Ahh… Spring Break. The joy of not sitting on my ass, not drinking beer, and not trying to get some college girl to show me her boobs. No, I am taking the “Break” in “Spring Break” literally, to see what it will take for me to be broken. 20 hours? 25 hours? 30 hours? Just how much cycling can I do in a week? So far the weather has cooperated. Tomorrow and Thursday aren’t looking so hot, but what would an epic stage race simulation be without a few miserable slogs in the rain?
Riders in my category and age group don’t usually get the opportunity to do more than maybe a 3-day stage race, usually a points omnium. I want to see what it might feel like to do 7-9 days of solid riding, no noodling about but real mileage at an intensity factor characteristic of your typical longer road race, about 0.75-0.85. While 6-hours a day like the pros is simply out of the question based on prior build-up, I think that 3-4 hours a day should be manageable, with perhaps 1 or 2 shorter “time trial” rides of an hour or so at a higher IF.
Because of the cycling class I teach in the evenings, the past 2 days have been 2-a-day workouts. I’ve put in 2-3 hours both days, then rode to the YMCA, taught a 45-minue class, and rode home. Monday. I teach a pretty advanced class, and while I don’t have power the HR is solidly in the tempo range. Here is the stage data thus far. I’ve indicated NP and TSS for each (I used a TRIMPS calculator to estimate TSS for the cycling class):
The next two days, I’m traveling down to NC to visit the folks and get some rides in on the windy flats. It’s going to rain there too, but at least it will be 5-10 degrees warmer. Compared to the Dismal Dash, it’ll be no big deal. Friday’s weather is looking sweet, and the preliminary plan is an assault on the Cat 1 Apple Orchard Mountain – 13 miles at 5.5%.
Spring Break starts this week, so I decided to make the opening weekend a series of epic rides. Didn’t hurt that the weather was sunny both days (although Saturday was a cool 40-50 degrees). Rode 75 miles on Saturday with the Rod-man at a mostly recreational pace, with an IF of about 0.72. There were 3 longer climbs on the ride, 2 6-minute climbs and a 13-minute climb, rode those at a steady L4 pace. Although VI for the ride was higher than my usual solo excursions (1.24), AP and NP both fell within my L2 range, which was the goal, and, combined with 2 shorter climbs, I still managed to get in almost 30 minutes of L4 work during the ride. I did some speed work with Rodney, helping him work on following a wheel, which I hope was beneficial to him.
Saturday’s ride was also an “experiment” in riding on empty, which has been popularized of late by a couple of interviews with some protour riders. I think that the primary goal is forcing your body to utilize fat for fuel by riding in the morning without having eaten anything, although I’ve also read something about forcing your body to create more mitochondria. Naturally I kept the workload relatively low-end, since I knew I was running on a limited supply of glycogen, but I didn’t find myself tanking on any of the L4 efforts. On the other hand, I spent VERY little time (11%) of the ride at L5 or higher. The entire ride was 2940 KJ, so I guess I had to have been burning quite a bit of fat, since at most I would have had 1500 KJ of glycogen stored up. Of course, I ate plenty when I got home, too. I might continue to try out this type of riding maybe once a week, during training weeks when I don’t have an upcoming race, just to see if it makes a difference. Even if all it does is keep my weight down, then it’s at least good for something.
Yesterday rode 80 miles solo, keeping my effort steady in low L3 (245-265W), IF was 0.82 for the 4 hours with AP at 248W. I fueled up well beforehand and brought 4 bottles of Perpetuem with me – I was far too chicken to attempt 4 hours of tempo on an empty stomach! I’ve always approached the supplement/fuel industry with a wary attitude, but I will say that Perpetuem & Endurolytes kick ass for the long-haul rides. A bottle an hour and my power stayed steady the entire 80 miles. I saw a 1% increase in AP across the first 3 hours, and then a 2% decrease in the last hour. Given that I’d ridden 75 miles the day before, I’m pleased with those numbers. I’m also giving their Mito-Caps a try, but the jury is still out on that. I want a full 6-months of anectdotal data before I reach any conclusions.
I’m tempted this week to go long most days, it is the last week where I can pile on the TSS before the Spring racing kicks in, and while most of the Spring races are B or C, there are a few TTs where I’d like to bring up the TSB a bit. There is a short break of a few weeks in May, which will be a good opportunity to rebuild some base, and then June-July is A-race time.
There’s something a wee bit thrilling about riding/racing a bike in what would be considered by most to be “extreme conditions”. To be more accurate, the thrilling parts are surviving the ride/race, living to tell the epic tale (which will, of course, grow more epic with the passage of time), and gaining new perspective on the amount of suffering one can endure.
Rides and races such as these often have a few common key moments:
This past Sunday’s time trial was probably the worse conditions I’ve ever raced in. I’ve ridden in worse, but the difference between a ride and a race is the amount of clothing you wear. If you’re out training, you can pack on layers, and you don’t have to ride that fast. But when you’re doing a time trial, you want to be as lean and aerodynamic as possible, and you want to go as fast as possible.
Fortunately, you generate a lot of heat racing, so that helps, but being wet when the temperature is near 40 and you’re experiencing 25mph winds – not pretty. Actually, the worst part is the few minutes before the start, when you’re just waiting to go, and immediately after the ride, when you’re no longer generating heat.
The couple things I tried that worked: Vaseline (liberally spread over the windward sides of the arms and legs, particularly the knees), a tight vest that kept my core dry, and a pair of polypropylene socks underneath my wool ones.
