Re-love your old saddles with South London Saddles - As seen at SPIN Manchester

Whilst visiting SPIN in Manchester I came across some great examples of craftsmanship and style at the stand of South London Saddles.

Suitably impressed by the display of saddles and bags, including those shown above, we stopped for a chat with proprietor, Emma, to talk about exactly what they are offering.

Emma, pictured at the stand above, will re-cover pretty much any old saddle with carefully selected new leather in a wide choice of colours. In addition to that she will also add your choice of design, including bespoke illustrations just for you, to the saddle using carving and colours. On close examination these look great and very well done.

For years I raced with Isca Selle Tornado saddles - I just couldn't get along with the Turbo's, Rolls or Concors that were popular at the time. Now I only have one tornado left and the cover is both worn and damaged to the point it has been repaired with Superglue last year (far from a perfect fix!). I can still find no racing saddle to match the Tornado but mine is now beyond use.

Here is where Emma and South London Saddles come into their own; for a price less than many new saddles (around £70) your favourite old saddle can be recovered, often making it better than new and creating a unique saddle, a one-of-a-kind just for you. For that kind of price it makes great sense and solves that problem of finding a new saddle that suits you.

Of course you can also buy a brand new customised saddle if you prefer and there are some special offers on the website at the moment. Maybe you have a saddle like my Brooks B-17 which is a design classic and ideally suited for its purpose but would like something a bit special - you could always ask Emma to add a unique design onto the leather....

As well as saddles South London Saddles also offer a range of uniquely designed bags and accessories including leather handlebar grips and clever D-Lock holsters that attach to your belt.

Well worth a look!


South London Saddles can be found at:

www.southlondonsaddles.com

and on Facebook at:

www.facebook.com/em.evansdesigns

For more information you can email Emma at:

southlondonsaddles@gmail.com

Back to Basics - Road Race Sprinting Part 2: Technique

Sprinting Technique - Simple, you just go as fast as you can don't you?

Life is of course never that simple and in sprinting there is much more to technique, and that's before tactics are taken into account (that will be the content of my next "Back to Basics" post).

Embed from Getty Images

Go as fast as you can?

Surely how fast you can go varies with how far you want to go? Some people believe that sprinting must be the absolute fastest you can go, your ultimate peak speed.

Does that make sense? At the end of a road race the actual sprint effort might need to cover anything from as short as 150m to as long as 400m depending on the circumstances, wind, gradient, competition etc. If you think that "as fast as you can go" is the same for 150m as it is for 400m then you are going too slowly for the shorter distance. It is perfectly possible to "blow" in an effort as short as a sprint just by trying too hard too soon.

If your top speed can be maintained for more than a very few seconds then you ought to be abler to go a bit faster and there are likely to be some technical rather than purely power based issues that you can resolve and by doing so boost that top speed.

During that last few hundred metres of a race, which takes between 10 and 25 seconds to cover, the sprinter will make decisions. The business of exactly what line to take, which riders to follow, how hard to go, when to hit absolute maximum and when to hold a pace just below that are the realm of tactics and not for today's post. But how to actually ride at the highest possible speed for the distance you need to sprint, how to accelerate either as quickly as possible or quickly enough while retaining a little power - those are the aims of this post.

Gearing

Many people see the professionals sprint at Tour de France finishes on massive gears like 53x11 and assume that is what you need to go very fast, fast enough to win sprints. In reality those professionals are often coming off a lead out where they are already travelling at almost 40mph (60kph) before they actually start sprinting. In most other circumstances the sprint in unlikely to start from a speed over 30mph and often more like 25mph (40kph).

It doesn't take much maths to realise that the same gear would not be appropriate. The biggest differences between the Tour de France sprint and the typical amateur sprint finish are:

• The slower starting speed in the amateur sprint means greater acceleration to reach the top sprinting speed
• The top speed reached is likely to be lower than the professional sprint
• The amateur sprint is often (not always) shorter than the professional one

All of those mean that getting that really big gear spinning really fast is unlikely to happen.

This is getting towards the tactics that will be discussed in my next post but the important thing here is that to sprint very fast doesn't mean being in that massive gear unless you've had a really fast lead out to the sprint.

To emphasise that point most riders don't realise just how fast it is possible to sprint on a fairly small gear. It is perfectly possible to sprint at 35mph and faster on gears of around 42x15 or 52x18 (that will also get a mention in the soon to follow post covering training techniques).

Embed from Getty Images

Balance and power transfer

In order to go as fast as possible the sprinter can't afford to waste energy and there are plenty of ways to waste that energy; for example if you stand up to sprint and the back wheel skips just a little bit you've not only wasted energy but also wasted a little bit of momentum slowing your acceleration or losing a bit of speed and then having to use up even more energy to get it back.

Many equipment reviews will report on how effective or otherwise the rear triangle and geometry of a particular race bike is at tarring power through to the back wheel or the road. The "Back to Basics" point here is that any modern race bike will do better at transferring that power than most riders themselves will manage unless they develop really good technique.

With your weight too far forward on the bike traction can be lost and that skipping wheel will slow the sprint and cost energy. If the weight is spread too far back the ability to use more of the body to get that power to the road is compromised, in addition the ability to control the bike is also affected so speed and energy are likely to be thrown away in all directions.

Other issues with body position affect the aerodynamics of the bike and rider and the ability to deal with issues that might arise during the sprint (taking evasive action, keeping yourself from being pushed off line etc.) - and that's without considering the distance from the saddle to the pedals (I'm assuming that the racer keen to improve his or her finishing sprint will have already sorted that out - perhaps the makings of another Back to Basics topic?).

Rapid and relaxed pedalling

In order to ride a bike really fast it is essential to be able to pedal very quickly, simply going for bigger and bigger gears just won't work as the torque required will be too high to deal with wind resistance as speed. The power you transfer to the pedals is the combination of the torque exerted and the speed of the legs - revolutions per minute (rpm). Just as a car will strain if you try to accelerate in too high a gear so will a cyclist. To accelerate you need a gear which you can quickly accelerate to high rpm and then for the remainder of the sprint you need to maintain that high rpm (some people will change gear once up to speed but the momentary loss of power whilst changing is likely to remove any perceived advantage).

High rpm on the context of sprinting means being able to accelerate from around 100rpm to around 130rpm whilst still standing and to pedal at a limit of at least 150rpm - many sprinters can pedal faster than 180rpm - that's more than three downward pedal strokes for each leg in the space of a second. Fortunately the technique can be learned and developed further through effective training. It isn't really all that fast - consider that Chris Froome can pedal up very significant slopes at 120rpm.

We all know people who believe they can never pedal faster than about 100rpm; sadly those people will not sprint quickly until they let go of that belief and learn to spin much, much faster. physiologically there really is no reason why any able-bodies cyclist cannot learn to pedal well in excess of 100rpm.

Technically fast pedalling requires the cyclist to be relaxed, to have a good position on the bike and a certain degree of concentration. Any movement other than spinning the legs will be exaggerated as the legs spin faster and those movements are often the real cause of the limit a rider feels when pedalling fast.



Here's a little bit of the science:

In order to ride twice as fast at a constant speed in still conditions on a flat road the amount of power needed to move through the air will be four times as much. Other energy use doesn't increase exponentially this way but pretty soon as speed goes up the only really significant need for power is to overcome that air resistance. If a rider needs say 210Watts to ride at 20mph at least 200 of those will be to push through the air. To double the speed to 40mph would require four times the power to push through the air plus the 10Watts for the other factors (friction, waste etc.) so the total power needed would be 810Watts. Imaging then that the rider is not riding at a constant speed but is accelerating to that 40mph from around 20mph - the power required for that acceleration will depend on the weight of the rider and how fast they want to increase their speed but it is suddenly easy to see how a fast road sprinter will need a peak power of over 1500Watts - Mark Cavendish is reputed to generate around 1800Watts maximum and most sprinters are significantly bigger and need to generate over 2000Watts to have any chance of matching him.

Those figures are just there for demonstration purposes - this is Back to Basics and unless you've got really close to your potential in all other regards you really don't need to know your own numbers.

Power meters, blood and oxygen values and all the little "marginal gains" are the realm of the likes of Team Sky who have not only the equipment to capture the numbers but also the specialists with knowledge to undersatnd and use it. For most riders the application of the techniques here and the training and tactics in the following pages can make "substantial gains" without the investment of anything other than thought and training.

The jump

The jump is the moments where a rider accelerates to sprinting speed and all that balance and control is most important here as this is often the point where any possibility of success or failure is created.

In most cases the rider will accelerate by standing on the pedals, weight fairly centred on the bottom bracket and as each leg pushes at high torque the body and particularly the arm on that side will create a strong platform against which the leverage of the leg can be exerted.

Hands and arms - At this point the hand on the side doing the pushing must grip the bars strongly and the arm pull against the leg - it doesn't need white knuckle grip but a good solid grip that won't let go.  If the arm pulls strongly enough then the bike will rock to the left as the right leg pushes and then as the left leg pushes it will rock to the right. Very often novices and younger riders will exaggerate the rocking movement believing that it will make them faster - it won't; the rocking should only be generated as a result of the amount of power being put into each pedal and the reactive pull on the same side of the handlebars, anything else is wasteful.

If you've ever seen a rider accelerate with a slightly hollow back pushing hips rather than thighs downwards then you've seen a rider throwing away energy and any chance of winning the sprint.

Sometimes the rider will accelerate hard enough to try to gain a gap and to hit a high speed so quickly that it will be hard for anyone else to catch them or come past, other times the rider will make the acceleration to match that of others, to follow the first rider to jump or even just to get things started, encourage others to go and then follow them until close to the line (tactics again - its quite hard to fully separate the techniques and the tactics). Exactly how hard the initial acceleration or jump is will depend on the tactical needs at that moment.

Straight Lines

Another little bit of science (or geometry): the shortest distance between any two points is a straight line.

Watching a finishing sprint with riders veering across the road and weaving left to right might look spectacular, those who remember Adbu in the Tour de France know what I mean, but the fastest way to get to the finish line will always be the shortest distance and that is a straight line. This verges onto tactics but whenever possible the sprint should be as straight as possible to avoid travelling further than absolutely necessary.

In terms of technique sprinting straight is not quite as easy as it sounds, towards the last few metres of a sprint the rider may have reacher their absolute limit and even steering the bike can be difficult. Abdu (Djamolodin Abdoujaparov) famously pointed out that he always naturally drifted to the right, he didn't try to steer that way it was just that once into that final sprint it would happen and he felt he had little control over it.

Embed from Getty Images

Sprinting in a straight line means that as well as concentrating on all the technical stuff above, concentrating on tactics and pushing to a level most athletes rarely if ever reach the rider must also concentrate on holding that line. It is worth it because it is the closest and therefore fastest way to the finish.

Technically being very well balanced and being relaxed even under extreme pressure make holding a straight line much easier. When watching other riders the sprinter still needs to know where they are aiming and a bit like cornering having a point to aim at, on or just beyond the finish line, will generally result in straighter sprints. After that it really does boil down to doing lots and lots of sprints, racing and in practice and (verging on to the training post to follow) being able to pull together all the techniques whilst right at the edge of ability is a skill best developed through specialist interval training.

A second kick

As a young racer wanting to know how to move into the top 6 rather than to 10 in road races I realised that I needed to sprint faster and I read anything I could get my hands on (there wasn't really very much back then). The one that had the biggest impact was an interview with Sean Kelly where he described how he had developed a second kick that could make all the difference in a tight finish.
I don't talk much about this at the time but I went out on my own and I worked on that technique during that winter and into the spring and won my first ever big bunch sprint in my first race of the spring (unfortunately it was a sprint for second place, but well inside that top 6).

A final lunge

Embed from Getty Images

The post Armstrong era - I'm back - lets take our sport back!

Cycling has now entered the post-Armstrong era, sure he'll be around for a while finding non-sanctioned events to take part in and having legal arguments to keep hold of the money that organisations rightly want back. But in terms of real cycling we are now post-Armstrong (and post-lots of others too!).

I've not blogged much lately, other pressures of life and to an extent not being sure quite how to react to what has been happening to my favourite sport. We've talked about it, worried about it, sometimes been the butt of jokes about it and sometimes argued about it.

We've all known about drugs for a long time and even at an amateur level most people who raced for any length of time will know of people who were at least suspected of using banned substances on occasion.

Personally I know what steroids can do in terms of training and strength building - I stopped cycle racing because I needed steroid treatment for an eye problem - I'd almost certainly never have been tested but I wouldn't have felt comfortable competing unfairly.Winning feels brilliant; but only because of the sense of acheivement, having done your best and beaten other, often stronger, riders. Cheating to win would never feel the same.

On a high dose of steroids for several months I found that my power, especially climbing, was much greater than normal (generally climbing seated in a gear two cogs higher than I would normally use) and I stopped doing any kind of training because I knew something of the damage I could do to my body had I carried on.

Some people will take the chance with their health, will want to win at whatever cost and will continue to find ways to cheat. But most cyclists are not like that. Most cyclists love the sport and would love to see fair competition and winners who are real heroes.

The challenge post-Armstrong is how to take back our sport, let the world know that most cyclists just love cycling and all the freedom, pleasure and benefits it brings.

At the top level Team Sky seem to have the right approach.

Let's take back our sport from the grass-roots upwards!

The Fall - Lance Armstrong's descent

News of Lance Armstrong's life-time ban from all sport should have left cycling reeling with shock. But speak to cyclists, those who know racing. Are they reeling? Are they even surprised? The die-hard fans look to their hero with unfounded Icarus belief, a hero who fought cancer and won, and then won the Tour de France and then did it again, six more times.

A man who created the Livestrong brand, the yellow wrist-bands and the cancer fighting "Lance Armstrong Foundation"

Surely such a man would never cheat, never risk his own health, never need to win at all costs. Surely such a man is heroic, a legend, almost mythical? But like so many heroes of myth and legend this very human hero was flawed.

This hero cannot be wrong and he cannot be challenged. Those who dare to speak out are threatened, bullied, sacked, ostracised, belittled and their characters are assassinated.

Then at the last minute this hero chose not to fight his corner with the USADA, he didn't want the public fight. This hero doesn't like to lose and if you don't fight you don't lose.

This hero made a uniquely French bike race a global phenomenon, awakened American millions to a sport where they might win.

This hero mixed with the politicians, the glitterati and the celebrities. A hero who preaches clean and plays dirty. A man who donates to anti-drugs development while leading his own team's drug fuelled regime. A man who helped shape the avoidance of positive tests, the systematic transfusions a culture of "risks for results". As others admit their misdeeds, face consequences, apologise and profess to turn themselves around this hero, this man can admit no wrong. For him the past is the past and it doesn't matter. He tells us his conscience is clear.

Tonight the news says otherwise.

When such a man falls, caught out by his own misguided belief, then like Icarus he falls far and he falls hard. A fall that far always ends badly!

Lance Armstrong's fall should end in the next few days. I expect he might try to take others with him.

The real tragedy for all sports would be a failure of the next generation to learn and to take a different route.

I won't be holding my breath!

Great Manchester Cycle - back to basics paying off!

The Great Manchester Cycle took place today and I lined up in Sport City at about 7.30am with 1500 others ready to tackle the 52 mile ride. A little early drizzle had cleared and occasionally the sun shone, but it was quite windy and still only 9C. My training over the recent weeks had consisted mainly of commuting, a 27 mile round trip 3 or 4 days a week on my Brompton. In a back to basics style that training was simple, riding more than normal and sometimes riding harder (especially on the way home).

After a long wait near the start line I took off my rain jacket with 30 seconds to go, stuffed it in my jersey pocket, and was ready to go. The start itself was fairly steady and it took a while, with so many riders of differing abilities and experience, for groups to form and settle into a pace.

I had planned a steady start and hopefully a nice steady group at 20mph or so. Turning towards the Mancunian Way with a fairly strong following wind the noise of tyres and the buzz of riding fairly quickly in a bunch were too tempting and I found myself clipping along between 25 and 28mph. Through Salford Keys the route got narrow and had 'interesting' features including bollards and posts in the middle of the narrowing paths. This first time through everyone slowed down and we came through unscathed with a group of about 10 as we headed past Manchester United's stadium and towards the city centre.

Heading back to Sport City the wind was in our faces and the group constantly changed as we caught up with riders who had started a bit more quickly and dropped others. Back in to Sport City and the course became a little more technical with a few nice tight turns. Riding my old road bike in such circumstances brought back memories and the bike itself handles such corners, and sprinting out of them, as well as it used to.

Perhaps I was a bit over-enthusiastic but I was having fun and kept moving up, group to group, and stayed with riders younger and fitter than I am.

There's usually a price to pay for such behaviour and for me it came in the shape of cramp sprinting out of the corners at Old Trafford on the fourth and last lap. First a twinge in my quads and soon afterwards in my hamstrings at which point with 5 miles to go it was time to back off a little and stretch the muscles. I watched the group disappear up the road all the time shedding riders in ones and twos as the headwind took its toll.

Not wanting to stop I did some stretching and 'heel of the hand' pressure on the affected muscles whilst pedaling more gently in a slightly lower gear and the cramps eased. With 3 miles to go I was able to build up the pressure gradually and got back to a reasonable pace into the wind for the finish. Around the final bend at Sport City and the commentator announced my arrival "number 773, Seamus Kelly, must be from Ireland"

For me it was a good morning finishing 186th out of about 1500 riders and well ahead of my planned time.

For thousands of others it was a good day too, the keen sporting cyclists, the triathletes, the families and those riding for a cause. It was amazing to see thousands of cyclists enjoying the day and their own personal achievements. Around the finish are you'd have struggles to find anyone without a smile.

Here's hoping this will run again next year.

BWC2012 Launch - Manchester

Bromptons in the Velodrome

Today Manchester was busy with Brompton's for the official launch event for the 2012 Brompton World Championships. It was a bit like a teddy bear's picnic "If you go down the canal today, you're sure of a big surprise ..." and 60 Bromptons on the towpaths in the rain certainly caused one or two surprises.



Gareth Rees (winner of the London Nocturne Folding Bike race)

 The action started at the Rainy City Velodrome, home of British Cycling, with people arriving from all over the place. There was Ian from Northampton, Mick from Aldershot, Alan and Jill from Leicester and a bike shop owner from Sunderland. There was world champion Rachel Elliot, Gareth Rees Winner of the London Nocturne and a whole team of people from Brompton in London. There were black bromptons, pink, yellow, claret, white, blue, red-white-and-blue,  and Bromptons of a thousand colours. There were enough to fill a Christy Moore song.

Tagging along with the factory team

Down at the trackside the Bromptons circled round and round the blue area and the riders fought the temptation to ride up on to the wooden boards (if anyone saw me it was an accident, honestly!). After plenty of laps of the dry velodrome breakfast was provided in the Velopark cafe before a couple of photocalls and a briefing and off we all went to scare the geese on the canal.

The rain grew heavier and the cobbles got more slippery but determined riders refused to put feet on the floor. Around the Fallowfield Loop, through Chorlton and back to the city centre where the London style marshalling came as a shock to the northern motorists (but at least it woke them up and they were more observant).

The atmosphere from start to finish was friendly and relaxed and the Brompton Team should be congratulated on an excellent job

Bromptons on turbo trainers

At the end of the ride everyone was smiling and chatting and enjoying the excellent company

Shortly afterwards I was back on the bike to pedal home and complete my longest day on the Brompton (just over 46 miles).

Rochdale CTC Reliability Ride

Brilliant weather, once the mist had cleared over Cliviger, seemed fitting for the first official Rochdale CTC activity in a very long time. It also seemed ideal for what was my first reliability ride in a similar period.

A 50 mile route with a good sprinkling of hills took the riders from Rochdale to Todmordon over the hills to Rawtenstall, Haslingden, Grange and back through Ainsley and Bury.

The Rochdale CTC Group will be running regular rides on Sundays starting from Rochdale swimming baths at 9.30am and a list will be available from local cycle shops. A website should also be up and running soon and I'll include details on this blog when available.

The group are welcoming and the distances and speed of the rides are not too demanding, offering a good introduction to group cycling for newcomers as well as a pleasant day out for the more experienced cyclists.

TFGM Cycle Challenge

I'm working on  a new cycle challenge for Greater Manchester with TfGM and CTC Challenge for Change. The idea is to get lots of people to try riding a bike for the challenge and perhaps remind them of how much fun it can be.

The challenge is a competition between local businesses and organisations where they compete to get the biggest proportion of their employees to ride a bike during the challenge.

The challenge itself runs from 14th May to 5th June but we're keen to sign up businesses as soon as possible to give time to encourage the non-cyclists and occasional cyclists to have a go. Participants only need to cycle for 10 minutes to qualify and there are loads of prizes and incentives.

Please contact me at seamus.kelly@ctc.org.uk for more information or for help getting your business or organisation registered or alternatively you can go to our website at

www.tfgmcyclechallenge.co.uk/home

Please let friends and colleagues know about the challenge.

Reasons to ride - Money

There are lots of reasons to cycle including health, fun and convenience as well as often quoted financial benefits. So I thought about the financial side and have done some "back of envelope" calculations around the savings I make by cycling to work.

Saving over driving £1570 p.a.

Saving over public transport £1474 p.a.

Saving over walking £1856 p.a.

Here's the details:

My normal trip is only 2.5 miles each way and I could get to work by car, by bus or by walking so I've done a comparison of all three;

Material costs by bike - 25mls per week, 1200 miles per year - New tyres & chain every 2 years (£30pa), new bike every 5 years (200pa) (I've previously used bikes for over 50,000miles so these costs are over-estimated). Annual cost £230.

Material costs by car - 25mls per week at 66p/ml (AA costing) = £16.50 per week plus parking at £21.00 per week. Annual cost £1800

Material costs by bus - £4.20 per day = £21.00 per week. Annual cost £1008

Material costs of walking - £0

Generally when calculating the costs of different forms of transport time tends to be ignored but spending extra time traveling can be significant so I've looked at time as well;

To return trip to work by bike takes up to 30 minutes a day.

Walking takes 110 minutes

Driving and parking takes 30 minutes

Public transport takes 60 minutes

So cycling saves 80 minutes per day over walking = 320hours pa

Or cycling saves 30 minutes per day over the bus = 120hours pa

Cycling takes about the same time as driving.

Costing the time even at the national minimum wage gives an idea of costs (really I value my time much more highly than that);

So accounting for actual costs and for the times saved by cycling my short commute by bike shows significant savings over other forms of transport. For the full year my savings are:

Saving over driving £1570

Saving over public transport £1474

Saving over walking £1856

Free Adult Cycle Training Available

I've got FREE 2 hour adult cycle training sessions for people living, working or travelling in Rossendale, Lancaster and Blackburn. This National Standards training gives people skills and knowledge to ride safely and with confidence. The instructors are qualified and friendly and deliver an enjoyable as well as informative course.

We'll provide bikes and helmets if required.

If you know anyone in those areas that might be interested please let me know here or by emailing me at work seamus.kelly@ctc.org.uk

MTB over Rochdale

Today I was cycling with my brother, Brendan, for the first time in well over 20 years and it was our first time ever mountain biking together.

The Peninnes over Rochdale are a brilliant place to ride and in less than 2 miles from home we were off road and stayed that way for the next 20 miles. The wind over the hills was really wild but then we always liked a challenge and being blown into the edges of ruts and sometimes off the edge of singletrack was fun.

After over 20 years we've a fair bit of on-bike catching up to do so perhaps next time we'll be in the Peaks nearer to his home or up at Lee Quarry for a bit of technical stuff.