The Cyclocross Workout Of The Day for Saturday, 12.3.16. “Dead Rock Walking”

Hey! Check out the stuff I’m selling, newly updated!

Howdy folks,

Thanks to all the people that checked out the stuff for sale page. More stuff on there today, will keep adding to the list. Don’t be afraid to lowball me on this stuff, ok? Need to make it go away…

For the people that are still racing, most/many of them are racing today.

If that’s you, have fun, and remember to warm up smart, especially if you’re doing the double this weekend.

What do I mean by that?

This time of year, it can be really darn easy to overdo things, to drive yourself so hard that you wind up in a hole that you can’t get out of before the end of the season.

When I see people spending an hour-plus on the trainer before a late-season cross race, and I know that they’ve done course preview as well, I generally know that I’m looking at a dead man walking.

Unless you’re doing very little else besides racing and training – no job, no school, no kids – there’s simply a limit to the workload you can put in and still recover from. For most people, two one hour races in a weekend, complete with all the course previewing, running around, driving time, gear wrangling, and a couple of short warm-ups and cool downs is pushing that limit.

I see plenty of people leaving their best legs on the trainer before the race.

If you find yourself losing ground in the latter stages of the race, fading in a way that isn’t reflective of your overall fitness?

Maybe you’re one of them.

Tone down that warm-up.

Do just enough.

For most people, it’s probably better to come into a race a little cold than it is to overdo it in the warm up and course preview.

Heck, I’ll admit it; at this stage of my old-guy racing career, I pretty much don’t do any structured warm-ups. I crank out as many preview laps of the course as I can, maybe do a couple of start efforts, then head back to the car, pin up, pound down a can of coke, and get my ass to the line.

Pushing 50, with a bad back, I’m lucky if I’ve got a full hour of hard efforts in me before things go sideways. Can’t afford to spend any more of those minutes on warming up than absolutely necessary.

I know I’m not alone in this.

So, think about your warm up a bit this weekend, ok?

If you are going to warm up on the trainer, try something like the…

The RSWO –

Hey, if you’re racing tomorrow, this makes a great opener as well!

– Get on trainer. Spin for about 5 minutes.

– 2-3 minutes at your 20 minute output level

– Shift into big ring/largest cog combination.

– Ride 30 seconds in this gear, then shift up one cog.

– Repeat until you hit the hardest gear you’ve got, or can handle.

– Ride 30 seconds in that gear, and then shift all the way back down to the Big/big combo.

– Ride 30 seconds in that gear, then immediately shift to hardest gear you can handle.

– Full gas sprint, out of the saddle, for 30 seconds.

– Back to big/big combo.

– Spin for two minutes.

Repeat The entire sequence, minus the 2nd “20 minute level” effort.

Go forth and conquer your race.

Not racing this weekend? Still got races upcoming?

Cool.

Go long, or take the day off/easy. One or the other.

Enjoy!

Thanks for following along.

As you’ve probably noticed, there’s been a “begging for money” bit attached to the beginning of this page for a couple of weeks now.

I’d like to thank everyone who has chipped in this season – and the past couple of seasons – when I’ve asked you to. It’s made a difference.

How much of a difference?

Well, let’s put it this way; the small donations from you folks have kept the lights on on this page.

There’s a certain (small) amount of money that has to come out of my pocket to pay for this page, and there’s a certain (larger) amount of money that, as a self-employed person, I need to write off based on the time spent on writing, posting, and – yes – giving training advice away that other people charge for.

So, once again, thanks to those who have contributed.

As much as I hate to say it, though, the contributions this season are way down compared to the last two years, and I don’t know if I can keep this going unless more people contribute.

Yeah. That sucks. I hate to have to write it, but I just looked at my bank balance, and the bills sitting on my desk, and the paying work that I’m putting off while I sit here writing this, and… well… crap.

So, that’s where we’re at.

I don’t know what the future of the CXWOTD looks like. Maybe there’s a paywall, maybe I try to pursue some corporate sponsorship, maybe I just bag the whole thing, maybe I scale things down and post less often… heck, maybe I just decide that I don’t care what the numbers say, and keep going anyways.

I dunno.

Nothing is going to happen in the short term. At minimum, I’m going to play things out through the end of this season before making any decisions.

Just wanted to let ya’all know what was what.

So, hey… if you feel like you’ve gotten anything of value out of this blog, and you’d like to see it continue, 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.