• Member aVatars are now properly clickable and take you to their profile page where you can check out their shit and/or message them.
• The strange character encoding has been repaired (ie the weird characters like “”are gone) on the Recent Posts in the sidebar and Activity feeds on the community pages
• The article author’s “View Profile” and “View Articles” are working again
• The hanging indent on the Recent Posts has been fixed
• The ellipsis on the Recent Posts has been fixed to remove extra periods and spaces so they no longer wrap
• Some other cosmetics that I am willing to bet no one else will notice, +1 badge to the first person to point one of them out correctly.

I’m guessing I’m the only person who was bothered by the last three items, very few noticed the third, but the first two should be noticeable to everyone.

Rock the fuck on.

I should get rid of the italics button, I suppose, since I hate italics enough to deliberately strip them from the posts. Good catch!

…and until I fix that, I’ll continue to torment you with the button.

Pedantically, they’re oblique rather than true italic, but that sounds like something cross trainers worry about.

Text formatting in comments hasn’t been working for me since the site’s been back online. Safari 7.0.x. Looks legit in the comment box, but styles get stripped upon posting. Just testing:

bold

italic

bold italic

centre justify

I should get rid of the italics button, I suppose, since I hate italics enough to deliberately strip them from the posts. Good catch!

…and until I fix that, I’ll continue to torment you with the button.

50% success rate isn’t bad…

bold

italic

bold italic

centre justify

]]> https://www.velominati.com/v-announcements/v-announcements-were-back/comment-page-3/#comment-798448 Fri, 27 Feb 2015 04:05:53 +0000 http://www.velominati.com/?p=32307#comment-798448 @Chris @Mikael Liddy

The host was helping me figure out a character encoding problem, and somehow got confused between the production and staging servers; I can’t believe they were troubleshooting in production.

Not cool, but things seem to be back to how they were this afternoon.

yeah I was seeing some of that, are you getting some weird ? graphics coming up in the text as well?

Oh, it’s gone. Carry on. Nothing to see here.

If it’s true then I’m completely cool with it as long as the next iteration of the V-Kit make me look as mind bendingly awesome as Bernie. If not then, sorry, it clashes a bit with the rest of the palette.

   

I keep stumbling upon heart rate. It’s not something I’ve had any intention of using, but I can see how it would have a use, especially as I’m planning to get in to doing time trials (riding my first 10 mile mid-March). Science is the difference between feeling and knowing, and HR seems a pretty scientific method of gauging one’s suffering. Plus, I’m not going to fork out for a power metre any time soon.

HR requires a little more thinking on the end-user’s part, but it can be a very effective tool especially for time-trialling. Before I got my power metre, I got HR-based pacing down to a science. I could target a 40k TT and know, to within 2bpm, whether this was a reasonable effort or if I’d blow.

Basically, find out what your threshold is (loosely correlated to the average HR over an hour maximal effort), find your maximum and rest heart rates, and through some math-ing and testing you can figure out what %age of your threshold HR works for what length of time. The only catch is that even with a thorough warmup, HR has a delayed reaction so don’t overshoot the start.

Pacing using a power metre is essentially the same, except one measures the effort itself (power) and the other the body’s reaction (HR) – who behave linearly one in relation to the other, except that relationship changes depending on fatigue and environmental factors.

I do agree that lugged steel is more elegant, and provides stronger joints.  However, TIG welded joints can look nice and do the job.  My own preference is that TIG welds are used on titanium tubes and steel tubes should be joined with lugs,

@RobSandy

@tessar

@ChrisO

Yeah, Virtual Power equations fall apart when you start comparing to other people. It’s a fine method for tracking day-to-day individual progress (since all things being equal, more speed more power on a trainer) but it’s all, as they say in physics, “to a constant”.

My own power equations (what I got off of the interwebs) fall apart between me riding uphill and riding on the flat. I only use them to try and correlate my turbo trainer workouts with riding on the road. Except it doesn’t seem to work. Humph.

Don’t bother. Heart rate showed much more consistency to all sorts of power-estimation methods. I used Virtual Power on the turbo only to keep my indoor workouts consistent and hard.

I keep stumbling upon heart rate. It’s not something I’ve had any intention of using, but I can see how it would have a use, especially as I’m planning to get in to doing time trials (riding my first 10 mile mid-March). Science is the difference between feeling and knowing, and HR seems a pretty scientific method of gauging one’s suffering. Plus, I’m not going to fork out for a power metre any time soon.

Thanks be to Merckx for all your hard work, frank.

I would have reduced the servers to rubble with a chain whip, pedal wrench and headset press had I been in your position.

Yes, Thanks for your work @Frank.  I’m glad things are back

@markb

Recovery is going well.

This is good to hear!

1. No point notifying us of our own reply, even if we were vain enough to quote ourselves in it.
2. In said notification mail, the link sends us to your profile. Pretty as it may be, that’s probably not the address the link was supposed to direct to.

@tessar

@ChrisO

Yeah, Virtual Power equations fall apart when you start comparing to other people. It’s a fine method for tracking day-to-day individual progress (since all things being equal, more speed more power on a trainer) but it’s all, as they say in physics, “to a constant”.

My own power equations (what I got off of the interwebs) fall apart between me riding uphill and riding on the flat. I only use them to try and correlate my turbo trainer workouts with riding on the road. Except it doesn’t seem to work. Humph.

Don’t bother. Heart rate showed much more consistency to all sorts of power-estimation methods. I used Virtual Power on the turbo only to keep my indoor workouts consistent and hard.

Now that I’ve spent a year with a real powermeter (the ludicrously-named Power2Max) I can tell that no other device has been as instrumental in inflicting pain as this, and my race-craft and training improved significantly.

It’s remarkable how much “going by feel” means you go too hard out of the gate and fade towards the end. Knocking out the same watts on the final climb as on the first gives a new definition to hard.

At the same time, it’s cool to see when the science and the actual riding line up. Pulling up a file of an interval session or a race and see the exact moment you crack coincide with hitting 0 on the W’-balance chart.

Where are the lugs ?? Needs lug construction.

>>> I hadn’t quite appreciated how hard it is when you don’t do any freewheeling over that length of time <<<

Exactly what I noticed immediately. No freewheeling is strange. No stretching on the bike after an effort.

I’ve never spent time on trainer nor own one. I always chose, when weather was inclement and days were short for the two months or so here in deep south USA, to simply hit the gym and work on strength and flexibility. This year however we’re working on an inaugural season for local High School Mtn Bike Club for state competition. And a local gym sponsored our team with time in their spin room. We do interval training for one hour once/week and I’m actually diggin’ the experience. The heart rate monitor, for me anyways, is invaluable for getting something out of the work. I suspect power would be even better.

@Jay

$17,500 price tag cooled my interest somewhat…

Actually that price tag made it more interesting. Not for an actual purchase. No, no, no… that’s a looney tunes price for non custom fit steel frame bike. The prospect of marketing, producing and selling all of 70 bicycles and pulling in a half million + dollars margin? And quite possibly a lot more. That’s very interesting.

@ChrisO

Yeah, Virtual Power equations fall apart when you start comparing to other people. It’s a fine method for tracking day-to-day individual progress (since all things being equal, more speed more power on a trainer) but it’s all, as they say in physics, “to a constant”.

My own power equations (what I got off of the interwebs) fall apart between me riding uphill and riding on the flat. I only use them to try and correlate my turbo trainer workouts with riding on the road. Except it doesn’t seem to work. Humph.

@ChrisO

@markb

I would gladly go back to being a mere Level 4 if it brought the Day of the Cap any closer.

Recovery is going well. If nothing else the great server outage has saved you all from regular updates.

I got out for a short ride on the weekend. Not much more than a few laps around the block to make sure I could still do it.

I’ve been doing quite a few hours on the trainer, and Zwift has been brilliant  – a real sanity-saver but also very social.

Mostly 60-90 minute sessions but yesterday I did over three hours, which was 100km. Some guy in Japan did 300km in 11 hours. Tell you what, having not spent much time on trainers, I hadn’t quite appreciated how hard it is when you don’t do any freewheeling over that length of time.

I think the longest time I’ve ever endured on a trainer is 2hrs, its the tedium that gets to you.  I suppose I should be doing more of it as it’s currently awkward to disappear for 1/2 day on the bike as my partner is not well and sometimes has to dash to hospital. Still on the plus side, I’m being made redundant and will have plenty of time on my hands in 3 weeks time.

Ugh. That sounds like a horrendous amount of time to sit on a turbo. Think I managed 1.5 hrs last summer training for a sportive.

I had planned plenty of turbo sessions this winter, but I joined my local cycling club instead so have been going to their track nights.

Racking up the kilometres without going more than a mile from my house! Plus it’s social and I’m learning a lot about group riding.

Yeah, Virtual Power equations fall apart when you start comparing to other people. It’s a fine method for tracking day-to-day individual progress (since all things being equal, more speed = more power on a trainer) but it’s all, as they say in physics, “to a constant”.

I have a friend raving about Zwift, using it to pass the time through the snowstorm we’re having (SNOW! IN THE FUCKING DESERT!) and preparing for an Everesting in May. Cool stuff. I’m a Sufferfest man myself, keeps me motivated and on the edge of death – just set a new power record last week without intending to, and broke the W’ algorithm. Gotta revisit the maths…

Zwift looks like fun! have to have a play around with it…..

Couldn’t get back to earlier comments using the page numbers.

They link to http://www.velominati.com/v-announcements/v-announcements-were-back/comment-page-1/#comments or similar.

Editing that back to http://www.velominati.com/v-announcements/v-announcements-were-back/comment-page-1/ got me where I needed to go.

Of course I should say how lovely it is to have everyone back together again.

Have been making some tweaks; the comment linking bit wasn’t working right for some time…try cleaning out the ol’ cache etc and see if it isn’t working right now. If its not, please be more specific or friend me and message me there to get into the nitty gritty. You might be doing something I haven’t thought of.

They link to http://www.velominati.com/v-announcements/v-announcements-were-back/comment-page-1/#comments or similar.

Editing that back to http://www.velominati.com/v-announcements/v-announcements-were-back/comment-page-1/ got me where I needed to go.

Of course I should say how lovely it is to have everyone back together again.

That sounds pretty crap for both of you, sorry to hear it.

Really if you want to spend some time on the trainer get the Zwift app. It’s still in beta testing and they aren’t charging for it (yet).

I think the PC version is pretty open now, but the Mac version is still a limited test group.

Really helps to pass the time and you get to know people when you see them regularly, then chat on Facebook or the Strava club. They’ve based the virtual environment on a real island, so if you link it to Strava it shows as if you were riding around the island, and also who you were riding with. Very clever.

At the moment quite a few people are setting up group rides where they meet and do laps together, sometimes steady, sometimes racing each other for the climbs and finish points. They say the plan is to roll out more courses and options, and also to have races and competitions.

You need a power device, although they do have virtual power estimation where they can estimate power on certain trainers (expanding list) based on your speed, but that seems to be a bit dodgy. There are some guys doing impossible power and speeds using that. Still it’s a way on if you don’t have a power meter.

And the only other thing needed is an ANT+ receiver for your computer to receive the signal from speed/power sensor – they’re quite cheap and just slot into your USB port.

@markb

I would gladly go back to being a mere Level 4 if it brought the Day of the Cap any closer.

Recovery is going well. If nothing else the great server outage has saved you all from regular updates.

I got out for a short ride on the weekend. Not much more than a few laps around the block to make sure I could still do it.

I’ve been doing quite a few hours on the trainer, and Zwift has been brilliant  – a real sanity-saver but also very social.

Mostly 60-90 minute sessions but yesterday I did over three hours, which was 100km. Some guy in Japan did 300km in 11 hours. Tell you what, having not spent much time on trainers, I hadn’t quite appreciated how hard it is when you don’t do any freewheeling over that length of time.

I think the longest time I’ve ever endured on a trainer is 2hrs, its the tedium that gets to you.  I suppose I should be doing more of it as it’s currently awkward to disappear for 1/2 day on the bike as my partner is not well and sometimes has to dash to hospital. Still on the plus side, I’m being made redundant and will have plenty of time on my hands in 3 weeks time.

Since there are only 70 being made and only 69 up for grabs I know that at that price I won’t ever have one.  However, it is an intriguing machine.

If money were no object, my order would already be in the queue…

$17,500 price tag cooled my interest somewhat…

@Teocalli

@ChrisO

Hey, me saying “+1″ and awarding the badge are two different things. I expect everyone to be funny and clever and witty and a bit of a jackass (Rule #43) but the badge is only awarded if you truly outsize expectations.

I believe it was LeMan who said to expect 2-3 weeks to regain fitness after taking a week off the bike. Not sure how long my wittiness bit will take to recover after such a prolonged layoff.

Jackassness though has a way of persisting, even without regular use.

I would gladly go back to being a mere Level 4 if it brought the Day of the Cap any closer.

Recovery is going well. If nothing else the great server outage has saved you all from regular updates.

I got out for a short ride on the weekend. Not much more than a few laps around the block to make sure I could still do it.

I’ve been doing quite a few hours on the trainer, and Zwift has been brilliant  – a real sanity-saver but also very social.

Mostly 60-90 minute sessions but yesterday I did over three hours, which was 100km. Some guy in Japan did 300km in 11 hours. Tell you what, having not spent much time on trainers, I hadn’t quite appreciated how hard it is when you don’t do any freewheeling over that length of time.

Anyway I’m back in Dubai now and generally OK. The leg is fine in a straight line and if there’s nothing sudden or slippy but I’m still limping around and not very nimble. Using the walking stick not so much for support but really to indicate to people that I can’t leap out of their way while they walk along texting.

I’ve definitely reached the point where the gains are becoming ever more marginal. At some point it will stop but hopefully not for a little while yet.

er, you might get a -1 coming your way? Anyway, how’s the recovery coming on – been on the road yet, or still sticking to the turbo-trainer?

Don’t get complacent though, no resting on your laurels, not too many stiff drinks, there’s still The Gear and V-Caps to sort out.

Too bloody right. No articles to write, no comments to reply to and he still hasn’t sorted out the freaking caps.

@girl

Very nice to see the site back up and running. Nice work @frank. It would be interesting to see how everyone’s riding kilometres spiked since we clearly had more time to ride.

Fortunately, or unfortunately, depending upon your point of view, I live in Wisconsin. To say it’s been a bit nippy of late is an understatement. I think the high was like 4 degrees yesterday. Not. Riding. Weather. You know it’s bad when the weather guy on the radio says, unironically, “it’s going to warm up nicely to 16 degrees today.”

Still, I have 5 rides in this year which is 5 more than this time last year!

Man I feel for ya up there in the great white… I have to say that the weather down here in the deep south as well has helped to prevent any serious effort at being fit for the early season. And today’s race, Southern Cross, 55 miles of forest road in N GA Mtns was postponed due to ice storm having knocked out power and made roads impassable. The dang daffodils are popping up and it’s supped to be blue skies and sunshine down here in Alabama! It’s cold.

Reminds me of the baby polar bear, asking his dad if he is 100% polar bear. His dad saying uhhh, ask your mom. Baby polar bear asks mom if he’s 100% polar and momma polar bear says, of course you are 100% polar bear son, why do you ask? And baby polar bear says, ’cause I’m friggen cold mom.

@ChrisO

Six weeks of recovery most of it with no Velominati.

Thank god there was still porn.

Oh, yeah. That’s the first +1 badge of the new site award sorted, then.

Cheers to that! +1 indeed. I can’t imagine what all’s involved. Both recovering from hip surgery and recovering from cranky servers.

Don’t get complacent though, no resting on your laurels, not too many stiff drinks, there’s still The Gear and V-Caps to sort out.

Very nice to see the site back up and running. Nice work @frank. It would be interesting to see how everyone’s riding kilometres spiked since we clearly had more time to ride.

Fortunately, or unfortunately, depending upon your point of view, I live in Wisconsin. To say it’s been a bit nippy of late is an understatement. I think the high was like 4 degrees yesterday. Not. Riding. Weather. You know it’s bad when the weather guy on the radio says, unironically, “it’s going to warm up nicely to 16 degrees today.”

Still, I have 5 rides in this year which is 5 more than this time last year!

Great to see you back posting. I must apologise for not popping in to visit to see how the family and the house has developed! Catch up on the bike soon.

@Teocalli

@ChrisO

Sigh, one thing is still the same – my IP address from home is still on the blacklist.

Have to use the VPN to comment, or do it from work.

but @frank is in clearly in high spirits as the +1 badge does actually exist…………………

Hey, me saying “+1″ and awarding the badge are two different things. I expect everyone to be funny and clever and witty and a bit of a jackass (Rule #43) but the badge is only awarded if you truly outsize expectations.

I trust the very last bit is not a ref to @ChrisO‘s porn link……………..

Sigh, one thing is still the same – my IP address from home is still on the blacklist.

Have to use the VPN to comment, or do it from work.

That is just so weird. And the fact that I can’t whitelist you makes me insane. And I’m sure there are others who struggle with the same thing but I have no way of knowing (we get about 1000 spam comments a day, impossible to filter them.)

@ChrisO

Sigh, one thing is still the same – my IP address from home is still on the blacklist.

Have to use the VPN to comment, or do it from work.

but @frank is in clearly in high spirits as the +1 badge does actually exist…………………

Hey, me saying “+1” and awarding the badge are two different things. I expect everyone to be funny and clever and witty and a bit of a jackass (Rule #43) but the badge is only awarded if you truly outsize expectations.

So so glad it was a temporary situation and I’m looking forward to enjoying the articles and banter helping motivate me back out regularly on the bike.  VLVV

Have a Beer!

Sigh, one thing is still the same – my IP address from home is still on the blacklist.

Have to use the VPN to comment, or do it from work.

but @frank is in clearly in high spirits as the +1 badge does actually exist…………………

Have to use the VPN to comment, or do it from work.

@RobSandy

Sharp eye. Fixed. Thanks for that!

@sthilzy

Wow, that’s an old book mark! Forgot the redirect when I moved the site, added back in. Thanks!

Also (ignore the blank post above), the Random articles feature seems to have got stuck. It’s been the same 5 there since before the site was brought back to life:

“But He Didn’t Inhale”

“The Ride of the Year”

“The Man with the Hammer”

“Cycling: A Year in Review”

“The Union Cycliste Irational (sic)”

“A Step Too Far”

@RobSandy

Sharp eye. Fixed. Thanks for that!

Six weeks of recovery most of it with no Velominati.

Thank god there was still porn.

Oh, yeah. That’s the first +1 badge of the new site award sorted, then.

Yep. Sad news. WK Ronse 1988. Godverdomme!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nI4W2l2J7fg

RIP Claude Criquielion, fine champion. With thanks to Winning Magazine’s The Fabulous World of Cycling for the memories…

Fuck. Another gone way too soon. I always liked CC. A good strong rider who mixed it up with the best. RIP.

You got that right. My productivity will now slump back to its usual pathetic levels.

The world is now spinning a little more smoothly now that we’re back in business.

I would have reduced the servers to rubble with a chain whip, pedal wrench and headset press had I been in your position.

Frank: your work on this is really appreciated!

@ChrisO

Six weeks of recovery most of it with no Velominati.

Thank god there was still porn.

This wins the internet!

Speaking of porn, I found an original report of Eddy Merckx winning the 1974 World Championship: http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1946&dat=19740826&id=BIkxAAAAIBAJ&sjid=1KEFAAAAIBAJ&pg=871,2871537

“…masochistically breaking trail through the humid air for four other riders.” I like that line!

Sharp eye. Fixed. Thanks for that!

@sthilzy

Wow, that’s an old book mark! Forgot the redirect when I moved the site, added back in. Thanks!

Too late…

@Frank Many thanks for the hard work in getting V back as it should be.

Six weeks of recovery most of it with no Velominati.

Thank god there was still porn.

word of warning to those at work, don’t google ‘bicycle porn’.

@ChrisO

Six weeks of recovery most of it with no Velominati.

Thank god there was still porn.

This wins the internet!

Speaking of porn, I found an original report of Eddy Merckx winning the 1974 World Championship: http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1946&dat=19740826&id=BIkxAAAAIBAJ&sjid=1KEFAAAAIBAJ&pg=871,2871537

Thank god there was still porn.

Don’t know if this is some sort of teething issue, but when you go on ‘The Rules’, the ‘Recent Posts & Articles’ that appear are posts from years and years ago.

Witness-

Same, on work pc Chrome, IE and home pc Firefox. All have http://www.velominati.com/blog/the-rules/ is set as my Favourite Tab.

Witness-

As I am currently warming the bench for the unemployed team, my mornings usually start with a strong short coffee whilst perusing the international websites of note. Praise Merckx you have returned!

RIP Claude Criquielion, fine champion. With thanks to Winning Magazine’s The Fabulous World of Cycling for the memories…

@brett

@frank

Why didn’t you just turn it off and back on again?

For more better tech jargon say “Did you re-power cycle the unit?”

So 2000’s, now it’s have you tried deleting and reloading the app?

welcome back keepers and the rest of you.

@frank

Why didn’t you just turn it off and back on again?

For more better tech jargon say “Did you re-power cycle the unit?”

@JohnB

Welcome back, Life is now good.

Stop teasing with the promises of additions to the V Gear, just hurry up and make it so.

Should be easier now that I’m not fighting the server gorrilla now.

Why didn’t you just turn it off and back on again?

The bank balance has suffered a serious blow. I blame you @Frank!

Shit happens

Rode in my first event of the year last Sunday. 80k event plus 70k extras for more volume. Training with a coach since October is paying off big time. 

As of next week more intensity get’s folded in. Need this site up and running to compliment the developing guns and engine.

FYI here is the new 9 bike / commuter ‘Serse’

It’s so fast now.

You mean You’re so fast now. On your new Veloforma…

Speaking of the VSP, is it ready for 2015 yet? I mean, the site has been up again for, like, a day now.

@PeakInTwoYears

Yeah, that’s reserved for future use.

10-4.

And I like the up arrow too.

Why is it I suddenly want a down arrow? Spoiled already!

I also can’t see my comment while typing. Just a blank screen. I sure hope my typing clases at Mckinly middle school paid off…

@brett

Damn, now I’m gonna have to write something…

We can always count on you to focus in on the right issue!

Oh right… Yay, we’re back!