More Riding

Not too much is new. Been getting in an okay number of miles - could stand to be riding a little more, but it rained almost every day this week, and when it wasn't raining it was threatening to. It's been like living in a freaking rainforest for that past week.

I kinda shot myself in the foot this past week by not getting enough sleep. I intended to ride about 50 miles yesterday but got out there and just didn't have it. So I cut it short to 26 miles and only one LT interval.

Did the Paceline A ride this morning. Ray, the ride leader, was not there so I kinda knew it was gonna get stupid fast, and it did - we went out of our way to find some hills and hammered up every one of them. Yours truly was (idiotically) setting the pace up most of them. It was a fun ride, and a great workout - about 10 miles or so of 170+ bpm riding. The group was only 12 strong this week so the sketchiness was much-reduced.

Ordered some new wheels from Neuvation that should be here Tuesday. I'm really looking forward to getting my hands on them, because my current wheels are stupid-heavy (especially the rear - 1+ kg!). Some people have had bad luck with Neuvation wheels, so I will see how these do. I'm cautiously optimistic.

Last Tuesday I hooked up with the Northside ride, which had been described to me as a hammerfest. I was not disappointed, even though our ride was cut short by storms and rain. I managed to stick with two of the strongest riders in Greensboro up a long climb, which was nice. I am definitely getting stronger!

Summertime

So summer's here, and with that comes a full time job. I'm working at General Dynamics AIS again this summer, and so far I've been having a blast. But, working 40 hours a week definitely makes it more difficult to train!

However, unlike last summer, where I didn't ride much at all, I've figured out a system that works pretty well. Multiple long rides on the weekend, and at least 2 high intensity, shorter rides during the week. My weekly mileage is down ever so slightly, but I'm still doing 100+ miles a week, which is fine. Total mileage for the year stands at 2,285.

My training plan is fairly ad hoc. For my shorter rides, I focus on 3 to 5 minute full bore intervals designed to increase my lactic threshold. In a 20 mile ride, I can normally manage 2 of these, and a shorter high power hill climb. Based on an article I read that I can't find the link to, and my personal experience, I think this type of training is the best way to increase my power.

In essence, the article I read said the only metric you need to track is 20 minute power - everything is based off of that number. Furthermore, the best way to increase your 20MP is to spend a lot of time above your lactic threshold.

So far, this seems to be working - yesterday I did a short, 15 mile loop and averaged 21.6 mph, including warmup, with wind in the 10 to 15 mph range. Since my workouts that include intervals always end up with a slower average speed, this ride is the only recent metric I have. In addition, I made a lot of improvement in those two weeks we had off during the season, where I did the CSH ride and spent a lot of time above my LT. So there you go.

I feel very good on the bike - the position feels extremely natural, and everything just feels really good. My weight is holding steady around 147 lbs. If I wanted, I could probably stand to shed 2-3 more pounds, but where I am now is a happy medium, and I'm not racing too seriously at the moment. Energy is fairly high all day, so overall I'd say I feel really great.

Tomorrow is the Saturday Paceline ride. Hopefully it will be a little less sketchy (and faster) than last week.

School's Out

Got done with my last exam Tuesday morning and headed back to Greensboro that afternoon. Went for a short ride today - was shooting for the abbreviated Hagan Stone route but got down to Level Cross (about 15 miles in) and decided to bail - I had been fighting a draining headwind for the whole ride and being behind on sleep suddenly caught up with me pretty hard. So I turned around and went home. Total distance was about 26 miles, with an average of 18.2 mph.

As I catch back up on my sleep, I'll ramp my intensity back up. Being off the bike for a week sucks.

Well That was Poorly Timed

Tried to sneak in a ride this afternoon and failed miserably: got about 10 miles out and realized, "oh sh*t, those are thunderstorm clouds!" Spun around and put the hammer down trying to beat the rain and pretty much failed epically. So the bike is still drying out, along with everything in my saddle bag and my shoes. I have to remember to check the radar before I roll now that it's summer. I still managed to squeeze in about 22 miles and average 18.1 mph, including some slow greenway riding.

In other news my little sis got me infected with some upper respiratory bug when I went home for a couple of days. Awesome. I don't have it nearly as bad as she does, but it still sucks. Glad I got in a couple good hard days before I got sick (possible correlation - riding hard = depressed immune system?).

For April I got in 432 miles, which isn't bad. So far this year I've ridden nearly 2000 miles. Seeing as I did just over 2700 last year, that's a huge ramp-up in my volume.

Since I'm feeling a little down on energy and I need to study for finals I will probably skip the CSH ride tomorrow. A sub 3 hour metric century leaves me useless the rest of the day, and I can't really afford to be useless.