this segment off Strava

D grade got won by Mario Romeo in 11.37, at an average speed of 37.6kph.

The road race: a 40km Road race in the rollers of Hervey's Range.

Not at all flat. Rolls the whole length of the trip. You rack up about 360m vertical over the course. Again 20km out and back, as you can see on Strava

 D grade was won by Tim Rademaker in 1.08.31, at an average speed of 35.0kph.

The crit: a 20 minute race around a short flat loop

The crit is pancake flat and non technical (Check it out on Strava). Fast paced. It's a race measured by the clock rather than distance.

D grade was won by Tim Rademaker. No average speed given the distance isn't fixed. Tim won in a 2 up sprint though.

The Climb of Castle Hill. 

Run in a TT format rather than a bunch race.

The hill is a 2.5 km climb, averaging 7.8%. That's deceptive though. The first half of the climb is a series of short ramps (of up to 11%) with a number of flatter sections to provide some relief, then after the last flatter section (known as the saddle) the remaining 900m of the hill is a constant 10% apart from the final 100m which jumps to 14%.

No picnic.

D grade was taken out by Dave Knight in 10.15, a result that saw him claim the overall win on the tour (Rademaker finished in 14.04, Romeo in 12.18). It might sound like Knight came from the clouds but he'd been top 5 in every stage (as was the fellow who finished 2nd, James Mort).

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A few things to note:

(1) Only the prologue and hill climb stages are useful from the perspective of benchmarking for me. Both the crit and the road races were bunch races, and riding in bunches is much faster than flying solo. 

The good news is both the prologue & hill climb roads are close to home, so plenty of scope to test myself on them

(2) There's no guarantee that any of the courses will be part of the 2022 tour. Chances are the crit course and hill climb will, but nothing is locked in.

That said, the tour in it's 2021 format was clearly won and lost on Castle Hill. Of the guys who seriously contended, they were all pretty close in the first 3 stages. They were only finally separated by the hill.

(3) All the TT stages were on road bikes were conducted on road bikes with standard bars. No clip ons.

(4) I've got some improving to do.

I'll lay down some times for both the prologue and hill climb courses in the coming weeks.

 

 

 

My Steed

So what bike am I riding?

Nothing overly flash is the answer: A 2019 Trek Emonda ALR5. Aluminum Frame, Shimano (largely) Tiagra groupset. It's a frameset I bought 2nd hand and built up. 

 

Quite a new machine, but fairly bottom end when it comes to race bikes. Tiagra and Aluminium doesn't exactly set many pulses racing. It's a $1500 bike.

That's though also something I'd like to prove on this journey: you don't need a flash high end carbon machine to compete at club level.

Indeed there are quite a few articles that talk about the fact that a new Aluminum/Alloy frame is better than a bottom end carbon frame (such as this one from BikeRadar, written in 2017). Aluminum frames used to be considered harsh rides, and were often heavier than a carbon frame. Not the case anymore. My 2019 Emonda is a nicer ride than my carbon 2013 Focus Cayo (which itself was highly regarded).

Compact crankset, 170mm cranks, 28mm tyres, rim brakes. Being Tiagra, it's 10 speed not 11. Probably the only three differences of note from what one would consider factory standard:

• I've added a Wolftooth derailleur extender
• I'm running a DT Swiss wheelset
• I use shimano MTB pedals
  

The Wooftooth is pretty cool. I can run an 11-36 cassette, where I'd usually be limited to 11-32 with a mid cage derailleur. And those extra 4 teeth make a massive difference to my climbing. Castle Hill is pretty much the only decent climb in Townsville, and the last km of Castle sits over 10% gradient. Not an easy climb, especially when you consider I'm weighting in over the ton.

 

The wheelset is nice but unremarkable. DT Swisse Allroads were considered a solid smooth wheelset. Nice high spokecount. Good for a Clydesdale like me. They've been well maintained and still run nicely.

MTB pedals? I took to them when I started riding cleats. Easier to clip into, the cleats don't wear out, the shoes are easier to walk in, and the pedals can cope with a bit of muck on them. 

Coming into the race next year, I'd toy with the idea of a new wheelset, and perhaps dropping the Wolftooth and going back to an 11-32 cassette. It shifts quite well with the Wolftooth, but I think it would be sharper without it. Depends on how well I'm climbing coming into the Great Northern Tour - hopefully I won't need the 36 tooth any more by then. I also think I'll swap out my Maxxis Refuse tyres for a set of GP5000s. 

 

 

Early doors - but a good start

 So I'm less than 2 weeks in, and I reckon I've made a promising start.

Last week I rode 109km with 750m of vertical.

This week I've ridden 108km with 379m of vertical. And I am planning a hill ride tomorrow.

Not epic numbers, but given I only managed 990km in over 6 months, two 100k weeks on the bounce isn't a bad start

Follow me on Strava here

From where do I start: TITS

 So here's an idea of my current cycling and phsiycal status. Consider it my baseline:

Age: 46

Height: 175cm

Weight: 103kg

Riding so far this year: 990km

All time cycling: 36100km

At 103kegs, standing 5 foot 9, it's fair to say there's some weight to be lost.

Not nearly enough km ridden this year. That's the first obvious port of call in tying to improve. TITS - time in the saddle. 

Feel free to follow me on Strava