Riding, Giving, and Getting it all Back

What more can you ask for in a title...

Check out a local event happening on Saturday May 2nd for those in the Bay Area called "Ales and Trails"; benefiting IMBA so really for us mtber's out there its just giving back to yourself.

Guided rides, beer, BBQ, demoing, plenty of great sponsors, Dave Wiens the Leadville 100 legend will be there to provide tips and tricks on how to compete.

Plenty of swag with the registration fee; along with cool gear from Ergon, WTB, Smith Optics (my endorsed eyewear on the trail), Marin bikes, the crew from Paradigm Cycles in San Anselmo will be on hand (chance to talk tune-ups with some of the best in biz), and again all going to good cause "us the mountain bikers".

For those who haven't been to past events; it is well worth the price of admission; not just for the goodies; but the guided rides; advice given; and I can't say this again the proceeds go to the trails.

Thanks go out to the folks at HILRIDE for putting it together.

Putting myself to the test

A little void recently in the blogsphere for me; but it was for a good cause; been training and put to test some thoughts on warming up before a ride.

I know that this question has been posed before "How do you warm up before a ride"; there is plenty of information on the web; there is a structured warm-up that applies to TT and short criteriums; but I've had the question asked of me gave my opinion on what I thought the person should do'. Still I wanted to see how I felt and if my endurance was really different.

I planned for an hour ride on three separate days; the ride would be a high cadence and wattage output on flats/rolling hills; I wanted to hit and maintain my Lactate Threshold (LT) through out the ride.

So here was the plan; first ride I would do both an active/isolated stretch followed by a spin on the trainer for 20 minutes, second ride just stretch, third ride I would do cold with a slow start up. I wanted to gauge my performance and see what worked and what doesn't.

The first warm up I did a set of active stretches for about 10 minutes followed by a 20 minutes on the trainer which is considered to be a endurance/steadystate (SS) warm-up

10 minutes Tempo, 75-85rpm

· 1 minutes Recovery

· 4 minutes ramping SteadyState 90-95rpm at or just below lactate threshold

· 30 seconds Recovery

· 2 minutes PowerIntervals, 105rpm

· 30 seconds Recovery

· 2 minutes PowerIntervals, 105rpm

I started the ride at around 80rpm; and quickly got up to 95rpm and maintained around 95-105rpm a around 300W of output. Legs felt good; there was a burn after the warm-up to be expected; but I didn't feel fatigue nor any soreness in my legs during the ride. Went hard for about an hour; again rolling hills and flat; after I finished the ride; stretched; legs felt good. Next morning; no residual. More importantly I didn't feel fatigue in the legs starting up; nor did I feel that they gave out during the ride; and I did close to 25 miles.

I gave it a day in between; did my stretches; all active isolated; got on the bike and started down the road; same route. Legs felt cold; which was to be expected; I didn't get as much as I wanted out of the ride as the first time; did closer to 21 - 22 miles. Legs felt fatigued the next day though; which became a recovery day.

Third ride; no stretch; cold ride; started slow; low cadence; slow peddle; did some single leg warm ups to get loose. Definitely a completely different ride then the other two; more time taken to warm up the legs; didn't get as much out of them; as the hour was winding down; my legs were finally feeling good. Not as much fatigue the next day though; but I did closer to 20 miles; and didn't get as much wattage out of the legs much closer to 250 - 260; big drop.

This type of interval I found is great for short rides; preparing for crits or TTs; on longer rides (2h>); probably not an issue as you don't want to fatigue the legs early on.