Wednesday, June 1, 2011
Fountain of Youth
Made it back over to the Golden Bike Park for a little refresher after the recent mountain bike clinic. The pump track was dry and ready to roll. I had so much fun. I was planning on a short little ride but ended up riding everything for about and hour. I felt like a kid back when I used to spend all day at the "dirt hills" on my BMX bike. Only this time the kids were watching me rail the corners. See the two sitting in the upper right hand of the photo. One of them had crashed and cut his elbow. (Yes, I checked he was ok. Minor cut but I think he was done for the day. Funny, these two geniuses rode to the bike park with their helmets on then took them off to ride; that's thinking.) They just sat their watching the old man on a 29er cross country rig rip around the pump track. Ha Ha
Friday, May 27, 2011
Mountain Bike Clinic
About a week ago I participated in a mountain bike clinic that the race team was putting on. Lee McCormack worked with us for 6 hours to get everyone dialed in and ready for the season. He did a fantastic job! Lee wrote the book on Mastering Mountain Bike Skills. No really, he wrote the book! The guy obviously has amazing bike handling skills but more than that, he knows how to share them with everyone else. He systematically took a group of racers and gave us new skills. Just step by step by step and boom, everyone got it.
We all had a great time and I would highly recommend you or your group take a look at Lee's clinics. They are well worth it! The weather we had for the day wasn't great but everyone had a great time and learned something new. I'm looking forward to getting out on the trail and practicing my new skills! I'm also hoping the team can get him back for the next level clinic.
We were out at the Golden Bike Park for the clinic. It was an outstanding location for the group because we could all work on our skills and Lee could easily see everything and give us pointers. Unfortunately the pump track was a series of lakes, designed without drainage.. really? Anyway, it was a fantastic event.
Trying to stay warm and absorb the knowledge.
Lee systematically stepping us through the process.
Our happy little group, ready to hit the dirt.
The weather was moving in near the end of the day but the group was motivated and having fun.
We all had a great time and I would highly recommend you or your group take a look at Lee's clinics. They are well worth it! The weather we had for the day wasn't great but everyone had a great time and learned something new. I'm looking forward to getting out on the trail and practicing my new skills! I'm also hoping the team can get him back for the next level clinic.
We were out at the Golden Bike Park for the clinic. It was an outstanding location for the group because we could all work on our skills and Lee could easily see everything and give us pointers. Unfortunately the pump track was a series of lakes, designed without drainage.. really? Anyway, it was a fantastic event.
Trying to stay warm and absorb the knowledge.
Lee systematically stepping us through the process.
Our happy little group, ready to hit the dirt.
The weather was moving in near the end of the day but the group was motivated and having fun.
Saturday, May 21, 2011
Friday, May 20, 2011
Thursday, May 12, 2011
Where has the time gone?
Wow, it’s been a long time. I haven’t forgotten you all, I just haven’t had time. Changes at work have caused a lot of extra stress and required more of my time. To keep the family and fitness part of my life in balance I’ve had to eliminate the extras. Sorry.
This past weekend I raced the Front Range 60, a 60 mile marathon mountain bike race here in town. A 10 mile loop raced 6 times. This would be the longest mountain bike race I’ve ever done and the longest single ride time I’ve spent in the saddle in the past couple of years, certainly the longest race.
My plan was… well, I didn’t really have a good plan. Having not race something like this before I had no idea what to expect from my body. I ended up felling pretty good that morning so I just let myself ride. I’m sure I was a little too fast the first few laps but I knew everyone would get tired as the race went on so if I could get in some time early, we’d just see how the last laps went. Maybe I could sustain those gains if I didn’t fade too bad.
The course was basically two parts, the eastern part that had two climbs of decent size followed by the western side with relatively flat fun little sweeping sections along a river. The wind was minimal and helped keep the dust away. The sun and temperature, for the first time this year, had us racing without extra layers. Nothing on the trail was overly technical making it fast. I ran my Kenda small block eight tires with about 30 psi pressure, making them pretty hard to minimize rolling resistance. The Cannondale Flash 29er was perfect for this loop. It was fast and the fork soaked up everything. I had no mechanical issues during the entire race.
In the end, I feel like I did well. I had a mid pack finish which wasn’t bad considering there are no categories other than age and I recognized some of the names of racers from faster categories in front of me. Where I feel I did well was with racers that are traditionally a little faster. Last year some of these racers put ten minutes on me in shorter races. I was expecting that they could put big time on me in this long race. This time however I was putting 5 to 10 minutes on them. Regardless, it was fun and I’ve been recovering this week. I'm just not starting to look forward to the next race.
I'll try to keep the blog updated a little more frequently.
This past weekend I raced the Front Range 60, a 60 mile marathon mountain bike race here in town. A 10 mile loop raced 6 times. This would be the longest mountain bike race I’ve ever done and the longest single ride time I’ve spent in the saddle in the past couple of years, certainly the longest race.
My plan was… well, I didn’t really have a good plan. Having not race something like this before I had no idea what to expect from my body. I ended up felling pretty good that morning so I just let myself ride. I’m sure I was a little too fast the first few laps but I knew everyone would get tired as the race went on so if I could get in some time early, we’d just see how the last laps went. Maybe I could sustain those gains if I didn’t fade too bad.
The course was basically two parts, the eastern part that had two climbs of decent size followed by the western side with relatively flat fun little sweeping sections along a river. The wind was minimal and helped keep the dust away. The sun and temperature, for the first time this year, had us racing without extra layers. Nothing on the trail was overly technical making it fast. I ran my Kenda small block eight tires with about 30 psi pressure, making them pretty hard to minimize rolling resistance. The Cannondale Flash 29er was perfect for this loop. It was fast and the fork soaked up everything. I had no mechanical issues during the entire race.
In the end, I feel like I did well. I had a mid pack finish which wasn’t bad considering there are no categories other than age and I recognized some of the names of racers from faster categories in front of me. Where I feel I did well was with racers that are traditionally a little faster. Last year some of these racers put ten minutes on me in shorter races. I was expecting that they could put big time on me in this long race. This time however I was putting 5 to 10 minutes on them. Regardless, it was fun and I’ve been recovering this week. I'm just not starting to look forward to the next race.
I'll try to keep the blog updated a little more frequently.
Thursday, April 14, 2011
Tuesday, March 29, 2011
Midweek Update
This past week has been a rest week and I've had time for my second hobby, brewing beer. Typically I get to brew about once a month. This past week I was able to get in two batches! Ah yes, it's going to be a good summer. My first batch was a repeat of a success from last summer. A honey amber. Its a high gravity/alcohol content beer with 2 pounds of honey in the 5 gallon batch. It was such a big hit last time around so I had to remake it.
For the second batch I wanted to try an all grain batch. This is brewing straight from the grains without using any pre-prepared and purchased concentrates. I had some time this past Sunday so I bought some grains to make a Summer Pale Ale. This was my second all grain batch, the first was ok... actually I drank it because I'm cheep. It was a Hefeweizen that could have used some fruit to make it better, it had a banana color. Ok, it wasn't that bad but I wanted to try again. So I gave the all grain beer making another shot. I'll keep my fingers crossed and let you know how it turns out later.
On the training and riding front, I've been getting ready for the season and I was beginning to wonder if I was getting any faster. That can be a difficult to answer early season. You know, the trees keep you from seeing the forest. Anyway the training has been focused on endurance and base mile training so how do you tell your getting faster when your staying out of the high end power ranges. Well I got one of my answers on my ride today, I tied my best 60 minute average power output from both 2010 and 2011. I guess things are coming along.
For the second batch I wanted to try an all grain batch. This is brewing straight from the grains without using any pre-prepared and purchased concentrates. I had some time this past Sunday so I bought some grains to make a Summer Pale Ale. This was my second all grain batch, the first was ok... actually I drank it because I'm cheep. It was a Hefeweizen that could have used some fruit to make it better, it had a banana color. Ok, it wasn't that bad but I wanted to try again. So I gave the all grain beer making another shot. I'll keep my fingers crossed and let you know how it turns out later.
On the training and riding front, I've been getting ready for the season and I was beginning to wonder if I was getting any faster. That can be a difficult to answer early season. You know, the trees keep you from seeing the forest. Anyway the training has been focused on endurance and base mile training so how do you tell your getting faster when your staying out of the high end power ranges. Well I got one of my answers on my ride today, I tied my best 60 minute average power output from both 2010 and 2011. I guess things are coming along.
Wednesday, March 23, 2011
Training Camp Complete
So this past week I was racking up the miles with a second training camp this season. I ended up with about 360 miles, 90 of them on the 29er mountain bike. Actually the mileage isn't all that important, what is important is the time I spent in my power zones. 4+hours in power zone 2 (endurance) and another 4+ hours in power zone 3 (tempo). I only spent about 3 hours in zone 1 (recovery), which is really too easy of an effort to get significant physical adaptation. If you include my heat rate (HR) info from the mountain bike rides, I had 7+ hours in my endurance zone. A whopping 1189 training stress score (TSS - nerdy stuff) over the past 9 days.
So now that it's over, I feel good. Tire but good. I'm on a recovery week this week. Workouts consist of a little intensity but short rides. Rest is as important as the workout. So I guess you could say I'm consolidating for the next work phase.
Actually the weather was really nice last week. Unlike the high winds we've been having the past few days. Made me laugh when I saw this video, looks like some not so fun spring training along the Colorado front range. It's hard to motivate yourself for this kind of a ride everyday.
So now that it's over, I feel good. Tire but good. I'm on a recovery week this week. Workouts consist of a little intensity but short rides. Rest is as important as the workout. So I guess you could say I'm consolidating for the next work phase.
Actually the weather was really nice last week. Unlike the high winds we've been having the past few days. Made me laugh when I saw this video, looks like some not so fun spring training along the Colorado front range. It's hard to motivate yourself for this kind of a ride everyday.
Wednesday, March 16, 2011
Training Camp #2
This week I/my coach has bumped up the training load to get in a big block of base/endurance miles. I could really tell a huge improvement in my fitness after the first training camp. This camp has a bigger training load.
For this training camp I have traveled... nowhere. I've taken, no time off work. I have and continue to try and squeeze in the riding time around everything else. So far it's working but I certainly couldn't keep this up longer than a week. Thankfully the weather has been incredible and I've been out and about. I've been commuting to work and taking the long route back and forth. I love riding by gas stations, $3.30 :).
Since this past Saturday I have over 13 hours on the bike and over 200 miles. About 70 of those miles have been on the Cannondale Flash 29er the rest on the SuperSix. Really that's not the important part, what's important is how they've been paced; at a quality endurance level (200-220 W). My base fitness will be larger than ever before, the theory is it will give you a foundation to build on later in the season. I'll let you know.
For this training camp I have traveled... nowhere. I've taken, no time off work. I have and continue to try and squeeze in the riding time around everything else. So far it's working but I certainly couldn't keep this up longer than a week. Thankfully the weather has been incredible and I've been out and about. I've been commuting to work and taking the long route back and forth. I love riding by gas stations, $3.30 :).
Since this past Saturday I have over 13 hours on the bike and over 200 miles. About 70 of those miles have been on the Cannondale Flash 29er the rest on the SuperSix. Really that's not the important part, what's important is how they've been paced; at a quality endurance level (200-220 W). My base fitness will be larger than ever before, the theory is it will give you a foundation to build on later in the season. I'll let you know.
Sunday, March 6, 2011
Work Life ImBalance
Sorry for the lack of posts. Life has been...... complicated. Over the past couple of weeks I've had a big deliverable due at work that required a lot of extra time. The work was hard and long but my group made the deadline. So, life is slowly returning to normal.
During those weeks l had to strip life down to the basics; Family, Work and Health. There weren't any extras. Unfortunately I had to miss a few workouts because there's only 24 hours in the day. I do have to give an extra special thanks to my wonderful wife, she also made sacrifices and really helped me get through it all.
The training is coming along. I'm spending most of my time doing endurance type rides. I do feel like my base endurance is getting good. I'm certainly ahead of where I was last year, not only in my power output but also in how I'm feeling. I really noticed in my rides this weekend were I was able to get out for long hard rides with out excessive fatigue. Not sure I'm race ready but there's time.
More updates soon.
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