Records and Gifts

It's funny that I found the most success in racing as a time trialist. It's really not something I'm naturally good at.

I'm a natural sprinter. Pretty much from the day I started racing on skates way back in 1996, I was always much better at short intense efforts than I was at long sustained efforts. For some reason, my fitness just naturally gains in that area first. On the other hand, it takes me months of focused training to improve my time trialing abilities.

It's really apparent in my riding lately. I'm working mostly on rebuilding my foundation, doing  tempo efforts and a few threshold efforts, and trying to build back up to longer rides. I can still barely make it through a 2-hour ride. Nothing there says "sprints."

When I go riding at lunch, though, the numbers tell another story. Even with my threshold down 50 watts and carrying an extra 15 pounds of weight that isn't useful on the bike, I've broken 3 personal records in the last month and have come pretty close to a 4th, all in that anaerobic/sprint range.

The numbers:

Time	This month	Previous best
10 seconds	991 watts	1048 watts
20 seconds	896 watts	855 watts
30 seconds	796 watts	783 watts
60 seconds	645 watts	600 watts

These are not small gains, either. Both the 20- and 60-second records are by more than 40 watts. That's a huge gain!

Of course, when I return to racing it will probably be to time trials. I enjoy the events and, to be honest, they are a whole lot safer than pack races, even if it means my natural gifts are not being fully used.

The Benefits of Resetting

Most of you know that I'm a bit of a data geek when it comes to my training. I use a software program called WKO+ to track all my training that, among other things, gives me a running tally of my best performances.

The problem with your best, though, is that you can't always hit your absolute best. For example, my workout yesterday was two intervals of 20 minutes each right around my threshold power. My best at that workout was two intervals at 290 watts. I can barely hold that for 6 or 7 minutes right now.

Luckily, I reset my "season" in the software for when I got back on the bike in April. WKO told me that my best power for 20 minutes since then was 226 watts. That gave me a target to aim for and to try and beat.

By having the recent "best" values, I always have a target to try and beat by just a little. Instead of aiming for a value I can't hit yet, I have something to aim for that's within reach.

Yesterday was a good day. On the two intervals, I was able to hit 228 and 234 watts. Two new peak values for the season and one step closer to getting back to where I need to be.

For comparison, at my peak, I can do three of them at 285. I have a lot more work to do to get back there.

The spirit cries GO but the body say UMMM MAYBE NOT

One of the frustrating things about coming back from a break in training is that you don't fully grasp that you're riding is different.

When I see someone make a move on a training ride, my first instincts are that (1) I can catch them and (2) I have enough fitness to do so repeatedly.

These days, on a good day, the first one might be true. The second one is a long way off.

On the plus side, my training partners are quite enjoying being able to drop me at will.

To help me rebuild, I reset all my training numbers for this spring, so my records all start in April and help me to see my progress since then, not my progress since last September (with a lot of ups and downs).

I'm making progress and slowly regaining fitness. It will just take a while!

Reboot

Starting over. Back to the beginning. Reboot.

There are lots of ways to describe where I'm at on the bike right now, but all of them boil down to me not being anywhere near racing shape right now.

To give it some numbers:
  Racing weight: 164 pounds
  Current weight: 180 pounds

  Racing Threshold Power: 290 watts (on the road bike)
  Current Threshold Power: 220 watts

  Racing Weekly Training Volume: 10 to 12 hours (up to 15 hours on some weeks)
  Current Weekly Training Volume: 5 to 6 hours

For those who train with power.... my ATL was at a low of 5... yes, five. My CTL is usually 105 to 110 when I'm building up to a race. It was down to 31.

So.... I'm not racing this year :-)

About two weeks ago, I was able to get back on the bike with some regularity, getting a little time on the trainer before work a couple days and riding at lunch a couple days each week. The guys at work are really enjoying beating me on almost every climb we hit. Even just riding 6 hours a week completely wiped me out, so I've got a long way to go.

On the plus side, at least I'm back on the bike now. For the next few months, I'll be gradually building up my training volume, trying to get into the 8 to 10 hour range so I can get a decent foundation and start to burn off some of the weight I've gained.

I don't have any real performance targets for this year, at least not yet. With the races I'd be interested in ending in late July, there's no chance that I'll have enough fitness to bother going to them. That's 10 weeks and there are limits to how fast you can gain fitness.

I'm considering doing a doing something like I did in my 2012 year, where I didn't start training seriously until really late in the year (that year was July when I started). That led into my 2013 season, which is the best performance I've ever had.

So, we'll see how it goes!

Absolute Zero

This week, I saw something in my training log that I have not seen in a really long time: a zero.

I started coughing a bit last Saturday. On Sunday, my fever was almost 102, I was coughing constantly, and I could barely stand up straight. Obviously, I was not riding that day.

As the week went on, I was not getting much better. It didn't help that I have too much going on at work to take any time off. My cough is just now starting to break up and I'll probably try an easy ride tomorrow.

Just one more hit to the training this year...

The Agony and the Ecstasy

This week was the start of life more or less back to normal: going back to the office after several weeks away, getting back into a morning riding routine, and going to the gym at lunch three days a week.

Being back into a routine, I can get my diet back on track more easly. It's hard to do when every day is different.

I've been riding as consistently as I could, so the riding was no big deal, but I haven't been lifting much at all since Thanksgiving. And of course, me being me, I didn't start out very easy.

I decided to start over with lighter weights for the first month, not wanting to risk aggravating my shoulder again and at least trying to give my body a chance to adjust to lifting again.

My first day back in the gym was Monday. On Tuesday, I could barely walk because my legs were so sore. By Wednesday, I was hurting even worse and by then my arms and shoulders were sore too. I still went to the gym and managed to get in something resembling a decent workout. I actually felt a little better afterwards. By Friday, most of the soreness was gone and I was able to get in a complete workout.

For the first month, I'm planning to do the same 8-lift routine that I was doing before that works pretty much my entire body. I'm not looking to gain muscle this month, just get some of my strength and durability back.

My weight is starting to drift back down. Right after Christmas, I was up to 175 pounds. I'm down to 174.2 now. I'm nowhere near the 165 that I wanted to be, but at least I'm moving in the right direction now.

Now that I'm riding more regularly, my power numbers are starting to improve. Not by a lot, just a few watts here and there, but at least I'm improving now.

Not Exactly at my Best

My fitness is kind of bottoming out right now.

My weight is up to 175 pounds and my body fat is at 18.5%. My goals set back in October were to be down to 165 pounds and 12% body fat, so I'm not even close.

I'll be honest: I did not eat well over the holidays. I ate every cookie and candy in sight.

My threshold power is at 245 watts on my road bike. Keeping in mind that my power output on the time trial bike is about 90% of what I can do on the road bike, my peak threshold on my TT bike last year was 260 watts (which equals about 285 on the road bike).  In order to hit my target goal for this year, I need to reach about 280 watts on the TT bike (equal to about 310 watts on the road bike). So I'm about 65 watts below where I need to be, pretty much requiring a 20% gain. Ouch.


My training has been pretty sporadic with lots of other things going on in life. I've been able to maintain the fitness that I had in mid-October, but in years past I've been making major gains this time of year. That's not the case this year.

The good news is that with the holidays over, I should be able to regain the consistency that's necessary to start improving, but I may have too far to go to reach my original goals. This may not be a big racing year for me.

Scattered but focused

The last few months, my training has been a bit of a mess.

I was sick before we went on vacation, went on vacation, and got sick again when we got back. Shelli had major surgery a couple weeks ago and I spent several days afterwards taking care of her and not wanting to leave her alone.

In the coming weeks, we've got a wedding to go to and will be visiting family for Christmas.

I've also got a bit of an issue with an old injury, a torn rotator cuff in my right shoulder from a speedskating crash in 2003, that's stopped me from doing a lot of upper-body weight lifting.

Putting it all on a calendar, I will miss 35 days of training over three months.  Not exactly my best record.

As a result, I'm having to train in short, 8 to 10 day training blocks in between breaks. For those short time spans, I'm training very intensely, aiming to be really in need of a break by the end.

It's worked pretty well so far as a way to maintain some basic, but I'm definitely not in great racing shape. Last year at this time I was down about 5% from the year before. This year I'm down another 10% from that lower level. Not good.

I'm starting to think that some of the more ambitious goals that I had for next season might need to be put on hold (especially the 56:00 40K, which was really a stretch requiring an average of 27 mph for 24.8 miles). I won't be able to say for sure until January or February when I can really see where I'm at.

Blog about being sick as a dog on a log in the fog

Of course, just as I start getting into a good training rhythm, I get sick.

It came on gradually. It started Tuesday with a sore throat. Wednesday started the occasional cough. I kept hoping it was some kind of late-season allergy. Thursday I felt like I was being stabbed in the throat when I tried to talk. Today, I'm in full-on cold mode.

I've done a couple of light rides just to help me feel better mentally, but I haven't lifted since Monday and I have not done any serious interval work all week.

The timing could not be worse. With Shelli's surgery in just over a week, she cannot get sick right now. So I'm trying my best to keep my germs to myself.

The More Something Changes....

So, yes, I've renamed the blog.

When I started this blog 5 years ago, the name Fat2Fast made sense. I was 200 pounds and 30% body fat and trying to get back into shape. After almost 2 years of near-zero training, my fitness was pretty low and I was not fast by any stretch of the imagination.

The name really doesn't make sense for me anymore. Like any cyclist, I'm always obsessed with my weight, but it's really not my big concern now. I hope to not gain that much weight back in the future and, let's be honest, most of my stories are more focused on training or racing, not on diet or weight loss tactics.

As I've mentioned in previous posts, I'm currently working on changing my body composition by lowering my body fat a few percentage points, but I'm not anywhere near fat anymore and I'm already pretty fast, even when I'm "out of shape".

So, I renamed the blog. It will break everyone's favorites/bookmarks, but most of my traffic was from Facebook when I posted a new link anyway, so I don't think it will cause many problems.

Welcome, everyone, to Adventures in Training and Racing!