A Biking Post
Mid-week, hamburger patty, onion rings, Greebo the cat. What does it all mean? Who can say? These words just pop in my head on the train and they end up here. I have a headache, a slight sore throat, and a little congestion. Maybe I should have stayed at a Holiday Inn Express last night?
The State of this Onion? After 2 days off I was back in the saddle this morning. Some basic Tempo-maintenance for 55 minutes. Why 55? It just works out that was. I go until 6:10 am and then rush like mad to get out of the house in time. One of my goals in 2008 is to spend less time on the trainer. Last year I spent a lot of hours on it and I'd prefer not to repeat that this year. But last year I needed it. Right now I'm a year plus into the "real thing" so it's not quite as pressing. Even though I fell off after the season I know I'm stronger now than last year at this time.
So right now is sorta "filling in the blanks" of December. I just need to get to this weekend then I have 11 days to bump up that foundation further and get some solid saddle time in. After the new year I'll start feeding in some Threshold work which is basically Tempo+1. Then in February I'm going to start the 2-6 week Ross Psychotic Tmax intervals which then bleed into a 4 week block of longer intervals. Tmax is generally in the 1 minute realm and the longer ones are 4-5 minutes. At the end of that I'll go into the first block of the race season, a "maintenance" phase of sorts. Then a little valley in the middle of summer, then a second build for the end of season.
So that's my sort of State of the Onion right now. I need to hammer out details and dates and stuff. I also need to get through the rest of this week. It's hard to believe it's only Wednesday. I guess this post turned into something mainly for Chris and Maurice as most of you guys probably zone out when you read it.
So I may as well keep going. Not sure how much I'm going to follow Ross to the letter because he suggests 4 days on of Tmax intervals and then 3 days off. The obvious flaw there is that you get zero time off-road which is just not acceptable. So I'm going with a partial/modified approach. When the weather is bad I may bang out a few back-to-back weeks of it but my overall approach will likely be off-road on Saturday and then maybe 3 days of Tmax stuff. Or I may throw in some longer rides on a Sunday, by which I mean 1.5-2 hours. As a sport class rider my endurance doesn't need to be very high at all. So my need for 3 hour rides is zilch other than to go out and enjoy myself from time to time and maybe with an eye on jumping up to expert sooner than later. Because let's face it, that's the goal.
So the trainer this morning gave me just under 20 miles today which gives me 2001 miles on the trainer and 2033 miles on the road, adding the 820 off-road miles brings the yearly total to 4854, just 146 short of 5000. Figure tomorrow morning on the trainer as well and then hopefully not again until January. Hopefully.
At some point I should revisit my offseason goals but right now all I've done is stopped night eating and regulated my weight at a solid 190 right now. My aim is to be 190 (or less) at the end of vacation rolling into the new year. At the beginning of 2007 I saw 202 so that's a lot of progress. I suppose I've also adjusted my riding to accommodate the Sat-Tue schedule I'll be maintaining in February and March. Other than that I haven't done anything else. That's all well and good as the eating and weight stuff is plenty thus far.
OK that was my serious biking post for the month. Back to gibberish and cow pies for a while. Winter hasn't even started yet bitches!
The State of this Onion? After 2 days off I was back in the saddle this morning. Some basic Tempo-maintenance for 55 minutes. Why 55? It just works out that was. I go until 6:10 am and then rush like mad to get out of the house in time. One of my goals in 2008 is to spend less time on the trainer. Last year I spent a lot of hours on it and I'd prefer not to repeat that this year. But last year I needed it. Right now I'm a year plus into the "real thing" so it's not quite as pressing. Even though I fell off after the season I know I'm stronger now than last year at this time.
So right now is sorta "filling in the blanks" of December. I just need to get to this weekend then I have 11 days to bump up that foundation further and get some solid saddle time in. After the new year I'll start feeding in some Threshold work which is basically Tempo+1. Then in February I'm going to start the 2-6 week Ross Psychotic Tmax intervals which then bleed into a 4 week block of longer intervals. Tmax is generally in the 1 minute realm and the longer ones are 4-5 minutes. At the end of that I'll go into the first block of the race season, a "maintenance" phase of sorts. Then a little valley in the middle of summer, then a second build for the end of season.
So that's my sort of State of the Onion right now. I need to hammer out details and dates and stuff. I also need to get through the rest of this week. It's hard to believe it's only Wednesday. I guess this post turned into something mainly for Chris and Maurice as most of you guys probably zone out when you read it.
So I may as well keep going. Not sure how much I'm going to follow Ross to the letter because he suggests 4 days on of Tmax intervals and then 3 days off. The obvious flaw there is that you get zero time off-road which is just not acceptable. So I'm going with a partial/modified approach. When the weather is bad I may bang out a few back-to-back weeks of it but my overall approach will likely be off-road on Saturday and then maybe 3 days of Tmax stuff. Or I may throw in some longer rides on a Sunday, by which I mean 1.5-2 hours. As a sport class rider my endurance doesn't need to be very high at all. So my need for 3 hour rides is zilch other than to go out and enjoy myself from time to time and maybe with an eye on jumping up to expert sooner than later. Because let's face it, that's the goal.
So the trainer this morning gave me just under 20 miles today which gives me 2001 miles on the trainer and 2033 miles on the road, adding the 820 off-road miles brings the yearly total to 4854, just 146 short of 5000. Figure tomorrow morning on the trainer as well and then hopefully not again until January. Hopefully.
At some point I should revisit my offseason goals but right now all I've done is stopped night eating and regulated my weight at a solid 190 right now. My aim is to be 190 (or less) at the end of vacation rolling into the new year. At the beginning of 2007 I saw 202 so that's a lot of progress. I suppose I've also adjusted my riding to accommodate the Sat-Tue schedule I'll be maintaining in February and March. Other than that I haven't done anything else. That's all well and good as the eating and weight stuff is plenty thus far.
OK that was my serious biking post for the month. Back to gibberish and cow pies for a while. Winter hasn't even started yet bitches!
Labels: training
1 Comments:
At 7:51 AM,
Anonymous said…
Interesting, as always.
Following your proposed calendar, when does "race season" arrive? April?
I'd offer that the endurance base rides are important not because they should equate with your common race distance, but because a "bigger" endurance base (theoretically) will allow you to build your intensity to a higher level.
-ChrisG
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