This year, Cyclevision was held at FlevOnice in Biddinghuizen in Flevoland. The campsite was about 100 km from home, but there was a complication in that the first event was on Friday evening at a track another 20 odd km from the campsite. I wasn't sure for a long time if I'd go, because I wasn't sure I wanted to cycle there and then take part in an event the same day. It also seemed impractical to turn up on Thursday evening for a race which didn't take place until after 8 in the evening on Friday.
Eventually I decided I would go, and make the most of it. I do it for the fun. It doesn't really matter if I perform less well than usual because I'm never in contention for any prizes anyway.
Harry also decided to ride there on Friday, so we went together. However, because I had a meeting to go to on Monday morning I decided I must come back early, missing Sunday's events. That left only Friday and Saturday.
Friday's event was a one hour time trial, held on the same 2.8 km long high speed test track as Cyclevision had used at the 2002 and 2003 events which I also took part in. Therefore it was a chance to see if I could go faster than back then. Due to having a much faster bike, I was sure I would do so, and so it turned out. However, my speed wasn't particularly impressive. Perhaps 130 km of "warm up" is just too much.
Anyway, here's the video I made going to, during and after the race. Apart from the race itself, there's quite a bit showing the cycle paths I came home on afterwards:
Last weekend was Cyclevision. It's an event for recumbent cyclists, including an exhibition, social rides, racing and much talking over a weekend.
I worked on the Sinner stand on Saturday. We had Wilfred's spectacular Mango+ on the stand for customers to see, and it got a lot of attention. Also I got to see Peter racing.
On the Sunday I took part in the six hours race. As ever, the leaders were much quicker than I am. The winning rider, Ymte Sijbrandij, rode more than 322 km in six hours and averaged over 53 km/h. He's always very quick, but this time he also had a "secret weapon" - a super lightweight version of the Quest velomobile, differing markedly from those you can buy, with a custom carbon frame not adjustable for other riders, and fitted with a racing hood. Indeed, the first six places were taken by machines which were not standard or not road legal (that's perfectly OK - it's a race).
I took 21st place out of 54 participants, covering 235 km in six hours, in the same Mango as I ride to work. My average speed was 39.1 km/h.
I didn't come close to a podium place, but I'm still very pleased with my result. My first two hours went well, averaging over 42 km/h. I covered 100 miles (i.e. 161 km) in three hours and fifty four minutes, and still had an average above 40 km/h at the five hour mark (200 km covered before five hours). However, I really ran out of steam in the last hour. It became increasingly difficult to eat and drink, leading to low blood sugar and general grumpiness, and my average speed dropped a lot. You can see it in the graph of speed over time. At this time quite a few people I'd overtaken earlier took laps back from me.
I also took part in Cyclevision in 2002 and 2003 when the long race was three hours in length. In 2002 I covered 97 km and in 2003, 95 km. These are average speeds of just 32.3 km/h and 31.6 km/h. This year I was about 30% faster for the first three hours, and 20% faster over the entire six hours than I was when I was eight years younger, in a race which was half as long and on a track which didn't include a bridge.
A good part of the difference can of course be put down to the Mango's aerodynamics. It simply goes much faster for the same amount of effort. However, in this case the difference in speed is greater than you'd expect between the two bikes meaning that I'm somewhat fitter now than I was eight years ago. I put that down in large part to living in the Netherlands. I always thought I cycled a lot when I lived in the UK, but in this country the environment invites you to cycle more than you would otherwise.
Last year in the four hour race at Tilburg I had a puncture which took ages to fix because I had no spare parts with me. As a result, this time I carried a pump, spare tyre and inner tube. I also still had my trailer hook attached to the Mango, the basket I carry things in next to my seat, speakers and in fact almost all the stuff I usually have.
I didn't really do any training. I've heard that some trainers refer to cycle commuting as "junk miles", but I still think the 60 km round trip commute must count as something. Apart from that, just the occasional Sunday huneliggers ride, and the elfstedentocht.
Thanks to the organisers, time-keepers, marshalls and other volunteers who gave so much of their time to make the event go so well, and also to the other competitors who were such fun to race with.
I returned yesterday from Cyclevision / Human Power World Championships in Tilburg. It was an excellent event, including racing, a trade show, lectures on various topics and of course lots of socialising.
The full race results reveal that Stephen Slade from the UK retained his Men's World Champion title this year, and that Barbara Buatois is the current Women's World Champion. Well done to both of them, and of course to all the other competitors. The people of Tilburg were great too. We raced on closed roads, and no doubt caused some inconvenience, but the people turned out to cheer us on and many volunteers helped with the organisation.
1 hour time trial video. I'm in this video briefly at 1:43, wearing a blue helmet and riding the white velomobile. As I enter the picture I only have two wheels on the ground, this being a problem with the corners on the course.
Compared with my own efforts, the winners were very fast indeed. My 39.6 km covered in an hour put me in 57th place of 157 competitors in the 1 hour time trial.
The four hour race course had some really nasty tight corners for those of us riding velomobiles. With such a machine you really want to keep your speed up, as these practical fully equipped every day / all weather use designs are inevitably heavier than the stripped down and comparatively fragile racing specific machines that we were competing with. Nevertheless, velomobile riders did very well in the race. If you watch the video you'll see that Steve Slade came unstuck on his two wheeler too.
My own attempt at the four hour race was unfortunately marred by a slow puncture which I failed to notice due to my inexperience in the Mango, and not realising there was a puncture due to the suspension masking the feeling. The puncture caused my speed to start dropping from about an hour in. I initially tried to pedal harder to compensate, drink more and eat more, as I thought it was simply exhaustion. This, of course, simply made myself yet more exhausted. It's strange how the mind works in such a situation. Eventually the tyre was flat enough that people could see the problem and started shouting to me about it. I stopped and was helped to fit a new tube and restart. Suddenly my speed was back again and I kept up just about a 35 km/h average for the last hour. This resulted in my covering only about 122 km in the four hours. Mind you, a few years back I wouldn't have thought that to be a bad average speed.
A great event, made more enjoyable by the company of Harry and Marjon with whom I went, and also by all the BHPC people I met again.
