The Workout Of The Day for Wednesday, 9.8 – “Listless”
Howdy folks,
All recovered from the first race of the season?
Well, if you raced on Monday, that is.
If you didn’t, You might feel left out for the next couple/ few paragraphs…
OK, so you raced.
What worked really well, skill-wise?
What worked kinda well?
What did you kinda stink at?
What did you totally suck at?
Take a few minutes to think about this…
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
OK.
Now, write those thoughts down.
You’re going to save that list, and for the next couple/few races, you’re going to add to it, modify it, whatever.
Here’s an example:
Good –
Basic Cowboy dismount.
– Nailed it, perfect every time!
OK –
Shouldering the bike
– Went OK, not as smooth as I need it to be.
Acceptable –
Basic remount
– bobbled a couple of times, but no real stutter step (yay!)
– Still not as fast as other folks in the race.
Bad –
Start
– Needs work, I’m losing ground on the fast guys in the first part of the race.
Totally sucked –
form over barriers
– Clipped a barrier and landed on my ass. ‘Nuff said…
See how that works?
Ok.
Go back and modify your list if you need to.
Now, for the Workout Of The Day.
Tonight is Cyclocross Skills Practice.
Warm up well.
Stretch, loosen up, get your game face on.
Look at your list.
Start going down the list, from worst to best.
You’re going to practice everything on that list.
Spend the most time on the things you are the worst at, and next to no time on the stuff you’ve got wired.
Stay at it long enough to make some progress, but not so long you get totally frustrated.
You should have your work cut out for you!
It will look something like this:
Warm up, 10-15 minutes.
Skill #1 – 15 minutes.
Skill #2 – 12 minutes
Skill #3 – 10 minutes
Skill #4 – 5-8 minutes
If you really need to work on something like Starts, don’t just blast starts out full gas for 15 minutes.
Be smart about this, folks. The more technical the skill, the more you can work on it. Something like the start is equal parts learning the skill, learning to pump the intensity, and developing your speed and strength.
Learn the skills, then work the engine.
If you stomp on the gas first thing in the night, you’ll be flat and clumsy the rest of the night.
The harder the effort, the later you schedule it in the session, make sense?
Along those lines, Finish up the night with a simulated race session.
Try to use a course that will emphasize the skills you stunk at in the race.
Try to link “bad” skills sections together, and really work on relaxing on the parts that are tough for you.
Don’t forget to have fun, and force yourself to smile the most when you’re screwing up the worst.
Spin out your legs, go home and relax.
If you didn’t race, you can do the same thing – it’s just not quite as easy.
Make the same list – as best you can – and have at it.
Not into this whole thing at all?
Take a gander at last Wednesday’s session –
Have at it, and have fun!
M
Crosssports's Weblog 
Do you have a “suggested” warm-up routine that you could share?
Thanks for the great question.
I do, and will… but a question back to you; are you looking for a warm up for races, or for more clarification on what I mean when I say “warm up” before we start a workout?
M
I was thinking of a warm up to do before races. Thanks!
Gotcha.
I will have something up for you for Sunday’s workout…
M
[…] https://crosssports.wordpress.com/2010/09/07/the-workout-of-the-day-for-wednesday-9-8-listless/ […]
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Hi Matt,
I am so grateful that I was introduced to your blog – i think it is great. Thank you! As I am new to cross this year and love to get a variety of workouts in during the week, when and do you incorporate any running during the cx season? I love to run, but am not quite sure when to fit it in, since I’ve been paying more attn to your suggested workouts. I also really enjoy your stretches on Wed nights and am definitely focused on getting in more core workouts to my weekly regimen. Thanks for all your infomration!
Krysia
Thanks, and glad you’ve found the Blog to be helpful!
I did a few posts on running early in the season; you can find them by entering “running” or “stairs” in the search box on the front page.
To directly answer your question, though – during the season, I don’t actually recommend that most folks do any extra running at all.
The amount of time spent running in most cross races is very small, and the time and effort it takes to work on your running is, generally speaking, better spent working on your riding. If you are having problems with the running sections of the races, or are consistently getting dropped when you dismount, that’s a different story, and it’s worth putting some time in to develop the skill.
When I’m training folks, we keep tabs on things and if the running is getting to be a problem, we do a couple of weeks where we will focus on the running, and do stairs/hill running 2x a week for a couple of weeks, and then return to a general schedule with running training coming only incidentally in the course of the practice on Wednesdays and the racing on the weekends.
Make sense?
Please make sure to say “Hi” to me on Wednesday, and drop me another line if you would like more info on the topic or clarification.
Thanks for the excellent question,
M
[…] We’ve talked a lot about the post-race journal in earlier posts; start here – https://crosssports.wordpress.com/2010/09/07/the-workout-of-the-day-for-wednesday-9-8-listless/ […]
The Workout Of The Day for Monday, 11.22.10 – “Chill Out.” « Crosssports's Weblog said this on November 21, 2010 at 9:56 pm |