Shoe comfort - Good for the Sole!

Here's some sideline information for you.

I've known about Sole Footbeds for about a year. They are not new to runners. Sole has developed a shoe liner that is heat moldable which allows you to customize your shoe insert without spending a huge amount of cash.

I picked up a pair of their "Slim Sport" inserts last week. I can tell you that they are significantly more comfortable than the paper thin inserts that typically come in your cycling shoes. I was able to make some minor modifications in length and thay popped right in. I haven't had the chance to heat mold them just yet.

I've never been a huge supporter of orthotics or inserts for cycling shoes. I held this belief because the rear foot isn't used as a contact surface. All force is delivered via the fore foot.
Most orthotics and inserts are designed primarily to support the rear foot.

However, with new knowledge comes new understanding. Yes, I'm willing to change when the evidence supports it.

Despite the fact that pedaling forces are delivered via the fore foot, the rear foot must maintain stability. Otherwise, you will loose power as the foot collapses under the pedaling force. Or, maybe your foot doesn't collapse because you are strong enough to support it using muscular support. This causes you to utilize muscular effort that could otherwise be used to pedal the bike. Loss of power is BAD! I don't care how you spell it.

If you have an excessively flat foot, you probably need professional help. Seek out someone who makes orthotics for sport application. Otherwise, Sole may be your solution.

I'll follow up with vendor information.

Full Rooster

School is out! Now I can participate in the full Rooster ride. Up until last week, I had to cut out early to be home with enough time to get ready and take the kids to school.

Overall, I felt great today. It was a good steady pace for the whole ride. I'm still fighting when it comes to getting dropped on the hills. Good news; typically, I can chase and catch the lead group. I was able to climb Museum drive with a good bit of power. It felt nice to be able to catch Mike R. But, that's a false sense of confidence. He attacked early and tried to stay away all the way to the top. I've never seen anyone do it successfully in the 10 years that I've be riding.

This is my sixth week of dedicated training. I guess I should be happy. It's only going to get better from here.

Tomorrow, I'm going to return to the Computrainer for my eveing workout. I'll have some new information to share about intervals. I know, I've mentioned this in the last couple blogs. It's coming.

Still no word on the ibike. Argh!

Love/Hate relationships!

You're probably scared to read this one!

Not to worry.

I have firmly established my love/hate relationship with computers. I've had the second computer crash in 4 months. Luckily, I was able to gather all of my data before formatting the drives and beginning the rebuilding process. It takes so long to get things up and running again. I lost most of the weekend while I reloaded all of the programs etc.

On the training front, things are continuing to go very well. I haven't returned to the cp20 workouts since last week. I had the opportunity to ride at a decent hour this morning. So, I opted out of training last night. We had an easy talking pace ride(except for the hills). I did 1 minute intervals +/- all the way home. Without a power meter, there's now way of telling how hard I was working. It was nice to work on something new since I haven't worked on short intervals in a long time.

Short intervals are my next training addition.
Here's the protocol: Determine your maximum power on a Conconi Test. This is a graduated power test that steps up the wattage by 10 watts every minute. Basically, you go as long as you can. When you can't go any longer, you are done(simply said).
Then you run a second test that determines how long you can ride at that maximum power.
Workouts are determined by creating intervals for various times at various percentages of your Maximum Conconi Power.

When you work at these intensities, you have to consider rest as a part of training. If you lifted weights, you would never consider taxing the same muscles every day. You have to give the body time to recover. As intensity goes up, rest goes up and duration goes down.

Just as I like the critical power time zones for training longer durations, I like this format for shorter, high intensity work.

280 is more that I thought

It's important that you respond to failure in a positive way.

I use an excel spreadsheet to help me predict my workouts. After I completed my 276 watt workout, the calculations showed that I was ready for 278 watts. I've been so eager to break into the 280's, I disregarded the calculations and made the jump. I was mistaken. I only lasted 13 minutes. My goal is 20 minutes. If I exceed the goal by 3 minutes, I can move up in wattage.

I won't have a chance to run at 280 again until Sunday evening. Tomorrow morning I'll be on the road for 3-4 hours.

On another topic. I'm doing research on predictive interval training for intervals less than 3 minutes. You might be surprised to know that you don't have to go all out to reap the rewards of high intensity training. There's more to study. I need to do some baseline tests to give specifics. Look for more information soon.

Minor adjustments

Last night, I completed my workout and exceeded my target! Recently I've started to feel a strain on my hamstring tendons as the wattaged has increased over the last week. It doesn't really bother me on the road. Also, I notice it more when I'm in the drops. Most likely, this is a result of rolling my pelvis forward a bit as I get in the drops. Rolling forward moves the ischial tuberosities back putting additional tension on the hamstring musculature.

I lowered my saddle 1mm and got back in the drops. It was much more comfortable. I'll try it for about a week to determine the effect.

As I said, I completed my 276 watt workout last night. Tonight, I'll be shooting for 280. I'm just ready to get into the 280's. In addition, I'm going to add a shorter duration interval work out once a week. I'll probably do it on Sundays.

I've been off my rest break for more than week. My training stress scores are starting to increase again. That is good. I'm going to let them accumulate more during this training cycle to see how I respond.

Still getting dropped/Krispy Kreme

This is a bit late but, I thought I would make an entry regardless. Yesterday's Rooster Ride was a bit more civil than most. Will H. was in from Montgomery which typically means that the heat is on. But, Will and Scott both played safe most of way out. It heated up as usual once we got past Schillinger.

For the most part, I felt good. I was able to make a few fast pulls. Once again, I got gapped on the hills. It looks like a good time to insert some shorter/more intense intervals for to increase my 30 second to 3 minute power. Also, as the weight continues to come off, the hills will get easier.

Speaking of weight...A friend of the family brought a dozen KK doughnuts by the house last night. I lack discipline with regard to a few things. KK doughnuts are definitely on the list. Lets just say that they were calling my name.

Tonight, I'll be doing some power testing to assist with determining my shorter duration power interval levels. It will be good information to report.

Kuppersmith makes Herring Gas!

Click the link to the left. Go to Scott Kuppersmith's blog to get the info. Congrats!

Workouts are back on schedule

Last night, I did the 20 minute workout at 273 watts. It went very well. Once again, my HR was a bit low for this intensity. It didn't feel like a huge effort. My next wattage workout is set for Wednesday night. I'll jump to 276 or 277.

In addition, last night, I extended my overall workout for greater effect. I did a 20 minute segment at 200 watts as a part of an overall 35 minute warmup.

I'm still shooting for the 300 watt mark as my 20 minute goal. Originally, I was hoping to achieve this before the beginning of June. I only have 4 more wattage workouts before the beginning of the month. So, at best, I'll be around 290 watts. It's still an achievable goal by Mid June. I'm not taking another rest break before I achieve the goal. Wish me luck.

Saturday Ride

I'm ready for the ibike to arrive! I'm tired of waiting. I sent an email to one of the guys at ibike sports. They replied with a notification that the power meter will be mailed out this week.

Why am I tired of waiting... becuase I felt like I worked my butt off Saturday and I don't have any data to show for it. We had a great ride across the bay and back. This week, we bought on credit. If you don't know what I mean, here's the explanation.

If you ride out with your back to the wind, it called "buying on credit". Why, because, you get the benefits immediately but you have to pay later!

Saturday, we paid becuase we had a great tail wind going across the bay. We were able to do 23-25 all the way across to Spanish Fort. The way back was fun but challenging. Mark and Kevin headed back a few minutes early. Others of us waited to talk to some other riders. Once we decided to head back, the chase was on! Mike B, Bubba and I worked hard into a headwind to catch Mark and Kevin. It took us about 5 miles at 21-22mph, but we did it. Once we regrouped, we stayed together all the way back to Mobile. Everyone is riding strong.

I would love to know the wattage for the ride, but....I don't have my power meter!

Coaching Services

It's time to take Gulf Coast Cycle Fit services to the next level. It's been a blast to work with so many cyclist over the last year. I've stayed in touch with many of you and I'm glad to know that you have been satisfied with the services that I've offered.

Now, it's time to step it up a bit. I'm adding coaching services to the list of offerings from Gulf Coast Cycle Fit. I've given a general list of services on the Training page of the www.gccyclefit.com website. If you have specific questions, please give me a call or send an email.

I'm limiting my coaching services to clients that are within driving distance to Mobile, AL. Many of the services I offer require that we meet in person. This isn't remote coaching. Also, I don't plan to overload with clients. I intend to limit load to 3-5 clients at an given time.

Power Training:
Power training is the way that training is going in the future. It's the purest way to know how you are performing. A great deal of my testing and training program is based on power training models. If you don't have access to a bike mounted power meter, we can approximate your power training program by using HR ranges.

1st day back to wattage training

Last night was tougher than I thought it was going to be. I decided to set the wattage to 270. That may have been a bit of a stretch for the 1st workout after rest week. But, I was able to achieve my goal of 23 minutes. Tonight, I'll step up the wattage to 273 and go at it again.

Last night, I noticed a significantly lower HR during warm up(10bpm lower). Once I started the higher intensity, my heart rate stayed in the mid 160's for about half the ride. I ended up stabilizing around 175 bpm. That's still lower than my LTH heart rate but the ride felt hard.

Prior to working out, I did 15 minutes on the Spinscan. My spinscan number continues to improve slowly. Over the last several weeks, it's increased from 72 to 76. It would be nice to have it in the 80's.

Looking forward into this training period. I'll be including longer durations of intensity as well as shorter intervals for quick power.

Rest week is over!

The Tuesday Rooster Ride was a stark reminder that rest week is over. Actually, it wasn't too bad. We kept a steady pace as we chased Scott all the way to the stop at the gas station. I'm not going to give him too much credit since he left the parking lot early to get a jump on everyone :). It was fun to try to reel him in.

I felt quite ready for this morning's ride. I had good mechanics for the entire ride. I did get gapped on the big hill. Thanks to Chad who helped me bridge up to Tim and Jay. After the break, we kept a steady pace on Howell's ferry and I got gapped once again. However, this time, I was able to bridge across to the lead group before turning to go home.

After the ride, I continue to feel fresh. No heavy legs!

I was able to catch a ride behind a cement truck for most of the way home. We were doing 37-40 mph all the way down Schillinger. Thanks to this, I was able to get home on time.

Tomorrow night, I return to prescribed power training. My next session is set for 267 watts. It's my goal to be able to do 300 watts for 20 minutes before my next rest week. Also, during the period, I'll be adding other intensities and durations. I need to retest my power profile so that I know my areas of strength and weakness.

Saturday rest day

Great ride, most of the ride, my heart rate was in the 130's-140's. I tried to ride smooth like I was on the rollers. On the hills, I tried to stay as still as possible while I pedaled.

My acute training load is coming down. I should be ready to start ramping up again starting next week.

Rest from Threshold training, no Laurels

Rest week is taking on a new meaning for me as I go. I still plan to maintain reduced intensity through next Tuesday. However there are gains to be had while my body is recovering from repeated Threshold training.

This week, I'm focusing on neuromuscular training. Part of this is on the rollers. I'm still keeping my HR in an active recovery mode. But the rollers give me the opportunity to work on my spin at various cadences. Also, I work on balance tasks to improve my bike handling skills.

Last night, I completed a 45 minute workout on the rollers. The intensity was low/moderate so my acute training load came down a bit. I keep track of my training load so that I can determine the needed exercise intensity as I go forward.

I'll probably ride Saturday morning. Most likely, it will be alone so I can work to keep my intensity low. This week it would be too easy to over do it.

Cycling is just about fitness. It's a skill sport! It's a sport is discipline. It's a thinking sport.

A couple years ago, I hear Phil Liggett describe cycling as a "30mph chess match". I think that describes it.

This is suppose to be rest week.

I'm not doing a very good job of resting.

A friend called yesterday. He wanted to get together for a ride this morning. I agreed with the intention of riding easy. As it turned out, we rode a bit farther away from my house than I intended. After he turned off to go home, I was still a long way from home. I had to turn up the heat to be able to get home with enough time to take care of the three S's and jump in the car to take the kids to school. I can tell that I've accumulated the exercise stress. My legs feel a bit weak. It's important that I spend the time to rest and recover.

As a result, my acute training load continues to rise a bit. Easy rides for the rest of the week!

I need to stay true to my schedule if I'm going to make the next jump in fitness.

I weight is continuing to drop, slowly. I was down to 174 this morning. I was 182 just 3 1/2 weeks ago. I stopped drinking caffenated drinks and primarily drink water. The first few days were tough to break the caffine addiction, but that is behind me now.

I've lapsed a bit on the nutritional side of things. Our family's morning schedule is tight. I haven't had time to eat a good breakfast like before. Also, I need to get back on the lunch plan. Dinner's have continued to go well.

Rest Week Rooster Ride

What a great ride. Today's Rooster Ride had a slightly different feel. It was a steady high pace. There were a couple breaks, but nothing serious. I got dropped a couple times on the hills but I was able to bridge back up once the road flattened out. I did better than expected on the Snow Rd. climb. However, it took everything out of me.

Yes, this is suppose to be rest week. I plan to ride easy the rest of the week. My next hard ride is planned for Next Tuesday.

Good Weekend Rides

I had a great weekend with great rides. Yesterday, I rode with the Saturday morning group. We rode a casual pace out to Presley Outing. On the way back, Paul and I rode a strong pace. We averaged 21-22 back home into a cross headwind. I felt strong for the entire ride.

Today, I rode alone for most of the ride. I focused on riding with my HR in the 140's-150's. I was able to ride anywhere between 19 and 21mph at these HR's. This HR zone falls somewhere between Endurance and Tempo levels.

Next week starts my first break from training at Threshold. Apart from Tuesday's Rooster Ride, I'll be riding at a rather low intensity. Here's my weeks plan:
Monday, Wednesday and Thursday nights: 1 hour + riding the rollers riding at about 150-180 watts.
Tuesday: Rooster Ride
Friday: Rest
Saturday: Group Road Ride

Next week, I'll get back to work on my critical power.

I'm still waiting on my ibike pro to arrive. Once it gets here, I'll have the opportunity to record my power for every ride. It's suppose to ship sometime the month.

It's all good

I can't believe the improvements that I've experienced over the last three weeks. Prescribed power training is the only way to train. It's predictable and it produces results. I've continued to see steady gains in my exercise tolerance. You have to understand, that these gains are coming at a time when I should be getting stronger. But, I think they have been accelerated because I have focuses on the right type of training.

Last night's workout was 275 watts. I was able to complete the 20 minutes and exceed it by 3 minutes. So, once again, I'm going to bump my next trainer workout up to 280 watts. Based on the critical power spreadsheet, I should only go up to 277. But, I've had good heart rate responses and I could have gone longer than 23 minutes at 275. My next power workout is scheduled for Sunday night.

Until then, I hope to get some roller time in this evening as a low intensity active recovery ride. Saturday, I plan to ride with the group at Lloyd's Lane. Hopefully, I can fit in some additional roller time over the weekend as well.

Power gains

I seemed to recover from the Rooster ride fairly quickly. I felt fresh all day yesterday. One of those days where you feel like you missed a ride.

I was ready to go for last nights Computrainer session. Based on my performance Sunday, I was spec'd to do a 267 watt effort. However, after feeling fresh following Tuesday's ride, I decided to bump up to 270 watts. It was a threshold that I wanted to cross.

Going into the warmup, I took some time to do some neuromuscular training for my legs. I noticed that my heart rate during the warm up was 4-5 beats lower than previous workouts. That's good because it means that my body is becoming more effective at lower intensities as well as high.

I was able to complete 23 minutes at 270!! It was a challenging workout but achievable. I'm going to increase my wattage to 275 for tonight's effort.

I've seen a huge benefit from this type of training. I know that I need to change things up in the next couple weeks. I need to move to shorter durations for a period to affect other energy systems.

Rooster ride

Not quite in the lead group today...but better. My performance has definitely improved with the wattage training. I was able to stay attached until the road turned up a bit. Today was the hardest that I have ridden all year and it felt good.

I set an intermediate goal for a CP20 of 300 watts. I'm only 32 watts away. I have training sessions scheduled for Wednesday and Thursday evening. This is my third week of prescribed wattage training. It's also the end of my first "period". Next week, I'll be changing things up a bit to give my muscles and joints a bit of a chance to catch up.

I'm very close to being ready to take on clients for coaching. Within the next few weeks, I should have everything in place to support 2-3 athletes. My coaching philosophy is going to be multifaceted. There are many aspects to training besides being told to ride harder and longer.

The threshold keeps going up

Since the last post, I completed a 262 and 265 watt workout. My next power workout is scheduled for Wednesday night. I'm on tap for 268 watts. It's been great to monitor my heart rate response. While my wattage keeps going up, my heart rate response has continued to be steady.

The results are there too. Saturday was a great ride. I was able to bridge to the lead group twice and stay with that group till the end. I can't wait for Tomorrow(Rooster Ride).