| 2008 march-april |
| Sunday, April 13, 2008 baby steps I guess this is the year of finishing races. It was a long hot day in the saddle. I was able to move around at will but had nothing left for the bunch finish. Rolled in at the back of the thirty some odd riders in the front group. I finished 17th on GC and learned some good lessons in the process. I need to race more. Lots more. Time to let it fly and go back to being a hammerhead. Saturday, April 12, 2008 Ouch! Shit, I I rode the same time as last year and got 22nd. It was hot and my average heart rate was 185 (178 is usually my flat tt hr). I puked in the parking lot. In the crit I was active at the front hoping to make a getaway. I flatted, took a free lap, then hung out at the back with Brick Radley. I bridged to a sizable break with about 15 minutes to go. The guys I talked to that didn't go said they thought that was the winning move. We had maybe a dozen guys and a pretty big gap but they couldn't work together. There are way better pacelines on the Monday night B ride. No lie. I finished with the bunch. One of Katie's high school English students took the final sprint. He's going to Cal next year. I'll be hunting the breaks again tomorrow. Time for more Cheetos. Friday, April 11, 2008 easy landing In-N-Out Burgers in Merced were yumdillyicious. It's gonna be nice and hot here tomorrow, good for us valley dwellers, bad for them Bay Area nerds. Nothing left to do but hydrate and wait. And eat Cheetos. Friday, April 11, 2008 leaving the station Yesterday was an easy 90 minute recovery ride. Today was 2x3:00 at 360 watts on the tt-bike with complete recovery. Tomorrow is 22 minutes in the pain cave. Off to farm country. I'll be posting as we go. Send mojo please. Next stop In-N-Out Burgers!!! Wednesday, April 09, 2008 rolleur 90 minutes of elbow time to and from the shop, followed by another 90 on the road bike. Easy endurance pace. I have a funny feeling that I’m about to uncork a monster effort on Saturday. And I’m way overdue for a run of good luck. I can hardly wait. Tuesday, April 08, 2008 triangulation I did 2x20 on the tt-bike. Followed by another 90 minutes of easy endurance on the road bike. The first 20 was 220 watts with a nice cadence of 100 rpm. The second was right in the sweet spot, 280 watts in a big gear. Both were with an average heart rate of 155. Weird. I like to focus separately on speed, cadence and power in hopes that I can go to the max with all three on race day. Tic tic tic, we shall see. I got my PowerTap disc wheel ready to rock. I am really excited about the time trial on Saturday. If for no other reason it is a delicious brand of pain that can’t be duplicated in training. From about 15 minutes on when the power curve begins to slope downward and the only thought is to maintain speed no matter what is where you get to learn exactly what you are made of. Muy delicioso! Monday, April 07, 2008 D-Train Did the Monday Night Wheelmen ride and spent mucho time on the front. The final 20 minutes I cranked out 340 watts and averaged 26.2 mph!!! That’s on my road bike with no aero gear. I think I’m ready. Sunday, April 06, 2008 2x20:00 hurts on tired legs I hit the aqueduct on Saturday with the tt-bike. 2x20:00 at 300 watts with five minutes rest. This workout hurts on tired legs. Saturday, April 05, 2008 tic toc tic toc Just finished another mini stage race block. The legs are still feeling the wrath of Super Sale. I’m hoping a day off tomorrow will help. That said, I feel like training is right on schedule and I should have good legs for the big event. Yesterday was 3x3:00 at 330 watts in the morning with a monster sprint at the end that resulted in my best 20 seconds in the last two seasons. Then in the evening I did a set of microbursts sprinting 15 seconds every two minutes for 45 minutes. So a recovery day tomorrow and one more block Monday and Tuesday and then I’ll freshen up for the weekend. Wednesday, April 02, 2008 Super Sale I survived five days in hell and managed a respectable sprint workout on Sunday night. Ten hour days on the feet are not my idea of a racing lifestyle, but Super Sale comes but once a year. Yesterday was VO2 in the morning and microbursts in the evening. Today was 2x20:00 on the tt-bike followed by the usual commute to and from work. I am cautiously optimistic that I am coming on form just in time. I have two more two day blocks to go before the big race. I am gonna go as hard as I can on the next one then spend Sunday on the couch. I only managed 32 minutes of microbursts so I’m hoping to extend that to one hour plus a full set of 6x3:00 on the VO2. We shall see. Wednesday, March 26, 2008 specificity, repeatibilty, self will run riot Did those farging 2x20 minutes on the aqueduct complete with Madera style rollers. Coulda gone harder, but the whole point of doing intervals is the ability to repeat them over and over in a race. And so it goes. One block down and three to go. Oh yeah, numbers for you squidheads. Yesterday was 360+ until the power dropped below 360. The fourth interval was at 352 so i cut it there and did one five minute effort at 315 to remind myself how to settle into race pace. Last nights microbursts were 15 seconds at 500+ every 2 minutes for 22 minutes with the average power of 280. Today was 308 and 305. We are on the move. Time to recover. Completing the work is one thing. Being ready to go again is another. Ooof, ya gotta wanna. Tuesday, March 25, 2008 bike drunk I did them VO2 intervals this morning on the tt-bike then walked around in a daze at work all day. It was a looooong day with a boring meeting at the end. Then it was off to do my crit workout on the way home...at nine o’clock at night. It was less than stellar, but I got it done. Super Sale is this weekend so after tomorrow’s ass whoopins I’ll be on maintenance mode until Tuesday. This bit of rest will do me good cuz I’m still hurtin from the last go round. Monday, March 24, 2008 here we go Specific training starts tomorrow. VO2 max intervals on the tt-bike in the morning and microbursts Bill Black style in the evening. The following day is a long ride with 2x20 minutes at threshold. I will do this little stage race miniblock four times in the next three weeks going into Madera. Sunday, March 23, 2008 sweet recovery After yesterday’s ass whoopin’ it was nice to noodle along the Parkway looking for our man Garland. He wasn’t in his usual spot, maybe we were late. Last year he was passing out Easter eggs. What a cool old dude, and how about that hair? One can only hope. Saturday, March 22, 2008 lantern rouge I finished, I don’t know if you can say I finished strong like I had hoped, but I made it around four times. I have to keep reminding myself that I’m racing against guys that can’t hold my wheel in a track race cuz the doubts sure start to settle in after about four hours of riding alone. So, anyway, I tried to sneak off on the first time up hoping that I would be the first racer to the steep section and then I could do the five minute all out fade and suck wheel for the next 20 minutes. It was not to be. And here is where the beauty of power meters comes into play. Even though today was a total bust in terms of a one day race, I got some great feedback about where I’m at in my run up to the Madera Stage Race. My average power in last years time trial was 330 watts, my best 20 minutes today was 329 with three weeks of specific training to go. Friday, March 21, 2008 ass whoopin’ tomorrow Tomorrow is the Copperopolis Road Race. It is an epic course, one of the few in Norcal. I've finished twice, placing once, and dnf’d twice. I think I’m in my best shape going in this year and am hoping for a strong finish. My Training Stress Balance is -1.3 meaning I should be pretty fresh. I’m gonna get there super early and get a proper warm-up cuz it’s ten miles of pure hell right out of the parking lot. Bring it beezees! Thursday, March 20, 2008 easy endurance day Three hours at 185 watts and 65% heart rate. Right on the border of recovery but long enough to stimulate the enzymes. Saturday is gonna be brutal, but the time has come for me to gut it out and finish wherever I finish. Amen. Wednesday, March 19, 2008 extra recovery Today was the option of endurance or recovery. I chose recovery. Tuesday, March 18, 2008 threshold rising 10:00@328 watts, 10:00@314, and 20:00@304. I had a nice long chat with Scott Fonseca about training at threshold and the light went on. Time to start pushing harder. Monday, March 17, 2008 more recovery Today my legs feel like someone beat them with a rubber mallet. Except for the time I was on the bike. Two hours of commuting with an average speed of 12mph. Cruising. Sunday, March 16, 2008 no place to hide It was 40 degrees with a nuking cold north wind. I started at the front and was active early but got shuffled back on the hills which means I would be stuck in the gutter as I made my way back to the front. I made it back to the front three times before being relegated to a chase group. 313 watts for 25 miles with my average heart rate at 173 and a max of 203. Yep, the engine is running full blast. I felt like I was still in the race until half way through the third lap. My deal is I can go to the front and punch it up the climbs then catch the draft and recover. Not in the wind. I have never had a good race in the wind, excluding time trials. So I guess 37th out of 100 on a training race in the wind ain’t so bad. Saturday, March 15, 2008 openers I took the tt-bike out this afternoon to open up for tomorrow’s road race. 3x1:00, 3x0:30, and 2x5:00 at threshold. All with at least five minutes rest between. 1:45 total with a Normalized Power was 222 watts. No burning or heavy legs tonight. I am motivated and cautiously optimistic. I will be hunting for a break tomorrow. I’ll make the front group or blow chunks trying. Friday, March 14, 2008 recovery day These rides are becoming more and more delicious, especially the morning commute. I'm currently listening to Mozart Concert Arias and dabbling in ornithology. I like turkey vultures, red-tailed hawks, and egrets. Thursday, March 13, 2008 ooof, ow, hot, hot This morning I did 25 minutes tempo with eight 30 second bursts up over 400 watts. This is a good race simulation when you have to repeatedly cover attacks with only partial recovery. At first the bursts are hard, but after a while settling back into tempo becomes the real bitch. I got this workout from Bill Black. I will eventually work up to an hour on this one. We call it Bill Black’s Hour of Power. Actually it's a variation on his theme. He does a 10 second burst every two minutes. Normalized Power for the hour works out to be threshold wattage making this an anaerobic capacity/threshold workout. Tonight I did the dreaded 2x20 minutes at threshold...287 and 295. I only say dreaded cuz I was worried I may have gone too hard this morning. But we are preparing for 3 races in two days, so its good to do the double dip. And obviously I did manage to save enough for the end. Two days of riding easy and a road race on Sunday. Wednesday, March 12, 2008 easy does it 90 minutes commuting at 185 watts. No big deal, but the tax man cometh tomorrow. The legs felt good on the bike but I am still feeling deep fatigue. I am looking forward to the Zamora Road Race on Sunday. Tuesday, March 11, 2008 more, more, more 2x20 minutes at 303 and 297. Nothing spectabulous but on the move none the less. Some days it's just about doing the work, the task at hand...punch the ticket and hit the couch. Repeatability is the name of the game. Monday, March 10, 2008 relief day... ...and not a moment too soon. The key to guilt free easy riding is to push it to the limit. Repeatedly. The recovery day is actually a relief day. The other key is to know what that limit is. "A man's gotta know his limitations." - Uncle Harry Sunday, March 09, 2008 elbow time I took the tt-bike out for a test run of my Million Mile May loop. Bradshaw-Grant Line-Aqueduct-Hazel-Parkway. It should be about a 50 mile ride to work. Perfect. I opened it up and for about three miles and averaged 26.5 mph at 290 watts. My heart rate only made it up to 81% in those 7-8 minutes. This is a good thing. I expect to be able to push 340 watts for 22 minutes in five more weeks. Saturday, March 08, 2008 SFRs, downhill sprints and standing starts We rode up around Grass Valley today and to make sure I worked on leg strength I put on the 11-23 cassette. There are lots of short and steep pitches in that neck of the woods so I got to spend a good 90 minutes in the 40-80 rpm range. I also did some downhill sprints cracking off five 1100 watt sprints at 40 mph. Then I ended the day with five uphill standing starts in the 53x15. Fun, fun, fun! Friday, March 07, 2008 form finder Today was one of those days. I scratched my name from the schedule, turned off the phone, cranked up the iPod, and stuck my nose in the wind for five hours. Yep, pointed the 666 West and woke up in Vacaville where I ate something like ten servings of chips, a quater pound of M&M's, two hamburgers, two brownies, 30 ounces of juice, a banana, and a bon-bon. Today would be a recovery day in the normal scheme of things, but sometimes I need to shock my system. Hence the pet name "form finder." It didn't take long to find the motivation to stick it to the big ring and get on up the road. I averaged 210 watts with two 30 minute intervals in the 250's. I never let the heart rate hit above threshold and averaged 68%. It was a very controlled effort. It felt good to be the boss, at least until that final 10 miles down Pleasants Valley. Man that's a looooong stretch of byway. Thursday, March 06, 2008 threshold session 2 I decided to take my sweet time this morning and do my hard intervals after work. I did 2x20:00 at 302 and 286 watts. The second one was a bit low because of traffic on the Parkway. No big deal. I'm already feeling improvements after just two sessions. I said it before I'll say it again, it is best to be conservative at the beginning of a long training block. And patience man, that's a hard lesson. Wednesday, March 05, 2008 all day pace Today I did two and a half hours at my all day pace. This is the average watts I would expect to hold at a 200 mile race. Today was 193, same as the Death Valley Double. With the fatigue of yesterday's workout it took a fair bit of concentration to keep it rolling. It's gonna be a long five and a half weeks. Tuesday, March 04, 2008 gotta raise me threshold The focus of my training is centered around raising my Functional Threshold Power. FTP is the average power that a rider can maintain for the duration of a 40K time trial. This morning I did 2x20:00 at about 290 watts. This may be a bit conservative but the biggest gains come from riding at or just below FTP. I will prolly do this workout a dozen times in the next four weeks so I do have room to grow. The penalty for going too hard is compromised recovery leading to lackluster workouts. I will do this workout on the flats, uphill, and on the tt-bike. Tonight I did 23 minutes in my time trial gear, 52x15. This is a muscle tension interval or SFR workout. It is designed to build strength, develop a smooth stroke and get me used to turning a big gear for the duration of the Madera Stage Race time trial. Ciao for now. Monday, March 03, 2008 six weeks to the Madera Stage Race The cold is just about fizzled out and tomorrow starts my build to the Madera Stage Race. So, today being Monday, recovery day, I rode easy to and from work. I'm starting with a Chronic Training Load of 98.8 and a Training Stress Balance of +15.3. I should be able to comfortably raise my CTL into the 120's and still be fresh for the race. |
 | |  | |  | |  | |  | |  |