Quick update

The last while has been pretty solid for me. I've not been doing any long distance stuff, but that's not terribly important at the moment. I've gotten a lot of work done on shorter, higher intensity things from my commute :) There's a really nice run of flat road out from the city that's normally pretty empty of cyclists, so I can really give it a bit of a go. I've started building up my speed to top out around the 38-40 mark just before I hit my final set of lights just outside Garching. I've also managed to time this right on a few occasions to roll through these, which was very nice. Normally not, though, it's just a bit too much effort.

Unfortunately, my nice long commute is finished as of today :( So no more enforced 38 km per day any more. It was fun, if a lot frustrating at times! This has, however, opened up more doors for training :)

A knock on effect of my prolonged efforts on the fixie seems to be that my running and heart rate recovery has improved greatly over the last while. Which is odd, seeing as how I only went for a run last weekend and then another one this weekend. I have no idea how long it's been other than that. A few months, I think... Anyway, not to dwell on the past, those runs went quite well, I have to say. I've managed to run the full circuit, looping around to the forest and then back in the long way. It's only 8 km or so, but the longest I've ever actually run, I would think, certainly for a continuous time. I've mapped out a 10 km course as well which I'm going to give a go at this weekend, as well as another mid week session. Now, I know, TWO whole running sessions in a week is a lot, but I'll try to go easy :P

Finally, although my commute has fallen (by a staggering 33 km/day) a new opportunity rises from the ashes; I now have the time to think about rifle training again. My German has also improved to the point that if people speak slowly and clearly that I can understand most of what they're saying, which is good! I've contacted a club not that far from here that have excellent facilities for air and smallbore (3p included). They're home to some national and world champion shooters, so I'm going to take my chances with them for the time being. Most of Germany seems to be on holidays at the moment, but they're back in September. So, I'll either get in a session before I head back to Ireland for a week, or start fresh after that :)

We're finally ready to roll. Fortunately, this will all not be wasted by my heading back to Ireland. I suspect that most of you reading this already know that I'm here full time from now on. Basically, the foundations that I've laid should stand me in good stead. Where are those EOIs again....

Cycling update

I know I should have running in there, but I haven't had the time or motivation for any over the last while. My cycling week has increased a fair bit, not leaving me with much energy for high intensity stuff over the weekend.

As I was saying a while back, I'm doing a German course in Munich at the moment, which I'm cycling in and out to, giving me a daily total of around 35 km on the fixie, 4 days a week for roughly 150 or so there. The average speed is quite low, on account of having to travel through the city itself and being hampered by other cyclists/traffic lights. On the way back out though, I've been starting to push a bit harder. I know that once I clear the city, going at around 33 km/hr or so should get me back to Garching without having to stop at any lights. I've not quite gotten the full ~8km run, but hopefully soon :)

On a related note, it's getting dark in the evenings. Very dark. My front torch just isn't cutting it, so I'm gonna need to start looking at something a bit beefier. Given the nature of my commute and that it takes in open road, something to see with, rather than just be seen, will be required, which will probably mean spending money :( If I move into Munich at any point though, this will be money well spent and used!

I also got out for a niceish spin on Sunday. 75 km, with a nice bit of speed built up at the end. Mostly kept the last 15 km or so in the mid to high 30s, which is pretty good going (for me), especially after a substantial, eh, warm up :P I think this regular fixie thing is starting to pay off, especially in terms of my pedalling technique and working well at higher cadences.

I've been reading a bit on ultra-light touring and coming up with some ideas for using as a light touring bag. My in-sy should be (finally) on the way, so that'll serve well as a starting bag. Packing light and keeping the weight down will be top of my list. It shouldn't be too hard given that I won't be carrying a tent or medical supplies for my shorter trips to Austria and the like. I am planning ahead to next Summer, though, and thinking of some fast touring through different parts of Europe and possibly some camping, if I can work something out that will allow me to use the road bike. It's not certain, but given my light weight, anything up to 15 kg of extra bulk should be well tolerable, if I can attach it correctly. We shall see. That's a nice bit into the future :)

World Cup, Munich

I've a few different topics to post up over the next while, relating to various things, but this deserves to be first I think!

Over the past while, shooting has very much taken a backseat. However, after the weekend at the WC, this has all changed. I've remembered my original purpose behind cycling, and how much I love shooting. To this end, an email has been sent to the office of the director of sport of the BSSB (in possibly my best German yet!), so hopefully that'll yield some nice dividends.

Anyway, onto the weekend itself. I don't think anything I can write here will do justice to what you see at this match. There is everyone and everything you have read, watched and wanted there. All the manufacturers, all the names we are so familiar with from Warren Potent, to Rajmond Debevech, to any other Olympic and World champion you care to mention who can still see down the sights, turning up. Seeing it all there gives a grand sense of occasion to the whole thing.

One thing I will say right now is that I am damn glad that I went to this before I even entertained the possibility of going as a competitor. There is nothing in Ireland or England to compare to this, and I've been to a few rather large matches in England. There's just a totally different scale of event here. Add to that Dave having a very casual chat with Potent about the state of his dislocated shoulder and you have a somewhat bizzare experience.

Before I go any further, I want to say well done to the Irish team that went over; Gary in prone, Ray in air rifle, and Peter in free pistol and air pistol. You were landed with a huge task and acquitted yourselves very well. Next year is the medal year :) Fair dues also to the team leader Liam, and coach Robb Stubbs for also going. Fair play especially to Dave who came over off his own back to support the team. Both him and myself will be hoping to go back sooner rather than later as competitors.

I won't talk about the shooting, there are reports online from the lads themselves about how they did. The only pics I managed to get are from the smallbore match on the Sunday. My camera decided to start beeping quite loudly when I tried to take some photos in the airgun range on Saturday :(

This pic was taken during Gary's match, not that you can tell. I have neither the camera nor the knowldge (OK, mostly the latter) to take a good shooting pic with the huge contrast required. Look at the range, though; beautifully lit, regulation flags, netting, mown  lawns. Baffles for 3p, and to keep the light out of shooters' faces as much as possible. It's a range designed for high scores, which were, I must say, astonishing. Normally in Munich, one could expect a 597 with maybe some inner ten countback to make the final. Not so this time. 598 and 599 only. Even the threshold for the qualifier was 591, which is well up there. Unfortunately, this means it'll be slightly harder to get through to the match next year for us Irische, but I'm sure at least some of us will manage it.

So yeah, fantastic weekend all around. Great shooting, great fun. Also, getting to talk to Heinrich Bleiker about his oh so nice barrelled actions was pretty cool. They are so tempting, but just outside what can be tolerated, investment-wise. For the moment. Since everything was there, I could get a good comparison of each brand, what they felt like, what the action was like, the balance, etc. I'll stick up another post on my thoughts about each, I think :)

Update

So it's been another long while since a post. To be honest, not much out of the ordinary has happened, no epic climbs or long distances.

What has happened is my German course has started. What this means (aside from the fact that I might actually learn some more of the language) is that I have a 17 km each way commute four days a week, which I'm doing on the fixie. It's been getting pretty much all of the kilometers I've been cycling lately since I was hit at the start of the month. Not cos the new bike is broken or anything, more just circumstances. I trust that Munich is a low crime city, but maybe not low enough to leave a full carbon fiber bike outside for a few hours...

So, I basically have a commuting week of around 160 km, which is nice. I've only actually hit that once, for a few reasons, but it should bounce up again from next week. Max distance in the last month was 225 in a week, the week we had out betriebausflug in work, which meant a few of us did 65 km (with me on the fixie) around some lakes and the river Isar. It was a fabulous day to be out on the bike, with some nice small climbs in (which I somehow managed on the fixie, much to everybody's incredulity).

On a somewhat different note, this weekend sees the target shooting world cup come to Munich :) I've got a weekend ticket to watch the matches and any finals that are on, which should be good. Not to mention that the GB and Irish teams have arranged to meet up :) Should be a good weekend!

Long day.

Warning; Incredibly long post with no pics!

I had a nice day out planned; lovely flat 110 km to fully recover from last weekend. However, it was not to be. About one kilometer from the flat, I came up behind a car, which then stopped in the middle of the road. Thinking this odd, I moved up around it (on the inside). Suddenly, a nice strong engine rev told me I was going down. I went down. Now, normally, this would be totally my fault, having moved around. However, there were no indicators flashing, before or afterwards (yes, I checked, instincts and all that), and the fact that I was almost clear of the car means I was well visible, had he checked.

The conversation afterwards was somewhat interesting;
Driver; You were going too fast.
Me; No, I wasn't. (10 km/hr)
I didn't see your indicators.
Driver; ...
*motions to wife to check side of car*
Me; is it ok? (somewhat incredulously)
Driver; It is ok. *stares at me*
*Gets back into car and drives off*

It was really weird. I mean, he just kept looking at me. I dunno if he was expecting an apology or what, but he certainly wasn't getting it. I was a hell of a lot more concerned about any damage to me and the bike. Very odd experience.

As it turns out, most things were ok. I have a few scrapes, a bit of road rash, but nothing huge. The bike was a little worse off; wheel a few mm out of true, rear derailleur took a bit of a knock, getting me worried about needing a new one. An hour's work learning how to true a wheel and that problem was solved, and some time reindexing the RD had that sorted. It's possibly a little out of alignment, but it shifts fine for the moment. I'll get a tool to adjust it properly at some point.

So, what have we learned;
Don't assume a motorist won't turn, despite lack of indicators.
Don't pass up the inside when they're stopped, they're liable to do anything. Also, it leaves you somewhat exposed and also leaves a lot of the blame, or at least potential for it, on you.

The first one is something that I've never encountered before. To me, if you don't have the indicators on, you're not turning, and that's what I would assume applies across the board. So, after seeing the situation of a motorist stopped in the middle of the road, with no oncoming traffic, no signals, I did what seemed most natural and moved up on the side with the most space. Unfortunately, this was the side he was turning. Could easily have been the other side, just got unlucky today.

On the second, I probably should have stopped behind him. That said, one doesn't have to think too hard for reasons that somebody would arbitrarily stop in the middle of the road. I don't know enough about the ROTR in Ireland, never mind Germany, to know if I would have been held at fault in this situation. Yes, I moved around from the back, but it's not like I was invisible. He had no indicators on and almost certainly didn't bother to check for anybody coming from behind.

The main thing that P***ed me off about the whole thing was the accusation that it was my fault for going too fast. Which is utter crap. GPS data shows that I was, at most, doing about 12 km/hr on that street, a lot less when I was behind him. I was well alongside the car before he started to turn; there was nothing I could have done at any speed.

Anyway, excitement aside, it turned out to be a not too bad day all in all. I did around 40 km on the fixie, heading into Munich to find where my German course is on for the next two months and taking a nice scenic route back out along the river and through the English Gardens. Also, I now know how to true wheels, which is one of the few things that I didn't know how to do. I think the only thing that I haven't done/been shown how to do is replacing a headset, but there's a specific tool for that, so that shouldn't be too much of an issue. Maintaining one's own bike is a lot of fun!

Finally, adding up my total distances so far this year, I've recorded just over 1600 km so far. Which isn't exactly impressive, but should ramp up pretty fast over the next few months. I should have about 6000 done by the end of the year, all going well. I'm already over the euro/km limit for my bikes, so the next goal is adding in all the other crap that comes with them and reducing the costs then :) Next year will see my price/km travelled come down nicely.

So yeah, that's about it. Hopefully the commute to Munich will go well for the week. And that I'll be able to handle the 34 odd km four days a week, on top of normal work and a long weekend spin!

Welsh Airgun Open

The call for entries to this match has been put out. As usual, it's set in the beautiful city of Cardiff, which I've gotten to know reasonably well over the years :D Historically, it's been one of the (few) abroad (rather than international) matches that DURC has sent a team to. It really gives great experience to any shooter who goes over, be they a novice or senior shooter.

To this end, I am throwing down the gauntlet to myself; try to get to this match. If I can at least get a range to train in sorted within a month, then I'm going for it. Three months of training should be plenty to get me back into the swing of it. Hell, I've shot some of my best matches on much less prep after a break! OK, air rifle may be a bit different, but I have the basic skills, it's just getting some WD40 on them to loosen myself up a little. Or not, as the case is...

This was in my plan to do this year anyway, though the specific goals will have to be rearranged somewhat, I suspect. I won't know my current status until into August, so that's something of an issue, but, as usual, the aim is an MQS, or 570ish. More realistically, and based on how I was doing the last time I took air rifle seriously, maybe 550-560 with good training.

Let's roll.

Test TT

I decided that I'd do a test time trial today, just for the laugh. I have a good set of aero bars that I've only used once, in the rain, so I decided to give them a whirl.

Set out with the intention of keeping the heart rate at about 160 bpm, or thereabouts, high enough to get a decent effort out of the ride, but low enough to get me through and not collapse after. This end of things more or less went to plan, lots of bouncing between 160 and 180, which is to be expected for the heat of the day, and the fact that I'm not used to constant power outputs.

What I was surprised at was my ability to hold speed. I mean, the aero-bars make a huge difference! My position isn't great cos my shoulders started to hurt after about 30 mins. Not a bad hurting, but the kind you get from leaning on a desk poorly for a while. Overall, I completed the first 16 km in 28 mins 40 or so, which seems to be an alright time. I was held up at a traffic light for a min or so, which kinda ruined things, but other than that it was pretty nice sailing. No downhills to help me out, either.

So, now I have a base time. Maybe weekly comparisons to track progress for this kind of distance would be good. A 1 hr effort is possibly a bit much for the moment, though it really would show a lot. And I could have a good idea of how I perform at threshold power. This calculator puts me at around 190 Watts for the effort, though it does assume a good aero position, which I most likely don't have... Unfortunately, that's one metric I'm a while away from justifying, so guestimates will have to suffice.  Once I get a bit more consistent with the perceived efforts, I can start looking at a 40 km TT :) Then come the deep section wheels, pointy hat... :P