Week 3 Summary/Week 4 plan

So due to relatives being here from Monday-Sunday this week, I didn't get my full goal in. It was time well spent with family though, so it was much worth it.

Week 3 Total: 12/16.5 hours

Running Deficit: 4.5 hours

Week 4 Goal = 18 hours

This is gonna be tough, and but it may be possible. The deficit will have to be made up over the Christmas break.

Saturday - Long Ride to Cape Ann

Today I rode around Cape Ann for the first time. It was a long journey, but one well worth it. I burned about 2500 calories, and stopped to take in food a few times. Lunch was a massive cheese steak with pepper, onions, and mushrooms. And a big M&M cookie.

Cape Ann is beautiful, and there are so many unique things about the communities that you ride through. I went through Beverly, Manchester-by-the-Sea, Gloucester, and Rockport. Little unique shopping areas with cafes and local restaurants. The concrete was decent, but there was some traffic almost the whole way. I went 89 miles total.

The Pic is me next to the Fisherman's memorial in Gloucester, MA. It is a monument to the brave souls who bring us fish from the ocean every day. Its the most dangerous job, so this is well-justified.

Ride time: 6.5 hours - long-ass base ride
Feeling: 90%
Post Ride Food: More Thanksgiving leftovers.
Sleep: 8 hours - ok quality...dog keeps waking me up in the night

Week Progress: 12/16.5 hours

Thanksgiving Day Ride to Nahant and Salem

Ride time: 3 hours + 1 school commute
Entertainment: Nothing. Just the wind in my face. Good time to think.
Feeling: 100%
Post Ride Food: Thanksgiving food! Sweet potato casserole, turkey, ham, green bean casserole, broccoli casserole, cranberry sauce.
Sleep: 8 hours

Week Progress: 5.5/16.5 hours

Tuesday - Roller Session with Jack Bauer

Jack Bauer is my hero (on days when I have no respect for international law). Today is one of those days. He is currently in exile in some unnamed African country, where child soldiers are being conscripted for a coup attempt. Of course, he manages to ... (sorry I can't spoil the plot of the new season-opener of 24).

But to quote our dear president, with Jack Bauer it's always a "kick-ass, skull-crushing war".

Ride time: 2 hours
TV Movie: 24 Season Opener - 2 Hour Special.
Feeling: 100%
Post Ride Food: sugar milk and a Banana and a special cranberry muffin from my lovely wife
Sleep: 8 hours

Week Progress: 2/16.5 hours

Sunday and Monday Rest Days

More rest days due to massive amounts of work at school and home prepping for the holidays.

Peace out,
Michael

Week 2 Summary/Week 3 plan

7.5/15 hours completed this week...Only 200.5 Hours Left!

So week three has a target of 9 or 20 hours depending on the time allowable by the thanksgiving activities. I will choose a target of 9 + 7.5 to make up my deficit from the last week.

I am planning on doing a Century this Friday (Pending wife permission) so a big chunk of hours will come Friday and Saturday.

Week 3 Target: 16.5 Hours

Michael

Friday Morning Indoor Ride

Now back in Boston, I rode inside on the rollers for 1.5 hours on Friday Morning. It was damn cold outside. Like 23degF this morning. I am not likely to get in the hours this week since I won't be able to ride the whole weekend, due to a trip to NYC for the Wicked musical, and prepping for the in-laws on Sunday.

Week Progess: 7.5/15 hours

Thursday Hotel Base Ride

So I did find the time to get in a final 2 hour session before heading off back home. Then I went to see my friend Rosemary and her boyfriend Keith. We went to PF Chang's and had a good dinner, then of to Reagan for a flight.

Ride time: 2 hours
Music: More Radiohead and The Mars Volta (its all I had on my mp3 player this week)
Feeling: 10%
Food: more bananas courtesy of the $18 hotel gym
Sleep: 8.5 hours

Week Progess: 6/15 hours

Michael

Wednesday - More of the Same

Except today I started reading Thomas Friedman's Hot, Flat, and Crowded while riding and listening to good music.

Ride time: 2 hours
Music: I listened to Radiohead and The Mars Volta
Feeling: 95%
Food: free apples and bananas courtesy of the $18 hotel gym
Sleep: 6.5 hours

Week Progess: 4/15 hours

Tuesday - Hotel Gym with Shitty Excercise Bike

So as I suspected, there was indeed a shitty exercise bike available for me to ride on in the gym here at the hotel. And guess what? They even let me ride on it for the whole week for only $18. Isn't that a steal? But seriously, I have never paid for a hotel gym before, but this hotel is pretty nice so you get to pay extra for everything.

Ride time: I rode for 2 hours in the sweat with minimal air circulation. Not fun, but doable.
Music: I listened to Radiohead and The Mars Volta
Feeling: 100%
Food: free apples and bananas courtesy of the $18 hotel gym
Sleep: 8 hours

Week Progess: 2/15 hours

Sunday and Monday Rest Days

So I traveled to DC yesterday after helping with the dishes the whole morning. Then I got to the conference and had drinks and food for about 4 or 5 hours, so the riding didn't exactly happen.

The Monday was hella busy with the GHGT9 conference and a reception/dinner thing sponsored by HTC PureEnergy and University of Regina (Saskatchewan). But I am getting to go to sleep early for riding in the morning.

Regards, Michael

Week 1 Summary - Week 2 Targets

12/12 hours completed! Only 208 Hours Left!

So for week two I have 15 hours as the target. This may be difficult since I am in DC for a conference the whole week. I am sure the shitty exercise bike in the hotel gym will be there, and I am not looking forward to it.

Michael

No More Excuses...the testing results interpretation

Based on my VO2 max, I have the capability to become at least a Cat 2 racer and could train up to elite levels with the right training. This number could increase slightly but not by very much since it is mostly a genetic characteristic. Thanks Mom and Dad!

Based on the LT numbers I am now in the range of a Cat 3 racer (which is very odd since I had trouble with placing top 5 in Cat 4 races). This is from the ranges in the book Training and Racing with a Power Meter by Allen and Coggan.

So this is great! but it also kind of sucks. Now I have no more excuses for doing badly in races.

Despite this, it is quite motivating for my training over this winter to know that I have the potential to be fast. Now I just have to keep riding and knock out those hours one by one until the final count is 220 in February. Hey maybe I can go to Nationals this year?

VO2 Max and Lactate Threshold testing

So I went to get tested at Blackstone Valley Human Performance for VO2 max and lactate threshold (LT). The first test is a maximum effort test to determine oxygen my body can process. The second test is to find out at what submaximal effort level my body begins to build blood lactaten at an unsustainable level.

I took MIT cycling team friends Alex and Amy, and they had the same tests done. We will likely begin a team partnership with this lab since they have offered us a 25% discount for the team.

The Results:
VO2 Max- 67.6 ml O2/kg/min at max 200 bpm HR
Aerobic Threshold- 205 W with 165 bpm HR
Lactate/Anaerobic Threshold- 235 W with178 bpm HR

Raw Results PDF

My new HR Zones:
I 116-144 bpm
II 146-157 bpm
III 158-166 bpm
IV 167-176 bpm
V 178-187 bpm
VI 189-max bpm

New Power Zones:
I 129 watts
II 129-176 watts
III 178-213 watts
IV 214-249 watts
V 249-284 watts
VI 282-317 watts

Thursday Base Ride with Steve McQueen

Today I did a nice indoor 1.5 hour base ride while watching the movie The Magnificent Seven with Steve McQueen and Charles Bronson. Those are some tough guys; I wonder if they are bad asses in real life too. Here is the description:

"Impressive Western version of Kurosawa's "The Seven Samurai," about gunmen hired to rid a town of bandits. Yul Brynner, Steve McQueen, Horst Buchholz, Eli Wallach. O'Reilly: Charles Bronson. Lee: Robert Vaughn. Britt: James Coburn. Elmer Bernstein score. John Sturges directed."

That's interesting it is a take on a Kurosawa film.

Ride Time: 1.5 Hours+ 1 school commute
Intensity: base - around 180W average today at 155bpm
Weather: Chilly and cloudy - 45degF and windy
Feeling: 100% Finally

Hours this Week: 10.75
Goal this week: 12

Wednesday Rest Day

Dinner and drink with the wife at "The Field", an irish pub in Central Square Cambridge. Home and to sleep early.

Feeling: Almost 100% again

Tuesday X-Pot Road Course Preview

So MIT is doing a road race weekend this spring, and I went with Eric and Keith to check out the course. The course looks good, but the road is really skinny at certain points, and we are worried about cars and safety a bit more now than we were. Some consultation with the Northeast Bicycle Racing Association and the Harvard and Bolton Police department is in order.

I drove out to Harvard since I didn't need to do an 80 mile hard ride today. I met the the other two guys at a diner where we I got a coffee, a pumpkin muffin, and an egg sandwich. It was less a diner, and more an old country store with a food counter. Pretty neat.

Ride Time: 2 Hours+ 1 school commute
Intensity: base + some climbing
Weather: Chilly and cloudy - 45degF and windy
Feeling: 90% - Feeling better every day. Must sleep well tonight

Hours this Week: 8.5
Goal this week: 12

Monday Recovery

Today I am recovering from Sundays long ride. I rode around town at an easy pace to run errands, and will do a longer ride Tuesday.

Total Week 1: 6 hours
Goal Week 1: 12 hours

Sunday Advanced Road Skills Clinic

Today's Event:On Sunday we met up for a beautiful day to do a skills clinic with our Coach Nicole Freedman. We went over racing in a crosswind, echelon formation, pack skills, attacking, defending against attacks, blocking, and hill climbing. We rode out to the mock race course in Dover, MA for this clinic. The cars and cops were rather aggressive today.

Fun fun, but I am dead tired.

Ride time: 4 hours
Feeling: 80% - not so great due to coming off cold. I sat out of some of the harder efforts.
Effort level: Mostly sub-threshold, but not base level.

Hours this week: 5.5

Saturday training

Length: 1.5 Hours
Type: Indoor on Rollers
Occupation: Alabama versus LSU football
Feeling: 90% - Still coming off a series of illnesses. 1 more week until any intensity, but base is starting anyway.

Highlights:

• Today I got to use my new PowerTap SL 2.4 wheelset so I can read power output.
• My average HR was around 163 and my power was around 125 watts.
  

Start of Base Training 2009

Tomorrow, November 9th, the MIT Cycling Team is officially starting base training for the 2009 collegiate road season. My goal is to get in 220 hours by mid-February if I hope to go to Nationals. This blog will serve as my training log for the next season.

Base training means doing nearly all of my riding at a low intensity Zone 2 level. This helps (taken from our team training guide):

To improve your cardio-respiratory system (i.e increase the amount of blood and oxygen your heart and lungs can push per beat.)
2. Increase the mitochondrial density of your blood capillaries in your legs.
3. Build slow-twitch muscular strength.
4. Basically, build as much of an aerobic base as you can so you can withstand as many anaerobic days as possible.

I only logged about 120 hours last year, and I did improve a great deal over last year, but I am sure that if I actually do the whole base then I can maybe race Bs or As then possibly go to Collegiate Road Nationals in Kansas next May.

Hope you enjoy it...