My initial plan was to do it in December, but it had to be pushed further. Before anything changes, I’m setting a fixed date, 10th of February, in just a little over two weeks from now.
I’ve been doing the Knighthood training plan for a few weeks now and it ends exactly on my chosen date.
The rides have been analyzed, shuffled around, charted out, shuffled again and finalized into the following order:
Who Dares
There is no Try
Power Station
Rue the Day
The Wretched
14 Vise Grips
The Trick
Do as you’re told
GOAT
The Omnium
I’m both terrified and excited. I’m still thinking if I can setup a live stream or if I’ll just try and post updates here whenever I get the chance.
I’ve received a ton of useful advice in my previous post, most of which I’ve incorporated into my prep plan. I’ve also charted liquid/food intake for each hour, so that I’ll just grab what’s next on the list and won’t have to think about it too much.
This post serves mainly as a firm commitment and accountability - there’s no turning back now!
As part of the KoS preparation training, I did 5 videos yesterday (Butter, Blender, Local Hero, The Rookie, BMX). All in all, it took 6:23 hours with 4x10 minute breaks. I barely made it.
The first 3 hours went smoothly. In fact, I was starting to think it should feel harder. I guess that’s when my reserves started to drop though. Hour 4 was getting harder, but closing in to 5h mark, I almost threw up a couple of times. I ate a power bar and that really screwed up my stomach, I was 99.9% ready to quit. The last video was only 45 minutes, but I couldn’t hold any power above my zone 2, my legs were completely empty, my back hurt and I had a headache.
I’m feeling better today, but yesterday really sobered me up at what I’m getting myself into. I can’t fathom doing it for another three and a half hours, yet I’m only 2 weeks away. Granted, I’ll have more breaks then, but still, this is the first time where I’m having serious doubts if I can even manage it.
I’m guessing my fueling wasn’t the best either. I’ve aimed 40g/carbs per hour and I had a nice spreadsheet printed out of when to eat and what to cover that. Croissants and bananas felt good, power bar and chocolate cookies made me want to puke. I’ll definitely aim for 60g of carbs next time and more water (I was at 750ml/h yesterday).
I actually believed that doing the videos yesterday will give me more confidence, but it turned out to be much harder and I’m afraid it did the opposite. I’m just hoping that the next 2 weeks will be adequate to raise my fitness/endurance enough to get through it alive.
Very impressive display of suffering, especially with Blender in there.
What percentage did you ride at?
Others has given some great nutrition tips, the biggest mistake I made was only preparing sweet foods - made loads of cupcakes, flapjack, banana sandwiches - and was really craving some salty beyond electrolytes in my water. Definitely a learning for me.
Blender and local hero are long vids and doing them both in combo with 3 others is quite something. Your experience with the Prep Plan is one of the reasons I personally recommend against doing it.
But…you’ve learned A LOT. You know you need to vary your foods and adjust your carbs, you know you need to increase your hydration, you may need to look at further adjustments in intensity earlier on in your quest than perhaps you had planned for on the day, you know that you’re gonna feel good for the first few hours then things are gonna take a turn and you’ll now be PREPARED for that mental hurdle.
I am 100% certain that you can complete your quest. This is an endurance event where after the first half (unofficially at video #7), it’s almost ALL mental. Just keep turning the pedals at whatever intensity you can and you’ll make it and it will be GLORIOUS and there will be much REJOICING.
Thank you. Yeah, I definitely have to refine my nutrition plan.
When I’ve gotten off the bike yesterday, the first thing I said to my wife was never again, but now that I’m reliving the experience, I’m feeling better about it and will definitely keep the set date.
Fwiw, I think I averaged about 70-75% intensity for my quest, and I know there were several points in the last couple vids where I was probably 60ish for an interval or two. You do whatever you got to do to make it work and get to the finish line.
Did you lower just one specific area (FTP, NM, …) or overall everything? I’ve noticed yesterday that you can selectively reduce intensity in all four target areas.
Nah, for me it was a global reduction though I left the recovery intervals unchanged.
My head wouldn’t have been able to manage intricate adjustments to individual metrics during an event like a quest. Just like having race brain, it was enough just to get everything loaded, connected, saved, and posted. I ran the SUF app on a MacBook and was able to use the up/down arrows to make incremental global adjustments.
I plan on running it on my phone and having laptop as a backup. For some reason, getting the sensors to connect quickly after each video is much more reliable on my phone and it worked flawlessly yesterday. I’ll see if I can get a bike holder so that my phone would be close enough to easily adjust the resistance.
for the “real thing” this is definitely too much. it’s better to start low, around 70%. if you feel you still have enough energy in the tank towards the end (after video 7) then you can start thinking about dialling up a bit. this is called a negative split and recommended for most endurance events (a lot of non-pros, e.g. marathon runners, tend to start too fast and then break around Km35). if it feels too easy at the beginning it’s just about right
