Sunday, June 29, 2008

you can be my coach!

So I took about 10 days off the bike when I realized I was starting to hate the road bike. The combination of getting a new job, working a crap load of hours and having raced 16 times from March to the beginning ofJune, made me decide to not spend 3 hours a day in lycra for a little while.

My eventual goal is to competitively race cross into December, so loosing a little fitness now in the name of some rest and recovery will hopefully payoff down the road. Ten days off seemed like a year, and now I feel good to go.

The problem, is I have no idea what to do now to train. I did two longish "reintroduction to riding my bike" days this weekend, with some climbing but no specific goals. I figured a refresher was good before just going straight back the power intervals. Unfortunately, the next thing to do is up in the air. Should I do some base? Hit it with the Vo2 max intervals again? Or do something else? Or do all of these things?

I could read a book, or hire a coach, but instead, I'd like to have you coach me for free. Really, you read that right. What workouts do you think I should do this week?

Keep in mind I have a job, post your suggestions. I'll look them over and pick the most interesting sounding one. From there you'll get to coach me by way of leaving comments on the blog after I post how the workout went.

I'll either get faster, stay the same, or get slower! Its all on your shoulders so don't mess up.

4 comments:

Danny Goodwin said...

Yo Eric--I propose helping you lumber your tall-ass frame up the hills if you help me figure out how to get some decent top-end for sprints.

You've actually been climbing really well this season, and it seems to boil down to two things: dropping a few pounds and not going too hard too early.

One thing that might make you way faster is to drink 7-less beers per night. You can still party plenty and spread three across a 30-minute block, or you could spread them out across several hours by pouring seltzer into a big-ass Duvel scuba tank and making like you're Boonen before a big, important stage (but skip the coke--that's so totally for losers). Your teammates will expect you to be useless the next day and so will work for you on the hills.

Someone with more knowledge of physiology than I told me once to think of each beer you drink as the equivalent of un-drinking two glasses of water. So if you chase each beer with THREE glasses of water, you're pre-hydrating AND carbo-loading at the same time, right?

I digress.

I think you should do a bunch of hill repeats with me and Buffalo and Goedeke T/Th, plus the smackdown this week. Then I think you should stomp us into the ground in the crits in two weeks. Train your weaknesses/race your strengths, right? I'm certainly not the expert (since when does a Cat 3 take training advice from a Cat 4?), but race-specific training would seem to be the way to go at this point in the season. My training diary has gone from "base" to "build" to "race". That's where we're at, baby. Race.

'Cross fitness will be there. I don't think we're racing nearly enough to burn out before September. I'm with you, though. Suffering on the road is all about 'cross.

-dg

Anonymous said...

Ride 5 days a week in the 53x11. Make sure you eat and hydrate well during rides and races. I recommend Nestle Quik for hydration maybe Jolt cola with some chocolate gu mixed in. For on the bike nutrition, donuts, lots of donuts. Maybe a slice of cold Pizza. This will do you right...

Coach FJG

Anonymous said...

Mon=1 hour fixie hill repeats, 2 hour endurance
Tue=4 hour endurance pace
Wed=30min warmup, 30 min 2x2 intervals, 30 min 1x4 int's, 30 cool down
Thu=off
Fri=3 hours of hills
Sat=1.5 hour easy pace
Sun=race & win

skip beer, drink tequila

Sumbiker said...

Train harder but shorter, rest harder, race smarter'

Repeat in varying amounts, then rest completely.

Then remember it's for fun and keep it interesting.