New Year's Day - 2011 Official Training Kickoff

Happy New Year and I hope that everyone has a great (and safe) 2011 cycling year.

Since the weather outside this New Year's day is raining and windy I will enter the pain cave to get some time in on the trainer with the typical intervals, but for a while I will change from my typical 20 minute intervals and go with 30 minute intervals for the next several months. There are a number of effective training philosophies on how to break up intervals in context of time, but if one were to review my posts from June 2010 to current day it may be noticed that I am focused on time at level more so than holding the intensity of upper threshold of level 4 for shorter time intervals.

From my perspective the metabolic adaptations chart shows the best bang for the buck somewhere between levels 3 and 4 called the sweet spot. I had a desire to enter a 10 mile time trial in February and I would consider a 30 minute finish to be suitable for my level at such an early time of the year and in comparison to the finishing results for Cat level racers it would be an average finish for Cat-5 & 4. Being that I do not race it would certainly be decent for me at this time of the year. But this is sort of the reason that I am bumping up from 20 minute intervals to 30 minute intervals because if I do the time trial I will need to sustain higher output power for 30 minutes straight and I want my legs to get used to it. By the way my last training session on the fluid trainer with 30 minute intervals in the sweet spot almost yielded the goal and that is why I may not do the time trial. As a note that I perform far better outside on pavement than on the trainer.

I am almost at the goal of this time trial and then I question, "why get distracted with the time trial?" I just need to keep my focus and keep going forward in building up sustainable power, but the time trial, if I am motivated to wake up early, will probably be a very cold morning.

My goal for 2011 is very simple. I plan to use this year to continue work on building my functional threshold and because I do not race I really do not need to focus on VO2 intervals this year. Along the way I will probably enter a few events for fun, such as, 3 State 3 Mountain in May and some other annual events, but all of these will be purely at the recreational level. I am not sure how my focus in training will put me for group rides, but I do hope that I can find a way to achieve both and be able to ride with my cycling friends.

Even if I cannot get outside for a ride today at least this season is starting off a little better than last year when I started the season with the flu and a respiratory illness. My 2010 season started with an illness and I had a CTL down in the 30's. 2011 starts today and I am better than twice on the CTL as a start for this year but I really want to get that CTL even higher. The more you train the more you can train as some have said. Of course one needs to consider all other things when thinking of that phrase.

I hope to stay healthy, keep my focus on the Lord, enjoy my friendship with my wife, work hard for my employer and keep trudging along trying to improve as a cyclist this year. My hope is that you too will have a great cycling year.