The Success and Unease of Training like a Pro

I have itchy fingers - no, not an infection - but like travellers have itchy feet, I have itchy fingers.  I have been staring at an empty page, longing to write something but no words come because there have been no great adventures recently. 

Yet I am more at home on a bike than I have been in a long time (not that I've taken this years' race bike out in weeks).

Training like a pro: I have focussed my efforts on my weaknesses this week and yes, for me, that is strength which means the trips to the gym are back on.

There's two good things about that in March:

1. I can get a big and useful workout done in the space of 1-2 hours.
2. I don't feel terribly guilty about not going out on my bike when the weather is shitty because I have to recover from a gym session.

After a gym session on Friday, we did get out yesterday to stretch our legs with a walk into town.  Then after I'd recovered I took my new bike, Twiggy, for its first spin on the rollers.  I realise I'm turning into a Zwift wanker without the Zwift account.

It took me a while to get the rollers and the bike set up so I was comfy but once started, I got plenty out of it - waking up the lungs and fast-twitch muscles and getting comfy on that bike just in case I get to use it any time soon.  1 hour 20 minutes later and I wasn't quite spent but I was quite hungry.

But there are no epic stories to tell from my roller sessions, my trips to the gym or my commute - which is blissfully and thankfully dull.  The most exciting event on my bike in recent weeks has been meeting up with Becky after work on my bike like a well ingrained hipster and my speedy drag races up the hill that are genuinely getting faster and less frantic.  It's so rewarding when I ask my legs for something and they respond.

In the absence of wild camping weather (or something anywhere near) weights and rollers are still great mood lifters.  They do a tonne for my fitness and confidence and the endorphins get to work and I'm more ready than ever for a nap.

Some people may not need to lift weights or work on their aerobic capacity.  It may come naturally when they ride.  They are lucky people who have probably spent their lives in clubs and pelotons, never really understanding why I wouldn't just turn up.

It's nice to see some of the people I look up to in the endurance world openly admitting to a cheeky turbo or roller session to get out of the weather.  Mostly they probably, like me, don't find much to talk about in it.  I'd like to think that everyone else is holed up indoors through this weather.  All waiting like chrysalis for March to be over, April nearly through, so that we can emerge, like butterflies to be flitted far and wide on colourful wings.

Training like a pro goes beyond the boundaries of the bike and going to the gym.  It's a wholistic approach to self care which strays in to coming to terms with day to day chores and makes them more bearable. 

The whole point of there not being someone else to do shit for me means that in some ways I'm like a lowly paid domestique, doing all the chores for myself.  There's no soigneuse to take care of my massage, food and no maintenance team to look after my bike. 

After months of being a slave to a difficult and stressful job, I am now taking measured pleasure and awareness from the following:

• having a shower (hygiene)
• the supermarket run (being stocked up with Calories and nutritious food)
• washing and rebuilding bikes (mechanic)
• cooking (nutritious food)
• Tidying up (hygiene & safety)
• Driving to work (recovery)

I still haven't really got the hoover out but the risk of injury, exhaustion and allergy attack puts that on a low frequency spectrum that I'm only prepared to endure once a month or less.  Other things I have not yet mastered include:

• massage 
• stretching
• cleaning the team bus

Rest still happens though this year I am trying my absolute best not to let it stray into laziness.  Where before I may have let laziness continue all day, instead I have replaced it after a while with simple, non screen-related tasks.  If I still can't get up then I at least get the knitting out.

Last year had more miles in it so far.  It also had more hours.  It had less weight training and that aspect only went down hill.  It will be interesting to see just how it helps me progress.  Last year at the Mag 7, I commented to Matt Payne that my annual first awakening to hill climb training comes with the Mag 7 ride (last year in advance of Ireland, the year before in advance of Alpe d'Huez).

This year I feel like I'm already three weeks into addressing my particular difficulty with hill climbing and we still have 2 weeks to go before the Mag7 race.  By testing myself on the course last week I realised that what I thought would have been working for me actually really wasn't (long mountain bike rides on a heavily laden bike).  In retrospect it's a good job I started weight training when I did.  I'd love to claim it was planned but it really wasn't.  Perhaps my body was giving me subliminal messages, secretly craving the thing that it will make it go faster.  After all, I know I'm *supposed* to do this, I just never really felt like it before.  Perhaps it was Ruth Marsden that started it.

I think I did, at least, realise that the yoga alone wasn't going to give me the strength I need and with an ever growing influx of new year students late on their new years' resolutions (for good reason - Exams), yoga is being strength-diluted with breathing, relaxation and stretching taking over.  I had to make my gym money go further and so far weight training has been a success. 

When I went to the gym today there were moments when the black leather cushion material on the machines burned into my skin from the beautiful winter outdoor sunshine baking them hot.  I also strengthened my glutes as the hailstones tore around in the maelstom of a flurry.  If I'd been out in that I would have been soaked and cold for hours afterwards.

There are moments when I think nothing will do away with the guilt of not being "out there in it".  Blogs like this where I'm trying to persuade myself more than you, my dear reader.  But there are moments when I will walk away from a hailstorm and into a hot sauna and I am fine with my choices.

I could be bothered by my hours and miles for this year being down compared to 2018 or we could acknowledge that 2018 still left me empty when I got to the race in June.  Sure, my endurance was OK but I had neither strength nor speed.  3 days in I was frazzled, uncomfortable and behind.  13 days in and I'd ridden myself somewhere near into the shape I should have started in. 

By contrast, though I've ridden less this year, I've climbed more per km and done it faster - and mostly on a loaded bike.  Interesting.  It's gonna be interesting.

Fuck Off Cold

So... New Years day.

I went to bed at 12:40, having driven home a tortuous route from my friends house (Anthony and Liz thank you).  Honestly, this year we really need to persuade the council to build that zip wire across the valley... or I could have been well and walked home in a straight line.

I got fed up with towing the heavy line of recovery last night and had some red wine.  Good stuff was on offer so it would have been rude of me to refuse since TSK was recovering from his hangover (thank you Rita for giving my husband a hangover) and playing DD for the night.

We indulged in our regular traditions of Scalextric and watching other peoples fireworks, being the only idiots standing around in the freezing conditions (little happy dance from me because it's cold again and I like to spread the love when standing around in the street with lovely friends and skinny cyclists who are soft - you know who you are).

Despite my best intentions to start persuading my body to get up early, I ignored my 7:30 am alarm and slept through until 10:30 am and read before getting up, eating, knitting, reading more.

Finally I'd had enough (again) of waiting for this cold to go away: waiting for my opportunity to train; the distracted, wandering thoughts flitting through my head; a complete lack of focus.  Am I missing my job?  Dear god - no, but in the absence of anything else really constructive and consuming to occupy body and mind?  I am missing engagement.  Andrew was tidying out the basement of stuff, searching for the truing jig to build wheels for Jes (thank you Jes) and really, I felt no better reason for me to get Phoenix out of Andrew's way and set up the rollers in the kitchen for a blast.

Yesterdays engaging activities included sorting out a playlist for the new laptop with all my favourite training tracks so I was ready to go.  I even got everything ready - bike, speed sensor, laptop, speakers, rollers, Garmin - before getting changed.

Of course, two tracks in and the computer stopped talking to the speakers and by the time I got back to my bike, the speed sensor stopped talking to the Garmin so time, miles and tracks were lost.

I promised myself no big ring riding to keep sensible with my lungs but then Green Day happened and I am unable to control myself in a song about cyclo-cross.

I also discovered a new game - that on my bike, I can play all of the guitar chords to the Plain White T's "Delilah", to "Go", by Delilah and just to prove that it's not just Delilah at work, also Red Hot Chilli Peppers "Breaking the Girl" and Birdy's "Skinny Love", which is a relief since my voice really can't hit the high notes this week.  It's an interesting game, simply ignore the beat of the music and pedal as fast as you need to in order to achieve the right squeal on the tyres.  Perfect for imitating those little surges associated with road racing or riding through mud.

Quite frankly, for a sick person, I beasted myself.  Though to be fair, I also went pretty easy on myself compared to my usual turbo sessions so I am proud of myself too.  Only one 2':20" foray into Zone 5.

And so, I feel tired, my brain feels still(er) for the first time all week and most importantly, I can start to enjoy 2016, not spend any more of it than I have to moping.

*Happy* New Year, everyone.

Dodging cats on the rollers

Finally an easy day at work followed by a trip to the doctors.  All but a few of my test results are in.  My haemoglobin is up at 150 so through the roof.  The cell mass has increased too.

I was tested for things I didn't know I was being tested for and those were clear, as was my biopsy.

I am only waiting for the anti-'s results.  Anti-this anti-that.  I will hear more on those in February at my next haemotology appointment.

I celebrated with a tour on the rollers.  The first time I have used them properly outside the disastrous attempt whilst in the lake district.  I guess my heart really wasn't in it then... and the rollers were set up wrong... and possibly they were the wrong way around.  I can't really remember.

For a while I set off with them facing the back door and the cat sneaked by just as I was getting going.  I locked the cat flap so she wouldn't come back in, bringing us both down in the process.  Part way through my set I got face at the window.  Sigh.  Hoping she would run away but sadly I got desperate paws at the window and I couldn't resist those gorgeous pink toes so I tried to encourage her inside.  By this point she had run away and sat on the windowsill looking like she was trying to shelter the rain as best as she could.

I tried to pick her up.

She wasn't having it though and I even ended up running around in the street in my shorts and vest in the rain.  Oh well.  Back to it an more paws at the window.

Eventually I was warm, she was angry so I opened the back door so she had clear reign to come in at her will.  I could just stop pedalling when she came near.

For a while she sat in the middle of the flower bed, trying to emphasise just how wet she was getting.  Looking at me but not quite.

Finally she came over to try and attempt to pass me.  I tried twice to stop pedalling but then only scared her off.  It was far safer to pass me whilst I was pedalling at 90 rpm, wheels spinning by at 15 miles per hour.

I settled down and enjoyed the view of the rain through the open door.  So begins the Christmas training period.

An odd day of indoor training, friends and a beautiful Welsh hotel.

I started today with a session on the bike on the rollers.  It wasn't a particularly bad day this morning, I just had the urge to do something in a controlled environment.

As soon has TSK had gone to work (so I didn't get in his way) I set the rollers down and put on the tunes.  I couldn't find the heart rate monitor so resorted to using the soft strap I bought about 8 months ago the last time I thought I'd lost the HRM.   It was really quite plush and I wished I'd been wearing it for the last 8 months.

I felt a bit twitchy at first but once I'd settled in, I got cocky and decided to try out the tri bars.  It was an outrageous disaster.  However I did discover that you really can't hurt yourself that badly if you fall off rollers.  I have heard descriptions / seen videos of people catapulting off rollers but I just seemed to slither slowly off the edge of the roller then come to a gentle standstill, leaning on the sofa or the wall.  I suppose I am an elegant crasher.

It perturbed me that I was so unstable on my tri bars and noticed that my knees were flailing all over the place - almost like I was trying not to bang them on my elbows.  That's exactly what I was trying not to do so I set about playing with my bike set-up, realising that I'd never really tightened the seat post clamp properly in Wales so the saddle had gradually been sliding down.  I finally tuned things so I could ride reasonably smoothly whilst staring at a lump on the living room door.  An hour later I was banging out a steady rhythm and not even noticing a wobble.  Success.

Lunch was a tasty affair comprising pasta and left overs although my attempt at feta cheese went badly, leaving me with indigestion which has lasted all day.  A brief foray into the office for paperwork and to ditch some valves that have been following me around in my car for weeks.  I stopped in at Chester to visit friends before their lives are turned upside down by three adopted children arriving next week.

I've decided to try a different hotel tonight, passing the site and heading for the Beaches Hotel in Prestatyn.  Right next to the Pontins, it's a fairly standard 1960s beach hotel but what it lacks in expensive furnishings and desireable bathrooms suites, it makes up for in glorious ocean views and comfortable beds.  I wonder why I've been wasting my time at the other hotel then realise that there's only one vegetarian option which I don't really fancy.    Given my ongoing indegestion, I cram in some evil duck.  At least it will keep me warm for my swim in the morning.

This is a plan which might not yet come to fruition.  I fear the sea may look slightly less attractive when the sun is not slithering into it but actually facing the prospect of 5am temperatures.  Still it's nice to think I might make it, having dragged my wetsuit all the way here.