The Cyclocross Workout Of The Day for Friday, 11.24.17. “Yup, I took the day off yesterday”

Howdy folks,

Sorry about the lack of posting yesterday (and this one going up late today!)

I did something unusual (for me!) and took the whole damn day off yesterday.

Gotta’ admit, it felt nice.

Spent a lot of time lounging around, and a fair bit of time cooking. Definitely didn’t think about riding the bike. At all.

Today, though, is a different story.

Which leads us, of course, to the inevitable question…

What are your plans for the weekend?

If you’re racing on Sunday, you might want to take it kinda easy today. I know, I know… it’s a nice day, and you might even have the day off.

That’s cool.

Just don’t overdo it.

Maybe go for a…

One to Two Hour Moderate Ride –

Get on your bike.

Go ride for an hour or two.

No hard efforts, but do throw in a couple of moderate ones. By moderate, I mean just that. You can sprint for the town line, but you should be laughing while you do it.

You’re not doing a recovery spin, so you need to put a little bit of gas into the pedals… just don’t go out and kill yourself.

Check out the view, smell the flowers, just do it while you’re putting a little bit of effort into the pedals.

1 notch above a recovery ride.

Make sense?

Racing tomorrow?

Gotta’ get those openers in! How about…

Ignition –

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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 (I am) 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!

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