This sequence shows how I will get into WiTHiN from deep water. I build a wood frame that simulates the size and general shape of a door that I will cut in the side of the top deck. This door will swing open like a gull wing door. The bottom of the opening is a few inches above the water line. I can kick myself in through the door head first, put my hand down on the flat seat (the seat has to be fully reclined first), push my head and upper body up with my arm, sit on the seat and then finally pull my knees through, then feet. It’s actually fairly easy. I reverse the procedure for exiting.

The other part of that strange looking wooden contraption is holding 60 pounds of weight at the exact location of the center of mass of the top deck. The top deck weighs 60 pounds, so this simulates exactly what effect the full top deck will have on the stability of WiTHiN.

My first test ride included only 25 pounds on the floor as ballast to offset some of that 60 pound weight up high. She definitely rocked much slower than before due to the center of mass now being further away from the center of roll. She also sat lower in the water due to the extra 75 pounds and sharp turns came very close to flooding the cockpit. Flooding during a turn or from waves will not be an issue with the top deck on unless the hatch is open. On the ocean, I will need to think about a bailing system for when that hatch is open and waves splash in, or I am getting in or out.

When I go into a turn, WiTHiN leans into the turn for a second or two, then she leans the opposite way. When I re-center the rudder, the opposite lean continues for a second or two, then she levels out. I call this ‘recoil steer’. It is caused by the position that the rudder and drive leg take during a lean into a turn. I’m not sure I completely understand what is happening under the water, but this is normal. With the 60 pounds on top, the recoil steer seemed exaggerated, but again, this could be due to the increased displacement from the extra weight.

Next on the agenda is rigging up some lines for the rudder instead of my push/pull rod. Then I can prepare the top deck (insert the 2nd half of the bulkheads), and glass the top deck right onto the kayak hull. Then, I can cut out the door, and cut out the window. Then I crawl in and finish off glassing the bulkhead seams, and inside perimeter of the top deck. Then the window and then small hatches for the rear and front compartments. Finally, I need to add vents and a couple of windows – small hatches that open for fresh air – one on the ceiling and two for each side (left hand side window will be on the door).

The LIVE reports and videos from onboard
WiTHiN during the 24 hour record attempt are here.

View the photos of the event at the PTO web site

Hey everyone:

I am recovering. Like I say to the media when they ask how I feel: “right now, I feel like I was run over by a truck”.

Here is a re-cap of my 24 hour adventure on Saturday/Sunday.

Before I start, I really want to extend my gratitude to friends and family who came out to help and support me. There would not have been any attempt if not for your help! In fact, I would NOT have finished the 24 hours if it wasn’t for you. I would have quit. The only thing that kept me going at 4:00 am was that I couldn’t allow myself to quit because I couldn’t let you down. You had invested so much into this that I felt indebted to you and I felt that this was the least I could do to pay you back for your investment. You were counting on me to do my best, and that is what I was determined to do even though every single muscle cell of my body (and my stomach) was screaming at me to stop. I didn’t stop, and in a very small way, I am a better man now because of that. Again, I have you guys to thank for that.

My crew: My wife Helen, sisters Theresa and Carol, my dad Rudi, Ben Eadie, Stefan Dalberg, John Mackay, Gary Erickson

Official HPVA Observers: Rob Hitchcock, Joey, Melanie, Chris, Greg

Glenmore reservoir patrol boat: Trevor Lamb and his staff

Photographers: Ben Eadie, Jennifer Armand, Karl Staddon

Signs: my bro – Alan

Psychological support: my mom Liz, Karl Gall, Linda Gall, Cyrille Armand, Jennifer Armand, Tom Short, Gord Weber, Val Erickson, Cody and Krista, Nick, Andy, Keisha, Stephan, Ryan, Bridget, Dustin, etc, etc

Also thanks to all of the others who stopped by during the day to check out my progress and cheer me on! Your support means more to me than you realize.

Friday, June 1, 2007 – “the last supper”

At 9:00 am I met Stefan, the surveyor Adrian Slater from Precision Geomatics Inc., Rob Hitchcock and the patrol boat out at the reservoir to pick out and measure my course. The surveyor Adrian was kind enough to donate his time. We decided on a rectangular course that routed around the rowing lanes. My starting waypoint would be an invisible mark 5 feet out from the dock. If I touched the dock when I went around, it was determined that I would have to be inside that invisible waypoint. The other 4 markers were existing and the surveyor took readings from his GPS at the center points of each 2 foot square box. The lake was calm and there was no wind. Here are the GPS coordinates starting at the dock.

WP-
N 50 Deg 59′ 07.62732″
W 114 Deg 07′ 00.57808″

Mk 1-
N 50 Deg 59′ 12.41543″
W 114 Deg 06′ 50.11895″

Mk 2-
N 50 Deg 59′ 41.02233″
W 114 Deg 06′ 05.17377″

Mk 3-
N 50 Deg 59′ 38.87088″
W 114 Deg 06′ 01.92596″

Mk 4-
N 50 Deg 59′ 04.49201″
W 114 Deg 06′ 55.76932″

Below is the GPS data plotted on Google Maps from AFTER the 24 hour record that shows my track during the 24 hours.

I invited the crew and their families out for dinner to Chiantes Italian restaurant to thank them in advance for their support and help. A great meal was had by all and I got to bed early – about 10:30 pm.

Saturday, June 2, 2007 – “race day”

I woke up at 7:00 am after a sound nights sleep. I had the car packed with my gear, and WiTHiN loaded onto the roof rack the night before, so all I had to do was get dressed, eat and head out. I did a couple of live telephone radio interviews before I headed out the door. I picked up my buddy Gary on the way and we drove straight to Glenmore Canoe Club at the Glenmore Reservoir.

I did another radio interview by cell phone when we arrived and Stefan, Gary and Ben helped unload WiTHiN and my 2 boxes of gear. By the time my interview was over, they had the boat set up on it’s stand on the dock. I put the seat in, the drive leg, my food bin, GPS, cell phone and iPod. Stefan taped over the drive leg plug seam under the hull with Gorilla tape. I don’t think this made any difference at all, but I thought that it would be a good way of stopping the bay plug from accidentally moving during the 24. It also covers over some very small seams between the plug and the hull – but didn’t really make any noticeable difference to my speed or efficiency.

Rob Hitchcock arrived and went over procedures and schedules with the observers. Then the patrol boat came over to take the first two observers over to the turn around dock. The turn around dock is a small floating dock tied to the far North West corner of my 3.217981 km course.

9:00 am Saturday

Below is a plot from my GSP showing my average speeds throughout the day. I found this useful when trying to remember what I was feeling during different parts of the day:

I got into WiTHiN at about 5 minutes to 9:00 and Rob gave me a count down using his atomic clock. I started BEHIND the start waypoint at exactly 9:00 am.

I was instantly surprised at my cadence gain! 150 watts at 87 rpm!! It used to be 76 rpm. I had an overwhelming urge on Friday to give my prop another small twist. I knew from experience that you should never run anything untested on race day, but I was also very concerned about my knee problem which I think was due to the slow turn over and that extra stress placed on my knees. I had added some additional twist to my prop previously via instructions from Rick Willoughby (WiTHiN’s designer), and the small increase in twist gave me a few additional RPMs, but not quite enough, as my cadence was still well under 80 at 150 watts. I knew that I would be slipping to 100 watts later on in the 24 hours and also knew that a cadence of 50 or less would be murder on my knees. I couldn’t resist the urge, so I put the blades in the vice and added more twist. I was lucky because the spin was perfect – almost 90 RPM and still at around 80 for lower wattage’s.

The first few hours were great – I was enjoying the perfect day – sunshine and heating up nicely. Calm water, cheery crew, lots of people out on the lake in their kayaks, canoes, rowing sculls and outriggers. They all knew what i was doing from the signs at out home base dock, and all of the TV, radio and newspaper press I had been getting in the days leading up to the big event. Everyone was cheering me on and I felt really great.

2:00 pm Saturday

It started to get pretty hot – I was noting 32 degrees C (89 degrees F) on the SRM meter. My average speed was between 8.5 and 9 kph, my average watts was around 145 or so and my knees were OK, but my feet were getting a bit numb. I was still having a good time and generally enjoying the whole experience

6:00 pm Saturday

At 9 hours into the day I started to feel some aches creep into my knees. My feet were no long numb for some reason. Strange. I can remember trying to exaggerate the circling action of my legs rather than pushing. More pulling back as well as pushing, but with an attempt to actually lift my feet up off the shoe bed on each pull stroke. This seemed to work. It never really did anything in training, but today it was working for some reason. My average was still near 9 kph and my power output was still pretty good.

9:00 pm Saturday

The sun was setting now and I knew it would be a long and difficult night. I was kind of looking forward to riding at night on the lake though – something I have never experienced before. My pace had dropped to between 7.6 to 8 kph and my overall average had dropped to 8.5 kph. I was still way over record pace, but my goal was to pad that as much as possible because I knew what the night was going to bring. My knees were starting to hurt a lot. This was a difficult time psychologically because I was 1/2 way though and it was kind of awful to think about another 12 hours still left to go!!

After dark Saturday

The night was weird. I wasn’t very happy because I was starting to get pretty uncomfortable from the pain in my knees, Achilles tendons and hamstrings. In reflecting on all of this now, I realize that it is probably due to the vastly reduced training period leading up to the event. I only had about 4 weeks to go from a fairly good trained state n my triathlon road bike to ultra endurance state in the recumbent position. It was the only time that fit into the summer and the schedule at the reservoir, so I thought I could do it. I was paying the price. I never felt pains like this during my two prior 24 hour record attempts with Critical Power streamliner on the track. In both previous efforts I had a few months worth of endurance training in the recumbent position, not a few weeks!

It also started to get very cold. I put on 3 sweaters, a rain jacket, my cycling pants and my winter mitts. I also started to feel very sick to my stomach. Greg who was observing on the far turn around dock during the entire night knows a little of what I was going through, and I don’t want to say how he knew.

I was really surprised at how well i could see on the lake at night. The full moon – which was one reason why we scheduled this event for the first weekend in June – didn’t actually rise until shortly before sunrise, so it was of no use to me. However, I had no problem seeing everything on the lake. Stefan mounted glow sticks on my course buoys so I could see them from across the lake.

I was being dive-bombed by bats! the strangest thing. At first they were kind of freaking me out. I realized that they were gliding a few inches above the surface of the water eating the mosquitos. The would stop just before hitting the boat and me, and flutter up and away. Very freaky though.

Thanks for all the phone calls!!! I got quite a few phone calls during the night and these really went a long way in passing the time. I was using these headphones by SkullCandy that plug into both your cell phone and your iPod. When you get a phone call, it mutes the iPod and connects you to the phone call. The headphone have a small clip on mic for hands free talking. They work really awesome!

Sunrise Sunday

I was starting to feel very sleepy shortly before sunrise. I think this might be due to my power output dropping so much that I just wasn’t exerting as much effort to keep my heart rate up, keep me warm and alert. I would close my eyes for a minute and feel like I was starting to nod off. Then I would shake my head and slap my face to wake up. This was a pretty rough time. Falling asleep, can’t get the power up because everything hurts so bad. My stomach was ready to heave up 20 hours worth of Gatorade, boost, coke, and bars.

The sun started to rise and I started to loose that sleepy feeling. My stomach was still bad, but I was concerned that I was going to run out of energy before the finish, so I wanted to eat something, but the thought of food made my stomach feel worse. Helen offered my a cup of hot, salty noodle soup and I was instantly craving it, so I knew that I must have been a bit salt depleted. That soup was magically good and it got me going again. After the soup, I started to slowly take in more carbs at a rate that my queasy stomach could take.

My average speed had dropped to just below 8 kph now. I knew that if i could make it to 24 hours that I would break the record and that was really the only thought that kept me on the lake. It would have been so easy to just say forget it and give up, but I knew that I could easily make the record if I could just withstand a few more hours of misery.

After I started taking in some more calories, my energy picked up a bit and I was able to hold an average of around 8 kph.

9:00 am Sunday

People started to filter back into life as the sun got higher in the sky on Sunday morning. Rowers and kayakers on the lake, and my friend Bryon Howard was out in his kayak to help me make it to the finish line – thank goodness!

Rob and my dad had been counting down my laps to the record from 15 laps to go until the last lap. That helped quite a bit because it kept me focused on notching down that count 30 minutes at a time. I was pretty relieved when I was on my last lap and got cheers from everyone as I crossed the start line and had broken the 168 km record. I decided that I needed to pad it a bit by doing one more lap and I had an hour, 15 minutes to do it, so I docked WiTHiN and hobbled up the steps for a luxurious use of the facilities in the Canoe Club.

I finished my final lap and the champagne was popped and we celebrated. Some press was there and I did a few interviews, signed some autographs for the kids and Pat Lor drove me home. My buddies Gary and Stefan packed up WiTHiN and my gear in my car and drove it home for where I was sound asleep in bed.

I think I had the best sleep of my life that night.

Again – thanks to everyone. This is as much your accomplishment as it is mine.

———————————————————–

Next – to get WiTHiN ready for the open ocean! We have a family kayaking trip planed for the Broken Islands on Vancouver Island at the end of August. It is my plan to have the full-deck version of WiTHiN ready for that multi-day camping trip. The first step is to simulate the weight of the full deck and figure out the weight and location of ballast required to offset the weight of the full deck. Then I need to simulate a hole for an entry hatch and see if it can be used for a deep water entry. Then it is back in the shop.

Stay tuned!

Hello everyone Ben Eadie here, the geek behind the brawn. I have been entrusted to post on this blog by Greg while he is out on the boat during the record attempt…

Ohhh! the power Bwaaaahahahahaaha…… hack! cough! he he…. So you will have to put up with mine bad gammer and speling for a post or two….

Anyhow here is another TV interview done by Greg, and I am positive there will be more to come in the next day or so.

Ben (The Geek) Eadie

YOU CAN FOLLOW MY PROGRESS DURING THE 24 HOUR RECORD ATTEMPT

On Saturday June 2, 2007 starting at 9:00 am MST, I will be transmitting blog updates directly from a camera phone on WiTHiN – probably about one per hour or so. I won’t be emailing these updates, so if you want to follow my progress, you will have to visit the blog home page:

http://www.adventuresofgreg.com/HPB/HPBmain.html

Ben and John Mackay will try to get to an Internet connection at various points to upload YouTube videos and photos of the action. The RSS feed is here: http://www.adventuresofgreg.com/HPB/hpv.xml

I will have a cell phone on WiTHiN – it’s hooked right into my iPod. I’ll have plenty of time to chat, so call me if you want. 403-651-2748

We are meeting the surveyor out at the reservoir tomorrow morning to figure out and measure my course. Tomorrow night is the ‘last supper’. Then Saturday morning I get to work. I am getting kind of excited – looking forward to getting back on the lake. I have been resting this week and I’m almost a full day into my carb loading, so my energy is starting to return.

URL’s and numbers:

The main web site: http://www.pedaltheocean.com
The Blog: http://www.adventuresofgreg.com/HPB/HPBmain.html
The 24 hour record information page:
http://www.adventuresofgreg.com/HPB/24hour.html
Greg’s on-board phone # 403-651-2748

Also the new web site is now finished and LIVE:

www.PedalTheOcean.com

MEDIA CRAZINESS

They don’t call him the PR wizard for nothing. Neil Bousquet from Synergy Marketing has been working magic getting me press coverage for the 24 hour record attempt this Saturday. I’ve been bombarded with Television, newspaper and radio interviews all week.

The major reason I decided to go for a new 24 hour human powered boat record is because I thought the event would be a great opportunity to generate some good publicity for the Atlantic crossing expedition. The plan was to complete our sponsorship package and coincide a push to find sponsors with the press that we generate from the 24 hour event.

Landing sponsors requires a very pro-active, sales approach. You can’t do your PR, sit back and wait for sponsors to knock on your door. It doesn’t work like that unfortunately. You have to pick up the phone, make contacts negotiate and develop relationships. We had someone on the team who was going to do that, but due to some very unfortunate circumstances, that job is now open.

And so we decided to proceed with the 24, issue the press releases, and finish the official PedalTheOcean.com web site anyhow, then wait until things calm down a bit and fill the open sponsor marketing position, then make our push later this summer or early next fall.

The press that Neil has generated for Pedal The Ocean has been spectacular! The high-light was a 10 minute appearance by yours truly on the Breakfast Television show on CityTV. The YouTube video of the show is above.

Here is a list of this weeks interviews:

• Almost a full page in the Calgary Sun
• Front page of Metro News
• Two pieces in the Calgary Herald
• 660 News Calgary
• 5 minute Shaw TV segment
• 15 minute CityTV talk show
• Discovery Channel (taped last week, to be aired in September)

On top of all that, some of the local TV stations and newspapers will be at the Glenmore reservoir on Saturday to report on the actual record attempt.

Plenty of fun. It’s also been a great opportunity for me to talk a bit on the childhood obesity issue. In fact, we got another KidPower school presentation from a teacher who saw me on TV.

The lake was like a mirror on Saturday. The paddle wheel boat in the background is the SS Moyie – a recreation of a paddle steamer from Heritage Park that cruises the Glenmore Reservoir

Paula Newby Frasier who is probably the most famous Ironman champion in history – an 8-Time Ironman Triathlon World Champion once gave me this advice from a presentation I was at. Typically, first timer advice from experienced Ironman triathletes is to ‘remember to have fun’. Paula says that Ironman isn’t fun. It’s not supposed to be fun. It’s probably one of the hardest things you will ever do, and when things are hard, they’re not fun. That’s what makes it such a challenging event. I know this and agree 100%. I don’t have fun on race day. But I have the time of my life after I have crossed the finish line! Especially when I have successfully achieved a goal or two. In fact, the ‘fun’ lasts for a very, very long time.

The pain is temporary. The pride is forever.

I am afraid of next weekend. It’s going to be tough. Very tough. It’s worse for me, because I know what I am in for, as I have been through it a couple of times before. 24 hours of non-stop pushing, pushing, pushing, pushing. Ugh!

Winston Churchill said “When you are going through hell, keep going!”

But, I must say that 24 hours of lake-side scenery sure beats going around a quarter-mile race track 1800 times.

As I type this blog update, my chair keeps bobbing up and down. I just spent 7 hours on the lake today on top of 8 hours yesterday. The feeling of floating with the waves does not stop when you climb out of your boat. It was a bit of a challenge to maintain the 7 km per hour speed average that I need to break the 24 hour human powered boat record ( IHPVA). And I was only out there for 8 hours. My knees are slowly getting a bit better, my right knee is pain-free now, and I am hoping that my left will follow suit by next weekend.

WiTHiN was not designed for a 24 hour HPB record, it was designed for an ocean crossing. While she is not the best hull shape for a speed record, she is probably just fast enough for the 24. That is what will make this challenge so difficult. There is no room for any coasting.

That said, I promise you all that I will give it my best.

———————————-

Here are some photos of Fridays continuation of the Discovery Channel shoot. They rigged up these tiny lipstick cameras to various locations on WiTHiN for some really cool footage.

Al and Neil from Discovery hooking up the lipstick cams

This is a photo of the ‘mission control center’ on WiTHiN showing my new Garmin eTRex Venture Cx GPS and the SRM power meter.

The 2 AA batteries on the Garmin supposedly last for over 50 hours! I am timing the battery life now to see how long it will last with the back light on. We decided that it would be easier and more accurate to simply have me follow my route on the GPS than having to string a long line of buoys that would have to be marked with lights. I tested this out on the lake on Saturday, and it is pretty easy to follow a pre-set route on the Garmin. It would be great if the batteries last for the entire night. If the batteries don’t last, then I will look at installing a small LED light to illuminate the Garmin screen.

My buddy John Mackay helping out

The plan is to mark the turn-around buoys and any obstacles near my path with glow sticks. June 2 is a full moon, so regardless, I should be able to see across the lake.

Ben picked up some of this really slick Loc-Line modular hose for me. I’m going to clamp it on the side perimeter deck and then mount the GPS and my iPod video to the other end so I can swivel it around for easy viewing without having to hold them.

SEPTEMBER 13 – 16, 2007LOS ANGELES CONVENTION CENTERSouth Hall (J and K)LOS ANGELES

There are a few recent developments that are very exciting!

I just finished a full day of shooting a 7 minute Discovery Channel segment with producer Neil Thomas from Full Throttle Films and Cinematographer Allan Leader. I was VERY impressed with this crew! Great guys and very professional. We shot a bunch of technical stuff in the shop with WiTHiN and then an interview. Tomorrow we head out to Glenmore reservoir for additional footage of WiTHiN on the lake. The show will air sometime in September due to a summer hiatus that the Daily Planet show takes.

The other exciting development is that we have been accepted to display Critical Power and WiTHiN at WIRED magazines NextFest.2007 exhibition.

About a month ago I received a package from WIRED magazine inviting me along with 500 other “technologies that WIRED magazine deems important to our future” to apply for an exhibit at NextFest.2007 :

This fall, WIRED Magazine is bringing its vision of a new world’s fair to Los Angeles. Experience more than 160 exciting exhibits from scientists, researchers, and inventors around the globe. WIRED NextFest features innovations in communication, design, entertainment, exploration, health, play, robots, transportation, security, and green living.

We submitted the following display proposal: “Two world records on the energy of a 100 watt light bulb”

It’s a great deal because WIRED magazine pays for the space. We need to pay for travel, accommodation, shipping and our display. I am hoping to pick up a sponsor to help offset those costs. This could be huge for a sponsor, as NextFest is covered by most major US and international media like CNN, Wall Street Journal, WIRED magazine, Discovery Channel, Science Channel, ABC, NBC, CBS, the Today Show, the New York Times, and hundreds of other broadcast, print and on-line outlets. We would, of course, splash the sponsors name all over the booth, Critical Power and WiTHiN.

We have two potential sponsors who are interested and all of this will end up going to the one who acts first. I was preparing a presentation the other day and just for fun I thought I would look up the cost of a two page spread in Popular Science magazine. It would cost $200,000. If I had a corporate sponsor for the 24 hour record attempt in Eureka, their branding would have been all over my 2-page Popular Science article and it would have cost them a fraction of what a 2-page spread is worth. I was also on the cover and I don’t think they even offer that as an advertising option.

Critical Power and my 24 hour HPV record are also in an upcoming issue of National Geographic Kids.

————————————————-

The weather around here has been pretty bad:

So my training has unfortunately taken a back seat. I plan on doing a longer ride on the lake tomorrow after we finish shooting with the Discovery Channel guys. I added a few degrees more twist to the prop, and exactly as Rick Willoughby said, it resulted in fixing my low cadence problem.

My brother-in law Tom Short was on hand to help with the new prop test.

I also made a smaller rudder to see if that made any difference in the speed and it didn’t seem to make much of a difference at all. In fact, even the handling felt about the same – turn radius is still very tight and it feels almost as responsive as it did when I was using the huge ocean rudder.

We are changing the course around the reservoir for the 24 hour human powered boat distance record attempt on June 2. We are moving our home base from the sailing club docks to the canoe club docks. The reason is to allow an easier move to our contingency route plan. If the forecast looks very windy for Saturday, we will shorten the course to a 3 km out and back along the canoe club docks on the wind sheltered side of the lake. Also using the canoe club docks as our staging area will move me past my crew about once every 10 to 15 minutes or so. I will still be doing a U-turn every 20 minutes as before, but this new course is sort of a figure 8 and the canoe club docks are in the middle.

The new map and details of the event:
http://www.adventuresofgreg.com/HPB/24hour.html

I successfully finished a full 10 hours on the Lake in WiTHiN yesterday. Whew! That was one LOOOONG day. Local kayaker Chris Comfort joined me for the last couple of hours which made the time pass by – thanks Chris!

The day had some slight windy moments and 1 to 2 foot waves kicked up. At the right angle to the waves, some were splashing over the perimeter deck and soaking me. I guess I should probably install some sort of splash lip on the cockpit edge in case it gets windy during the 24… I wonder if there was something temporary and removable that I could make just in case? Any ideas?

During parts of the day it was also dead calm, sunny and HOT. It reached a high of 29.5 degrees and the water was like a mirror.

My speed while I was peddling averaged around 9 kph. Including some lengthy stops to adjust my seat, etc, etc, my average was still hovering about 7 kph. If I could end up with a 7 average after the 24 hour attempt, that would convert to 168 km which is at the current record. During the record attempt, I am not planning on any stops at all if I can help it, so I really hope that I can maintain a least a 7 kph average by the end of the day. My goal is to end with a 8 kph average which would be 192 km. My 100 watt speed is about 8.3 kph, so an ending wattage average of 100 is realistic, as I have done it before.

My KNEES are becoming a problem now!! What a pain (literally). My numb feet weren’t a problem since I have lowered my seat back and replaced my small Speedplay pedals with larger Time pedals. The reclining of the seat back puts less pressure on my butt and lower back, so I think that it encourages better blood flow down to my feet – don’t know for sure. However, since the new open hip angle, my knees have started to ache. I think this has to do with one or a combination of these factors:

1. My lower cadence of 70 rpm for 150 watts
2. The knee position is ABOVE the pedal position at the maximum torque position of the crank.
3. Possibly a wider foot stance (Q factor) due to the position of the cleats for the new TIME pedals.
4. Possibly a closer than normal seat position (I’ve been playing around with various seat positions, shoes and cleats in order to resolve the numb issue, so that could have resulted in a closer than normal seat position)

I was out on the M5 for 2.5 hours on Tuesday and hammered for most of the ride at 250+ watts. I was using the new TIME pedals and I had NO indication of any pain whatsoever. The seat position is slightly different though – the distance from the seat bottom to the cranks is the same, but the seat back angle is higher. I can’t lower it any further on the M5 due to the addition of a mid drive last year.

I got my new prop yesterday and hauled everything out to the lake for a quick test and training session. Rick Willoughby made it for me and it only took about 1 week to get here by mail. From Australia!!

I could tell immediately that it was different because my cadence to produce power was about 10 rpm slower than my prop. It was also faster! On average .5 kph faster at 150 watts. I did some speed intervals on 10 watt increments and here is the result as compared to Ricks estimate:
We’re getting much closer. I still think the remaining gap is due to the hull shape.

On the agenda for this week is to get my HID headlight installed on WiTHiN. We’re still waiting to hear back from the city of Calgary as to weather I will be allowed to use the lithium polymer batteries for the light on the reservoir. My proposal to them is to have the batteries tethered to the boat or the dock at all times.

I also need to deal with the hydration IN/OUT systems. A water bag for hydration, and a ‘dirty water’ bag for outgoing. This bag will be handed off to the crew about once per hour when I circle around to the home base dock where I will pick up a new water bag and what ever food i require. For comm, I have decided to just use my cell phone instead of my two way radio. It’s lighter and the battery should last all day.

I am testing out my Trimble Recon PDA. It features a GPS with moving map software. I downloaded a detailed photo of the Glenmore reservoir from Google Maps and added it to the Fugawi GPS navigation software. It worked perfectly!

I also want to experiment with a video iPod, or portable DVD player. This would be a great way to take my mind off the monotony of going around and around in circles for 24 hours. The advantage to a DVD player is I can just stick any DVD in to watch it on the big screen. The disadvantage is poor visibility on the screen during the day, and poor battery life. The advantage to something like an iPod video is a bright screen and good battery life, but here in Canada, you can’t buy any video content from the iTunes music store – that sucks.