Crosssports's Weblog

Howdy folks,

It’s Monday again, and that means that most  of us are headed back to work… or school, whatever. Bottom line, unless you’re incredibly lucky (or incredibly unlucky,) you’ve probably got real life stuff you need to take care of in addition to all this cycling fun and games.

Don’t forget about that.

OK, pretty obvious, right?

What I really mean is, don’t forget the toll that all that real-life stuff takes on you.

If you work as hard as most folks that I know, you need to figure that into your training plans. When work, or school, or any of the other everyday life bits decide to bear down and take a big damn bite out of you, don’t try to ignore it. Don’t try to train through it.

REST, DAMNIT!

A big part of designing a training program is figuring out how the work stuff, the riding stuff, and the rest-of-life stuff all fit together.

Last week, I asked you to start writing down season goals, races you want to do, stuff like that.

That was the first step towards putting together a training calendar for yourself, or as I like to call it –

Step 1, Construct The Fantasy Scenario

This week, the hard part;

Sit down with a weekly calendar and write down everything that you need to do that doesn’t revolve around the two wheeled addiction.

Everything.

Sleep, Significant other(s), Work, other hobbies… everything.

That’s step 2 in the calendar prep:

Add real life into the equation.

You’re probably going to feel exhausted when you get done.

That’s OK. Writing this stuff down is an important piece of the puzzle, and while it might feel like sucking on lemons,

…it’s worth it.

You need to track the stressors in your everyday life if you’re going to get a real handle on the why’s and wherefores of your training.

Even if seeing them written down is more than a little bit depressing.

Make sense?

OK.

My father always used to say “When life gives you lemons, make lemonade.”  *

So, got lots of lemonade? Fold out the lawn chair, have a long sip, and take a nap.

Alright, enough with the trite nonsense.

The point is, we’re working towards an understanding of why and when you need to take a load off and get some rest, rather than train hard.

Again.

That’s pretty much the idea with Today’s Workout, The…

One Hour Recovery Spin.

– Get on your bike. Roll out into the street, and just spin around for an hour.

Really small gear, no hard efforts – heck, no medium effort. Spin. You’re looking to move your legs around in circles, almost like there is no chain on the bike. The idea is to get your body moving, flush the systems out, and speed your recovery.

When you do your recovery ride -if you have the time- just get out and spin aimlessly. At a certain point, your legs suddenly feel better.

As soon as that happens, turn around, go home, eat, stretch, and put your legs up.

…or, you know, go to work.

Or School.

Or whatever real-world hassle you have to deal with. 

– Despite all the words about taking it easy today, don’t forget that your “rest” day is a pretty good day to get some core work in. You need to get this work in on some kind of a regular basis, and since most cyclists will manufacture excuses to avoid it on days they have serious riding scheduled, I’ve found that the only way to actually get riders to work their damn cores out is to make them do it on the rest day.

Lots of info is up in previous posts, so if you have any doubts about what to do core-wise, page back a week or two and you’ll find words on the topic.

G’night,

M

.

* Actually, I’m lying. What my Dad (who was kind of a jerk, truth be told,) used to say to me was: “Matt, you better learn to like lemonade, because life isn’t going to give you anything but lemons.”  Yikes…

~ by crosssports on August 29, 2010.

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