training updates

After Dragon's Back took a 5 day rest block.
-off
-commute
-5x1on 2 off (Very hard. Difficult to maintain the power for even a minute.-Due to two days in a row off)
-commute
-Zone 2 (Was going to get out for 1.5 hrs, but at 30mins into it, still felt like crap and turned around)

Back into it on Saturday with a really good interval workout. Butt kickers. 12 minutes long alternating between 1 minute at SMSP and 1 min at MSP.

Then on Sunday. One for the books. Broke my PR on Old farm. By 1:02. One of those days where the legs just turned over with ease. It didn't even seem hard until the very end.

I've brought out the hardtail to do some timed comparisons to the Azure. I have feeling this good day may throw off the results. It's just amazing to me that the legs could hardly get an hour in on Friday and then they come around for a ride of a lifetime.

This is where knowing yourself becomes so important to your ability to ride well when you want to. I know myself well enough to understand that in the the difficulty of the 1bys on wednesday are nothing to feel worried about. And that the stiff legs on Friday is something that always needs to be overcome before I'll ride well.

The other thing Sunday's really good ride reminded me of is that there is a difference between being strong and getting strong. Being strong is the ability to ride well and it seems easy. This happens once in a rare while, ideally coinciding with a race.

Getting strong is where it hurts. In the basement, on the road, on the trail. Pushing hard and feeling like you're going nowhere. It's hard to embrace these times and yearn for the efforless great days. But the hard days are much more importnat.

I'll be changing my training to more of a 2week cycle. This cycle has less pronounced rest blocks. They are hard to even see when you look at the calendar, much more subtle than these 5 or 7 day blocks that I've taken after 3 week on-cycles. But somehow they always seem to work and I can ride strong when race day comes.

Training will emphasize some hard race simulation efforts, leadout intervals, and butt kickers. In addition there will be race start intervals (2-3 minutes hard followed by 6+ minutes at steady state). There will also be lots of easy or off days.