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PaperclipPerfector  7d ago (text post)   1522 thread views

Wellness Wednesday for October 29, 2025

The Wednesday Wellness threads are meant to encourage users to ask for and provide advice and motivation to improve their lives. It isn't intended as a 'containment thread' and any content which could go here could instead be posted in its own thread. You could post:

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Step two in the path to a Century Ride is completed, I made it 50 miles on Saturday morning. The final ten miles were definitely a different animal compared to the prior rides I've done, I don't think I technically "bonked" or whatever the preferred technical term is, but I was definitely on the struggle shuttle. Near the end of both rides, I start adjusting constantly. Jacket on-jacket off, different handlebar positions, saddle postures, different podcasts or audiobooks. I feel like I just can't get comfortable, which makes sense at that point, but I need to work on ignoring the discomfort and just locking in, there is no combination of things that makes riding a bike that far comfortable.

This time rather than a long ride to a destination where my wife would pick me up, I did it out-and-back, which worked much better. As I wore down on energy, the streets got more familiar rather than less familiar. Which was a good choice, I was more comfortable in the saddle despite fatigue, I knew where I was going and which streets would be safe/efficient. I'm realizing in retrospect that some of the confusion and getting lost at the end of the 50k ride was more related to fatigue than it was to the route itself. And the traffic concerns can easily be lessened by knowing the route better.

It might be too late in the season to practically shoot for the 100km ride this year. I think I have the physical capability to slug it out if I needed to, but the combination of temperature/daylight/location would work out such that I don't think I could do it in the way I want to do it, if that makes any sense. So it's sort of back in the lab for me. I need to increase my speed to hit 100 miles. I did 53 miles in four hours flat, so around a 12mph pace. That would make a 100mi ride way too long to be practical, I want to be holding around 15mph at least, and to do that I feel like I need to be able to hold 18mph for a few miles, which I really can't seem to do right now. My problem seems to be with cadence, I can't manage to move my legs fast enough for very long to sustain higher speeds. I picked up a used Peloton bike for my wife a year back, I suppose I'll use that pretty extensively this winter, they have a lot of rides built around varying cadences, so hopefully that will help. I'm not going to be able to ride my bike outside as often with the shorter daylight hours, but I'm hoping to get out to a bike trail one morning a week and hit at least ten to fifteen miles to keep the groove greased.

My target is right now to try for the 100km in early spring, and if that goes well the 100mi in late spring, or if it doesn't I'll aim to do 100mi next fall. My secondary worry being that I need to do a better job of choosing a route, that the friction is going to catch up with me over the course of a really long ride.

This is more cardio than I've done in years, and that's been good for me, no question about it.

I need to work on ignoring the discomfort and just locking in, there is no combination of things that makes riding a bike that far comfortable

Ironic. I just attended my first bike fitting yesterday to prepare for a 100-mile race next weekend. This has always been my tack - that the equipment configuration can't possibly matter that much, and the secret is to beat my body into submission and be comfortable in the suffering.

To be clear, any mileage over ~40 means some suffering. It's part of the gig. More than that, you've progressed quickly - it took me 9 months to go from zero to 100 miles. So yeah, there's some "slugging it out".

But when I basically told the fitter your/my MO, he just hung his head for a second and then recovered. "That's pretty much the opposite of what you should be doing". At the scale of a Gran Fondo and above, little adjustments matter. And frankly, the $175 I paid for a fit seemed like a deal with how fucked up my saddle height, shoes, stem, and pedals were. We spent 2.5 hours adjusting every piece of the bike, then testing how it felt with motion capture etc. It felt a lot better in that room, very quickly, and I'll be able to report back how it felt at scale soon.

Is it still overkill for my level of talent and power? Absolutely. But I would say you deserve to have the bike set up correctly and that much discomfort suggests it. At least check out some youtube videos on fit.

  • Doing an out and back is awesome, especially if you have a distance goal. I've occasionally had to zig-zag a bit near the end to hit my 62.2mi target, and that makes it easier (plus your wife not having to pick you up is a major plus).
  • The Peloton is a great way to up your cadence, the workouts really focus on that over power or distance. Plus Olivia Amato is.... motivating. Even if it's a huge rip off of a workout platform.
  • Given your progress, you'll have the capability to do this in the winter or early spring. If you're trying to prove something to yourself, fine, do it then. Frankly, I think hitting a milestone like that is best done on a warm day where you can have some fun - because it's also going to be hard. Things stop being enjoyable between 100km and 100mi IMO.
  • For a long time I was so focused on losing weight that I would not eat on rides. You don't need performance food: Some sour patch kids, one of your bottles having gatorade, and something else you just like eating are probably enough. But don't not eat, because it'll slow you down bigly. I almost never bonk, but when I do it's a frustrating waste of time to try and limp back home with cramps slowing me down to a crawl.

But when I basically told the fitter your/my MO, he just hung his head for a second and then recovered. "That's pretty much the opposite of what you should be doing". At the scale of a Gran Fondo and above, little adjustments matter. And frankly, the $175 I paid for a fit seemed like a deal with how fucked up my saddle height, shoes, stem, and pedals were. We spent 2.5 hours adjusting every piece of the bike, then testing how it felt with motion capture etc. It felt a lot better in that room, very quickly, and I'll be able to report back how it felt at scale soon.

I've been trying to put off doing all this, I guess out of embarrassment over how bad I am, like I need to earn it. Also why I've put off spending any real money on a bike. But maybe all the persuasion on here has made the bike shop up the road a few hundred bucks.

The Peloton is a great way to up your cadence, the workouts really focus on that over power or distance. Plus Olivia Amato is.... motivating. Even if it's a huge rip off of a workout platform.

I despise everything about their business model, but Mrs. FiveHour wanted one off craigslist and she loves it, it's worth any price to keep her working out, so we already have one in the basement.

For a long time I was so focused on losing weight that I would not eat on rides. You don't need performance food: Some sour patch kids, one of your bottles having gatorade, and something else you just like eating are probably enough. But don't not eat, because it'll slow you down bigly. I almost never bonk, but when I do it's a frustrating waste of time to try and limp back home with cramps slowing me down to a crawl.

For the places I've done long rides, wawa is my rest station, so I've got a wide variety of junk food on tap. Tastykakes are the thing I allow myself only in the middle of large cardio events. I doubt its optimal, but its good enough.

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