Pack Fodder

Just to keep it on the lite side, and not get too caught up in all this blogs training ups and downs, I found this:

All bizness CDale’ This bike is Hawt. Mama.

Greetings readers!

I went out for a spin today, for Morale’s sake. I was alone so I had no one to chase, no wheel to hold on too, no gaps to have to close down. I took it slow, Painfully slow. It was indeed a recovery ride. I at no point tried to push or exert any force on the pedals. I took it as easy as I could.

I tried not to think about my fitness, how fast I was going, my avg speed, cadence, spinning, the time, nothing. I left all the existential stuff out of my head and just rode my bike. I got a little bit of everything today: sun, wind, rain, snow, hail. Only I cared not of the weather, or anything else. I probably should have taken the day off, but after yesterday I rode for morale. Whatever it takes, stay positive and keep riding.

On deck: we’ve actually got a nice week of weather coming up, so I’ll be parking the car and enjoying some rides to work. The sun will be a welcome change from the last few weeks of weather!

Miles ridden today: 33

Miles ridden 2008, 947

Cheers!

Greetings readers!

I had a tough ride today. I’m not sure why? I do have a theory though.

It wasn’t a hard ride, 34 miles, mostly flat, some rollers. Nothing I should have struggled with, I’ve done it a bazillion times. But struggle I did, I paid some dues today folks. The weather sucked, 1st rain and wet, then it cleared and the wind picked up. Seemed whatever direction we went, the wind was against me. My riding partner today had no troubles, in fact he seemed casual, promptly kicking my geared butt on a fixie. I was really wiped after the ride, I shouldn’t have been.

Oh yea, my theory. I think that the body responds to stress levels occupied by the brain. Meaning, (I realize this is oversimplified) when your loose and carefree, you sleep well and workouts are refreshing. I was watching my dog sleep the other night, she was in rem, jerking all over the place. “I wish I could sleep like that” I told my wife. “She has no worries” my wife replied. Wise woman she is. I’ve found a direct relationship to the rising levels of stress at my work to the declining levels of recouperative sleep, and subsequently my declining fitness, dispite my efforts to ride through it. The basis for athletic achievement after all, is good health. Show me a stressed out, sleep deprived, elite level athelete? I dont think the two are synonomous.

I’m not here to whine folks, on the contrary, I think its a revelation. I think I’ve finally put my finger on why I’ve struggled so much in March. Heavy job stress = less recooperative sleep, and declining fitness. I feel relieved. The light bulb went on, now I know the problem and I can deal with it. Stress is just another obstacle in my way, I’ll deal with it in a positive manner. Keep your eye on the prize Jimbo, cross season is 25 weeks away.

“Everything starts from where you are right now, the journey begins today” A quote I heard today that I took to heart. Stay motivated, hungry, and driven. Hell, if this was easy everybody would do it. It’s funny how a diagnosis can energize you.

Miles ridden today, 34

Miles ridden 2008, 914

Cheers!

Greetings Readers!

What crazy weather were having! I was literally getting snowed on during my ride into work this morning. It’s dang near April? WTH? I’ve got me some tired legs after running yesterday, I’ve surely used some muscles long dormant in my body. Sore I am.

Coach says take tomorrow off and rest, I’ve two days of hard riding this weekend. Ok Coach, whatever you say.

I love cross, but I sure can (being a roadie) appreciate a stellar road bike. So, I found this Spectrum over on the Serotta Forum and feel the need to share. I found this bike to be really well done, aesthetically speaking especially. It’s Clean, subtle, classy, elegant, balanced, and timeless. I like the Campy hubs laced to the box section rims, I don’t think fancy deep V wheels would have fit this bike. Beautiful build. Gorgeous bike. I suspect it doesn’t ride like a pig either.

You can view a group of photos HERE. But for a quick pic, here you go…..

For you bike geeks out there like me, you’ll have to register over at the Serotta Forum to see the pics in the “Custom Bikes” Forum. It only takes a few minutes and you’ll see some incredible builds. Spectrums, Serotta’s (of course) Indy Fabs, Dave Kirk’s, Richard Sachs, Vanilla’s, and a host of others. You won’t find anything that you’ll see on a showroom floor in a bike shop. All Custom, all high $$, Good Stuff.

A personal congratulations to K-Man for being appointed Director of OBRA, and a Thank You to Candi Murray for 22 years of service!

Miles ridden today, 20

Miles ridden 2008, 880

Cheers!

Greetings Readers!

Yup, I said run. Not ride.

Keep in mind I don’t run, never have, that’s why man invented the bike, so we wouldn’t have to run. I’m a weak runner, mostly because I don’t like to run, I don’t run to the mailbox if there’s money in it. Did I say I don’t run?

Do to factors outside of my control, I didn’t get to ride in to work today. Heck, I may not get to ride until Saturday. So what can I do to help myself come cross season? Start running. Runups are not my strongpoint when it comes to cross. I had planned on doing some running this year to help me with runups and drop those extra lbs. A friend and runner told me not to wait till the summer and throw in some running earlier. The nice thing is: I can get a pretty good workout in 45 mins that I can’t on the bike. It takes me 45 mins just to warm up on the bike. So for the 1st time since I was in high school, I went running. I took it easy, and only did about 2 miles. I’d run, then walk a little, and start running again. I found that my sorry old tennis shoes let me down more so than my engine. So now I’ve got some new running shoes on my agenda. Ideally, I want to be able to run a good clip for longer than the length of a race. If I flat, beleive me, with my karma, it will be just past the pits and I’ll have to run a whole lap just to grab the spare wheels or pit bike.

So my plan is to run and do runup repeats on the days when I can’t get on the bike, not in place of the bike. The bike is my escape, it’s my therapy. It’s what I look forward too. Time on the bike is paramount, I’d be in sad shape without it. I’m not talkin’ physically here folks, but mentally. When I’m stressed, there’s nothing like a lung busting climb to make it all go away. It’s the best medicine there is… 

Cheers!

I feel lucky, I actually got to commute today and somehow avoided the rain. Go figure?

I didn’t however, avoid getting pummeled with Silly String. I’m cruising home, minding my own beezwax just pedaling along in the bike lane when this old beater truck filled with kids lets me have it, drive by style. Me and my bike were covered in pink Silly String. Harmless, it wiped right off when I got home, but I sure got some looks from cars driving by…… 

Miles ridden today, 21

Miles ridden 2008, 860

Greetings Readers!

After feeling kinda puny on Easter I decided to give myself an extra day off the bike today to recover, thinking I was fighting a bug, or the beginings of one. However the reality is: I felt pretty good today. So I decided since I didn’t get to commute on the bike to work, I’d head down to the pond and hit those stairs. See the 1st post HERE. This time I threw in an extra trip up the stairs and did 22. I didn’t seem to suffer as much as I did the last time, in fact I had less recovery time inbetween assualts on hitting the stairs. Having read the last post I realized it was about a month ago, hmm, could I be in better shape than a month ago? I’d sure like to beleive that, although the scale doesn’t seem to show it, I’m still stuck @ 155lbs. I tried to concentrate on my dismounts, and remounts. My remounts need a lot of work, and I want to aspire to have the grace and fluidity that the “A” racers do. Get off, and back on, the bike at speed without bobbling, a stutter step, or any other imperfection in my technique. Hell, If I’m not winning I at least want to look good racing!  

Cheers!

Greetings Readers!

We had a great day today, near 60 degrees and sunny! Ken and I went out for a spin, we decided to opt out of longer mileage in the favor of going uphill……. ugh. I love climbing, although I’m no good at it. Climbing is sorta like cross in a way, it’s a mind game. How far can you go up and how fast, without stopping? Your body says “I can’t make it I gotta stop” and your brain says “no way, you ain’t stopping, I don’t care if you puke” Sound familiar? How many times in a cross race with several laps to go have you been through that scenario? Must be the masochist in me cuz I like to climb. I’m just no good at it.

We took on several climbs today, the 1st over Mtn Home, and the 2nd over Laurel. I’ve taken pics of the Laurel climb for you in a previous post. So I just took pics of the Mtn home climb.

1st we start going uphill….

Check the sign at the side of the road, I love seeing that!

I like the wooded sections, the shade is welcome when your suffering.

I dig this shot Ken took.

I liked this guys house………

Gradually, still climbing.

At least it’s curvy, nothing sucks like a straight up climb!

Same spot, looking back the way we came.

Snow still covers the hills.

Mt Hood, watching over us.

At the top, looking southwest over greener pastures….

At the top, same spot, looking northwest.

All-n-all it was a pretty good ride, and I’m happy to be doing these climbs this early in the year. I’m closing in on a thousand miles at the end of the 1st quarter and that bodes well for a 4000 mile year. I have high hopes of continuing my fitness and getting stronger. That’s of course the best case scenario.

Balancing my competitive side, with the staying healthty and being stong side, is a tight rope walk that takes finess. I can easily stress out over being fit, and or missing a workout. That inner coach in me has to constantly intervene. “It’s ok Jim, chill, relax”. Recover, recover, recover. My pal Ken is a great sounding board and always seems to keep me grounded, so thanks for that bro. I’d love to use a real coach, but that isn’t in the plans this year. I’m going to have to do “it” on my own. Tall order folks. I keep trying to push it just a little bit more, a little bit harder, in very small increments. “Do the least amount of properly timed, specific training that brings continued improvment” Hoping that this strategy will pay off for me come Sept 21st when we have our 1st of 10 cross races this fall. The challenge: Managing training, my family, and my work. If I could get three even pieces of pie that would be ideal. What happens when that balance is offset? What happens when all of a sudden the job requires long hours at the expense of training miles? Or family time? Hey, this is the “Da Fodder” struggle, all us guys who make up the field have real jobs, long hours, and families. Training takes the back seat to the other two. So missing workouts, especially if its more likely than random, can really put the damper on your fitness. What to do? There’s no training bible for that, it’s work it out the best way that I can. So I keep trying to get r’ done, and we’ll find out come Sept 21st how well I’ve done at coaching myself this season. So stay tuned, there’s not a day that goes by that I’m not thinking about dialing in the pressure on my tubbies, and given’r!

Miles ridden today, 44

Miles ridden 2008, 832 

Greetings Readers!

Ok, so I’ve been remiss in posting for the last few days, what can I say? I’ve been in the middle of a squal, a noreaster if you will,  a perverbial  s**t storm at work and I’ve been putting in the hours. Nuff of that, now on the the good stuff!

Check out this pic! I was trolling for some content this mornig and came across this photo of a cross race from days gone by. I love it!

Makes me want to go out and do runup repeats……… 

Cheers!

Greetings Readers!
 
Boy us athletes are an anal bunch aren’t we? :)  Yesterday I was all panicked over missing an opportunity to ride, and it was only Tuesday! Having got back on the bike this morning all is right with the world again. :)  I only missed two days off the bike, but for some reason I had my days mixed up in my head and thought I had gone 3 days without riding.
Sheesh, what a stress case! Would 3 days off of the bike have been so bad? Would it have hurt me? Nope. In fact, it would probably give me some much needed time to recover. This is one of the things Joel Friel talks about in his book. “Do you feel like your competition is riding more than you are?” is one of the questions Joel likes the self trained cyclist to ask themselves. “Do you feel anxious when you miss a workout?” or, “Do you feel the constant need to train and intensify your workouts even though you feel fatigued and burnt out?” Ahh, thanks Joel, I answer yes to all three of those questions.

Keeping my mindset on training and “coaching” my body is so difficult because the emotional side of training subscribes to the “more is better” approach. I have to objectively try to listen to the self coach within myself and let it make the decisions. I have made this mistake already in 2004, I was burnt out and declining rapidly by Sept, having pushed myself too hard all summer with little regard to recovery.
The truth is I was stressing over missing a ride yesterday, when it was probably the best case scenario for my body to get another nights sleep and recovery. I had no lead (fatigue) in the legs this morning on my commute in to work. That’s not to say I wasn’t tired, but the legs felt good, there’s a difference.
 
For those of you that related to my post yesterday, (and you know who you are) and if you’re stressing over missing a workout, chill, let it go….. :) Who knows? You may even feel stronger having had an extra day to recover!

Disclaimer: this doesn’t mean that you should skip workouts, remember commandment #2 of training? Consistency! Us “Da Fodder” cyclists who are comprising the field at local CX events all over the country need all the help we can get!
It does mean missing a workout will happen, and when it does? No worries, don’t stress, and your body gets and “extra” recovery day. Embrace it!
 
Cheers!

Miles ridden today, 21

Miles ridden 2008, 788