Workout Of The Day for Wednesday, 11/25 “Twas the month before X-mas…”
Holy Cow!
It’s exactly a month ’till Christmas!
…and we’re talking about bike racing!
It’s Wednesday, and that means it’s Cyclocross Skills Night!
For some of you reading this, this is the last week of your season, and the last Wednesday night practice. Have fun tonight.
No big agenda, feel free to follow the basic outline of the previous Wed. night sessions, or just go out and play on your bike.
Set up a course, and go out and rail it. Go fast, round the rough edges off of any lingering little problems, or – heck – just do what you feel like.
HAVE
FUN
OK?
For those of you whose season is continuing on after this weekend, what we’re working on tonight is some of the little things that will help you in the big races, in particular the Portland GP and Nationals…
Here’s the schedule for tonight:
– warm up, 10-15 minutes.
– Brief run. 5 minutes.
– Stretch.
– Barrier skills, 10 minutes.
Ideally, run through the barriers with a bunch of other people, in traffic, and at odd angles.
Intentionally cut each other off, chop the line, and otherwise screw up the traffic through the barriers.
Make it tough. Really try to screw each other up!
Working out by yourself? Set up a really tiny narrow barrier, and force yourself to squeeze through a space you don’t really fit through. Simulate screwy situations as best you can!
– Technical skills, 15-20 minutes.
– off cambers, tight turns, wide/fast turns, mud, sand… try to ride a little bit of everything. And make it weird!!
Get a couple of people together. One person is the wildcard, and takes as many screwy lines as they can through the course. Everybody else rides things “straight” and tries to get past the jackass in the way…
A small group (3-5 people) rides the course at a moderate tempo. The last person in line rides full gas until they are first in line, passing the other riders. When they get to the front, the last rider goes.
Do some bumping drills. Get on the bike and bum into each other. Learn how to be comfortable with some contact.
You get the idea, right?
– Starts, until you get 5 perfect starts in a row.
Do your basic, run-of-the-mill starts, but also do some “disaster” starts…
– Full gas start, straight ahead… suddenly, somebody yells “CRASH!”
Full on panic stop.
Start again.
– Start with 2-3 rows of people. First row intentionally soft-pedals the start. 2nd/3rd row need to negotiate traffic to get up to speed….
– Race simulation.
I would recommend a lap on/lap off approach tonight, unless by some miracle you’re still trying to squeeze in some fitness building in the next 3 weeks (really?)
Go fast… really fast… then recover. Go again. Try to go faster than race pace, but for a small amount of time.
HAVE
FUN
!
– Warm down.
– Go Home. Eat. Recover.
Remember… at this point in the season, keep it simple.
Avoid the temptation to add new skills to your quiver, unless you’re filling in a really obvious gap.
At this point, what you’ve got is what you’ve got. In these last few days, use only the best of the skills and approaches that you have learned and perfected all season. Throw everything else out.
Go F-ing fast.
Have fun!
Get ready for this:
G’night!
M
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