The Cyclocross Workout Of The Day for Saturday, 12.13.14. “Bark at the Ignition”
Howdy folks,
Hey, nice… you made it to another Saturday!
Hopefully you’re in better shape than me – IE, not dosed to the gills on Prednizone, and barking at the moon…
Blecch. No fun, trust me.
Could Zakk Wylde possibly throw more pinch harmonics into that song? Into any song?
What’s with that?
Where were we again?
Oh yeah… training stuff…
SO, it’s Saturday, which means you might well be racing today. Good luck if you are!
Not racing today, but racing tomorrow?
How about some openers today? Specifically…
Ignition –
You’re going to do a series of short, hard sprints midway through a 1 – 1 1/2 hour ride. Before you head out the door, give some thought to where you can do that effectively.
A flat, straight, low-traffic section of road is what you’re looking for.
It would be great if it’s about a :45 minute ride away; that would make things nice and simple.
Hop on your bike and roll out the door.
Ride steady, at a moderate pace for 1/2 hour – 45 minutes, eventually winding up at the aforementioned stretch of road.
You’re now going to do a series of Hard out of the saddle sprints.
How hard?
Well, hard to say. You’ll start to get the hang of it pretty quickly, but figure that you’re shooting for an output level that will allow you to crank out all the sprints in the set at about the same level, but not easily.
You aren’t sprinting to failure here, and you aren’t doing a max power test.
Don’t overdo it, you’re trying to open your legs, not destroy them.
Make sense?
10 sprints, 10 seconds each.
1 minute between each sprint.
After the last sprint, roll back home spinning easily to recover.
Budget at least 15 – 20 minutes for the spin/ride back home.
when you get home, put your feet up and relax.
For some folks, this isn’t quite enough to get their legs open and ready the day before the race – or at least it doesn’t feel like it’s enough – and the importance of “feeling” ready can’t really be overestimated.
If you’re part of this club (and frankly, I am too!) add a 10-minute effort at right about your 2×20 output level before you start the sprint sets.
Warm up, 10 minute effort, 5 minutes spinning, sprint efforts, spin down, go home.
Enjoy!
M
**********
Hey there…
Thanks for following my blog!
This thing started off as a lark, and over the years that I’ve been doing it, has become a little bit of a monster.
It takes a fair bit of time – and a wee bit of money – to keep this thing rolling, and as you may have noticed, I’ve recently started asking for folks to chip in a bit if they feel like what they’re getting her is worth something to them.
Honestly, it’s not like I’m trying to get rich off this here thing… or really even make any money from it at all.
It’d just make my life a fair bit easier if I didn’t lose quite as much money doing this as I currently do.
So, hey… if you feel like you’ve gotten anything of value out of this blog, please do me a favor – and yes, it’s a favor, and I will be truly thankful for it – and send a buck or two (or five, or whatever…) my way.
How do you do that?
Simply click on the graphic below, and PayPal will be glad to make it happen.
Crosssports's Weblog 