Cycle to work

Bray Header

Hi Folks,

I cycled to work today for the first time, having spent a few months building up my fitness.

The cycle was from City Centre to Citywest, via Coombe, Crumlin, Longmile, Naas Road Cycle lane.

Distance was 14.3 K, mostly uphill (as those familiar with the route will know).

Time was 43 mins door to door, I reckon I can get this to 30 over time.

I'm riding a Giant RX Hybrid, with Maxxis Slicks (changed from Winter Tyre last week).

Any tips on how I can improve this time, other than practise and fitness?

Also, should I eat before or after cycling to work? I ate after today.

seamus

If you can get that down to 30 minutes, then fair ****s to you. The problem with timing your commute is traffic lights. Most bike computers have a function which stops timing when you stop, but the problem is the ten seconds slowing down to the lights and then the ten seconds accelerating away again. This might add 20 seconds onto your time, which isn't much. But if you have to do this at 15 sets of traffic lights, that "adds" five minutes to the timer on your computer.

I have a 10km commute and it's practically impossible to get the homeward leg below 30 minutes because no matter how good the tailwind on a particular day, I'm constantly neutralised by lights.

Since you're relatively new to cycling, you can definitely chop some time off your commute, probably up to ten minutes at most. Just keep cycling and the fitness and time improvement will come. You know you're getting no fitness increase from your commute if you're not sweating and breathing heavy at the end. If you're sweating, you're working.

Whether to eat before or after is a matter of personal preference. I eat before but that's because my inward commute is practically effortless, I could nearly freewheel in. If I had to work at it, I wouldn't feel good riding with breakfast in my stomach, and I would eat when I got in, as I did for years.

t'bear

I have a 15km commute, eat before I go out and tend to be a bit hungary on the way home, not that I have tried to reverse the sequence to see what impact there is. But I notice the morning trip tends to be meh (timewise) whereas I bomb home most evenings. I am breathing hard and sweating on both ends of the trip and typically feel very good after cool down.

My homeward commute is the one I use to time, started out with 35 mins on a flat road (3 months ago) , hit 29:20 last week but halfway home I knew this was going to be a fast one so I kept the pressure on.

Beasty

Bray Header wrote: »

Any tips on how I can improve this time, other than practise and fitness?

That about sums it up, plus wait for a tailwind

Bray Header wrote: »

Also, should I eat before or after cycling to work? I ate after today.

I have a 23k commute - can never be bothered eating before, but have a bowl of porrige when I'm in work

njburke

OP, I have a similar commute, 14.8 KM, my time started out at around 42 Minutes but I've got it down over the past few weeks as the fitness has come up. I did it in 33 one day recently.
I think the trick is to keep up the pace throughout the commute rather than try sprinting on sections and recovering. Also my confidence on the bike has come up over the past few weeks.

Above all try to enjoy the commute.

t'bear

Dont forget to checkout the surroundings, fresh air, rising sun etc.

Pigeon Reaper

I do roughly the same route going through town to Citywest. I find going up the Quays to St Johns road past the Gaol and into Inchicore it quicker than the Coombe/Longmile road mostly due to fewer lights and the N4/N7 tend to get priority where there are lights.
I never eat before cycling. I do 23Km each way from Raheny to Citywest and find eating afterwards is better, just make sure you have some water.

thebourke

I do a 23 k daily (11.5k each way)commute from kimmage to leopardstown in 1hour 5 mins approx...i eat before i go to work as it is uphill in the morning...a good bowl of porridge with honey is what i have....

triggermortis

If I'm on day shift I have to be in work for 6am so eating before is not an option so I'll have porridge in work. If I'm on nights, I'll usually have a bigish meal about 4pm and cycle in around 5.15. I only have a 10Km ride each way but I've found that I go faster after work than before no matter which shift I am on. Its fairly flat all the way and 99% traffic free (Swiss efficiency).

langdang

Left the house about 12hours ago, 16k in, 16k to look forward to on the way home soon. The highlight of my day - nothing seems so bad if you can cycle in the sun.

Fairweather commuter only though. Not really practical to on crap days for me with the "facilities" available at work...

Dunno how much you'll be able to chop off the 43mins for a 14k commute...

I have porridge before I leave, and a scone/yoghurt soon after I get into work.