Wednesday, April 30, 2008

Maintenanece Backlog


3 bikes all in various stages of disrepair.
Flat on the commuter
-need to put new tire on the front of the road bike and move the front tire to the rear, and trash the tire that's been on the trainer for teh past 6 months.

two chains are shot with knowledge from my trusty park chain checker.

-rebuild rear der. redo cablehousing. repack freewheel, fix flat on commuter bike.

I'd like to ride but am having trouble getting out the door. It's hard to think about it with school and finals and work going on now.

This weekedn I want to do a good long ride up to mtn lake from home, see how that goes.

trying to enjoy my time on the bike and now that day will come soon where this will be a higher priority again.

Tuesday, April 22, 2008

Zone 2 buffer days

Oftentimes a week's training program will consist of two back to backhard days on the weekend followed by a day off on Monday. The next interval day is on Wednesday. What to do on Tuesday is often a questionmark in my mind.

Dave's program usuually calls for 1hr Zone 2 on Tuesday before the interval day on Wednesday. It's interesting how this works out.

Saturday you do a hard ride. Your fried but all the pipes are primed and the fatigue really hasn't totally set in yet. A tenent of the Morris plan is to perform back to back difficult days with the only stipulation being cutting down the durations on the subsequent days, however keep intensity high.

So Sunday you do it again, and usually you can accomplish another hard day. Now Monday comes and you take it easy.

I used to think that after an easy day I could go right back to it on Tuesday, but my body takes a little while to do everything. It takes time for the fatigue to set in and it takes time for the effects of rest to kick in. So Tuesday I'm often feeling the worst of the week because the fatigue from the weekend is catching up and the rest from the day before hasn't taken affect.

On first guess I would say to take another easy day on tuesday in order to be ready to to the interval workout on Wednesday. However that is the wrong idea. The reason is that taking two back to back days off requires at least a day to get the legs back underneath me in order to be able to successfully do an interval workout.

So what the master (Dave) suggests is to do this 1 hr Zone 2 workout on Tuesday. Zone 2 is an interesting animal when you are tired. I used to think that Zone 2 (2 out of 5) should feel easy, so I'd just spin around outside and call it my Zone 2. I'd go into my Wednesday interval workout and the legs would not feel ready to rock until the workout was almost over.

So then I did a quick calculation of what the power range for Zone 2 should be. the % range is in the book. For me it came out to be 200 or 220 on the Tacx. Which is no where near accurate but still a number to compare to when i do my SMSP, MSP stuff.

One day I tried doing my Zone 2 on the trainer. What an interesting feeling. It was not easy. Like a spin in the park easy. It felt annoying. Just enough twinge in the legs to require mental effort to keep within the zone power range. Just enough hurt in the legs to annoy me. I'd say that it would be easier to bump up to the sustainable power rather than stay in this Zone 2.

The amazing thing is what happens the next day on the interval ride. Typically the legs feel ready to go. Not stiff and dead like what would happen if I'd taken the day off on Tuesday, and not fried like would happen if I'd done a really hard ride on Tuesday.

It's like the Zone 2 wakes up the legs after the day off on Monday, but isn't hard enough to compromise the recovery that is taking place on Monday and Tuesday.

This cycle isn't repeated every week. Often I will take two days off back to back. But before getting back into a hard ride it is best to put a Zone 2 day just prior.

So all this is trying to say that sometimes it's worth running the legs at an intensity that seems too low to be doing any good from a training perspective, but is also too hard to be considered really really easy. Just enough to tweak you legs but not enough to do harm.

Sunday, April 20, 2008

When in doubt, do hills

Wife and kids have been sick and I caught it the other day. I'm trying to learn from history in order to avoid a sinus infection and have been on Sudafed for the last 3 days 24 hours straight.

Got out on the mtb for an hour yesterday and got out on the road bike for an hour today. Just trying to keep the blood moving and sweat out the cold a little bit. No fever, so feel ok sweating a little.

Got out to some hills near my house. Always a good workout on short time. I'm close to home in case it rains or don't feel good. And even if I don't feel like pushing it, just getting to the top ensures a good workout.

Starting to get the bug back about riding, even started perusing the mtbr forums again and spending money on mailorder. That's always a telltale sign I'm into something when the credit card comes out. At least (for the moment) I'm not concerned about getting a new bike. Quite pleased with all my bikes.

Though next week we are travelling so another 4 days gone off the bike which will require at least a week and 1/2 to get the heart/legs back.

Thursday, April 10, 2008

reality check

Went mountain biking for the first time in weeks today. Little bit of a reality check, but still great fun and good for the soul. Climbed Old farm, timed myself for the first time since they re routed part of the trail. 18:41. Considering my best time set last year was mid 15s I've got a goal for sure.

Downhilling and speed comfort has also gone by the wayside. I'm not too worried. I just need to get back to the basics and start workinging again on my drills and get out on the bike more than once every 3 weeks.

Another thing that is an issue that hasn't been in the past is some shoulder fatigue. It's the muscles that you use when you do the chicken dance and flap your elbows out. They are a lot more tired than I've had them in the past. Most probably due to lack of time on the mtb.

Anyway fun fun, nice to get out, nice to carve up a few turns. Motivated to re-improve and enjoy. My new limits are lower than they were in the past but it will be fun to keep pushing slightly at envelope whatever that is.

Sunday, April 06, 2008

still here

Still at it. Busy busy, mind going to many directions. Even if I had time I still don't ride.

I've been trying to follow the trainer model as best as possible, but the end result is doing the same style peogram just not as hard. 2 reps instead 3. Not like a few years ago.

No Dragons Back for me. Wonder how it went given the rain from last night.

Anyone's up I'm tring to get some destination rides planned
-mt rodgers
-norh carolina
harrisonburg
-sharndo lake
libery u

So legs fetl ok. Tht kind of kould of felt reaaly ogood feeling bu still feel ok. ENice enjoyanle ride.