Local Hero

With terrible winds and driving rain on the menu this evening I was pleased to have the option of a rusting turbo in a cold Lancashire kitchen to get my training fix. Who needs the roads anyway?

It's been a while since I've done a Sufferfest Local Hero so I thought I'd treat myself to the King of workouts. Well, one of the Kings at least. The King that keeps on going and going and then expects you to sprint at the end. 4 times.

For entertainment I had some high energy Spinning music and a video of an old race running too which, combined with the workout, made for a very engaging 80 minutes. Everything seems to be back to normal after my enforced break; my HR was about right, my legs felt about the same amount of lactic burn, I was really suffering on the sprint parts of the last 4 intervals, I didn't nearly pass out when I finished so I seem to be about in the same condition I was in early January, which is nice.

After a shower I treated myself to some Weetabix and then some cold Chicken and pasta leftovers from yesterday. Wow, I really know how to live!

60 mins around 310W

Had a recovery day yesterday, did a bit of shopping, took some photos, drank a couple of glasses of wine, relaxed.

Today I wanted to work on intervals around 310W (FTPish) with shortish recovery intervals between as a result of a poor performance on Friday's 2x20 session. For some reason, and it's not just me, starting the second 20 of a 2x20 seem extraordinarily hard so I wanted to work in that area for a while.

About a month ago I devised the following interval set (with a 2 min recovery interval between each one) with 37 mins at or above 300W so this was the first time I'd tried it:

6 mins x 330W

5 x 300
4 x 320
3 x 310
5 x 300
6 x 310
4 x 320
3 x 300
1 min all out (achieved 408W)

Black=power, red =HR.

Any power variations through the intervals were me trying to manage my average power to ensure that I didn't overcook it too early in the session. Intervals 6 and 7 got my HR up to LTHR and I was suffering a bit towards the end of the 7th. The last 1 min interval was very hard and I did it on feel rather than looking at my power output, which probably explains why it rises throughout. At the start I was quite conservative and then allowed power to build throughout the interval, really whimpering and grunting by the end of it. It's no surprise that the slope of the HR rise for the last interval is so steep.

Overall the session was quite enjoyable and I can imagine being able to repeat intervals 5, 6, 7 and 8 to make it a longer session before hitting the final all-out interval.

2x20 at FTP (bailed out)

After another day on the road I was looking forward to a 2x20 at FTP (307W) session, I consider these to be a very efficient way of getting some good training in and I tend to struggle a bit on the second 20 from time to time. Today was no different. After a good warm up and a successful first 20 (at 309W) I settled into the recovery interval ready for the second 20. 4 minutes into it I started to feel uncomfortable and the I suffered from the quits, head down and hating the effort. I hate stopping a turbo session and always have a 'bail-out' option to ensure that I don't just stop when things get tough, but back off enough to recover to do something useful. Back at around 280-290W I let my HR stabilise but when I tried to increase the power I got the same uncomfortable feeling again; like my body telling me it was just too difficult even though I know the power is within me to achieve it.

So, I thought I'd teach my body a lesson and finished with 7x1 min intervals with a 1 min RI between. The intervals ended up as 330, 336, 360, 363, 345, 373, 378W with some good lactic burn in my thighs on some of them. Looking back, it's a long while since I've done some proper high intensity intervals so I feel like I need to do some to remind my body that it's there to work hard and recover well for racing rather than just bashing out 60 minute sessions around 80-110% FTP. February will see a transition towards shorter harder intervals.

Back to proper training

After a great week away I was keen to get back on the turbo and back to proper training. I've managed 2 sessions so far this week. The first was on Monday morning when I did the short version of Shorter Harder.

It all seemed to go very well except my HR was way higher than I would have expected, peaking at 179bpm but I never really felt that bad. Normally 179 would be me on the limit, but I just plugged on and never really felt like I was over-doing it. Just goes to show how much HR can vary from day-to-day for the same effort.

I then had 2 days of driving around the country, eating more crappy food and sleeping in uncomfortable beds and I arrived home too late last night to do a turbo session. These are the 'wasted days' when I should be doing something but the time and then the motivation just drains away and then the day has gone.

Left work a little early so I could get a good session in tonight and I completed the longer version of Shorter Harder (the last workout I did before I got ill earlier this month). I was interested to see if my HR would be as high as it was on Monday, and it wasn't. It was much more normal, peaking at 174, which is a good.

I added 10W to 4 of the intervals and then went for a 500W surge at the end of the last one and felt quite good throughout so I don't think I've lost much, if any, fitness over the last 3 weeks of very little turbo training. I just probably haven't made any gains. Or maybe 2 weeks off and a week of skiing has actually done me some good. Time will tell.

About 20 minutes after the workout I spent a couple of minutes crouched down sorting out some clothes packing and then stood up a bit too quickly, had a dizzy spell, banged my head on a door frame and then thought I was going to pass out. After a couple of minutes sitting down I felt fine again. I'm putting it down to the crouching rather than the workout.

So that's my winter holiday and winter illness out of the way and I can get back to some proper training again and start to focus on getting ready for racing. This will do me the world of good and get rid of the frustration I get when I can't train.

Skiing

I've been away from proper training for a while now, mainly due to a niggly cold and then a great week's skiing in the 3 Valleys. It's nice to get away and do something different every once in a while and I was surprised how much stronger and fitter I felt than when I last went skiing 5 years ago.

For 6 days I hit the slopes for the first lift of the day and skied all day until the last lift of the day with maybe 20 minutes off for a quick lunch. A couple of mornings my legs felt a little tired, but nothing like the muscular pain I used to get. Because I felt so strong and the snow was so good I spent a lot of time off-piste giving my legs a good workout, effectively doing a lot of squats, so I'll claim that as a 'high altitude strength week'!

Unfortunately I went into 'eat anything in sight' mode; a consequence of a catered chalet and long days skiing, so I'm now struggling to stay off the chocolate and get beck to a healthy diet. Really struggling.

FFS!

After quite a gentle session yesterday to see if I'd be able to do proper intervals, I got the answer this morning. NO!

Back to a blocked nose and I can feel that my chest is somewhat tighter than expected. I'm going on holiday at the end of the week so I really don't want to drag myself back down into illness so I guess I need another couple of days off to fully recover.

Post-cold leg spinner

After 6 days of feeling too ill to train I was looking forward to getting back on the turbo tonight to give my legs a spin to make sure I'm over the cold and ready to train again. I am usually lucky with colds and don't normally suffer for more than a couple of days, so I was a bit concerned when I had to have a day off work because I didn't feel well enough to go in.

Today's session went quite well. Basically I just pedalled at a comfortable working level while I monitored my heart rate, keeping it below 165. As the 45 minutes passed I seemed to get stronger with power genty rising from around 250W to 290W and HR rising to 165. So, providing I feel OK tomorrow I'll be back into the groove with some intervals again.

It's a real shame to have lost a week of training, but as I'm not trying to peak for a specific race I suppose it doesn't really matter. After all, most other riders are just doing longer versions of what I did today as they build up their winter base fitness. Ah, the traditions of cycling!

While I was ill I ate everything and anything I saw. Loads of chocolate, carbs, fruit, cake. You name it, I shoved it in my gob. So I'm also back on my New Year healthy eating plan and trying to cut out the carbs and cheese and increase the protein.